The Farberware FMO07ABTBKA was not perfect in our tests, but it was quite good, and the price was nice. We found it for less than $70 on some sites. At only 0.7 cubic feet, this is tied for being the best compact microwave we tested. Things did seem a little tight on some tests, but if you just use your microwave to heat up individual portions, it will work fine. This might not be the best if you prepare large family meals in the microwave.
The FMO07ABTBKA tied for second-best on the potato test. It produced a thoroughly-cooked finished potato and it did that when using the Potato button. That was not the case with some microwaves, which produced uneven results when using their Potato option. This one struggled quite a bit with popcorn. It had almost the most unpopped kernels at the end. It did much better on the second round, though, popping more of the bag and producing no overdone spots.
The results were not stellar when we tested heat consistency with pizza rolls. The pizza rolls on one side of its tray were about 15 degrees hotter than on the other. That's not great, but some microwaves did much worse – some with more than a 50-degree difference from one side of the tray to the other.
There is a decent selection of cooking options with the FMO07ABTBKA. You get presets for popcorn, potato, pizza, frozen vegetables, beverages, and dinner plates. You can also use the six express options and cook for between one and six minutes with the touch of one button. This is not one of the microwaves that will sense the moisture levels and adjust cooking times automatically, but it does have a memory button for saving often-used settings. For instance, if you often cook something at 80% power for 2 minutes and 10 seconds, you can avoid inputting those time and power level settings every time. You can save that setting and push one button.
Aside from the cooking options you can defrost by time or by weight with this microwave. A keypad lock will keep the kids from accessing any of the features.
This microwave is lackluster in terms of its warranty. There is just one year of coverage on all parts. That is not as impressive as the ones that guarantee at least their magnetrons for more time. Since this one represents less of an investment overall, that is a little less troubling.
The FMO07ABTBKA has just 700 watts and that is the lowest of all the ones we tested. It really wasn't noticeable during our testing, or at least we couldn't directly connect a weaker performance to the lower wattage. Other microwaves of the same wattage had their own unique scores for everything and they outscored the units with more watts on some tasks. That’s not to say that you may desire a more powerful microwave during some cooking tasks.
The Farberware FMO07ABTBKA ties for the smallest size and lowest wattage of all the microwaves we compared. It has a very small pricetag to match, and we found it to be competitive, even if not perfect, during our testing. It cooked our test food thoroughly and evenly for the most part. If you plan to use your microwave for preparing large quantities of food, this is not the best option, but it will heat up individual portions fine and for less than $70.
