It's lightweight and work's like it should be. Now, haven't needed to use the defroster, or the temp probe, yet. But, the temp probe should work just fine, and never cared to defrost anything with the microwave, or anything like that. I have always done it the old fashioned way, by using the water soaking trick, or when cookin meat for pasta sauce's, just dumped it in the pan, and cooked it, as it defrosted. But, for the price, and how it is pretty efficient, and the heater core is obviously much lighter than the older version's are, by almost half the weight. The ceramic pot itself, is slightly lighter, as well, but not by much. But, it hasn't burned anything, even though, I have only made thing's, like chili, or soup's in it. So, I would recommend it, if you can afford it, and what you see in the picture, is what you get, as there is no storage cover, but if you have an older one, that is basically the same size, you can use the old cover for it, when you store it. It got only 4 star's, simply because it doesn't have a manual digital temperature control for it. Which, that is what I loved about our old one, as I could set the temperature to an actual precise temperature, instead of just "warm/low/hot", and the warm setting, does work well, with keeping it warm, without burning it, even chili...