So I read the manual, played around with it, and came to the conclusion that yes it is a big appliance (for a rice cooker anyway) BUT it is great.  The digital screen will take you through the cleaning steps or cooking steps if you lose your manual.  It comes with a recipes book too. This cooked my steel milled oats beautifully! I will say, it took some adjustments to get used to the cooking steps and how to override the scale. Other than a learning curve: it is perfect.