A Review of the Oral-B SmartSeries 5000 Professional Care Tooth Brush

Today I received the Oral-B Professional Care SmartSeries 5000 Tooth Brush to review. For the next week I will experience what it means to use a tooth brush that retails for $159 (now $120) . For that price I am expecting something close to nirvana for my mouth. I can't wait to begin.

The OOB Experience

There are two important parts - the handle and the wireless SmartGuide. The handle comes in a hard blue case for travel. There is a charger and some brush heads. Mine came with two heads but apparently there are other brush heads that can be purchased separately. There were two batteries loose in the box and a yellow piece of something. Reading the first page of the instructions I couldn't figure out what it is. The handle is attractive and felt well balanced in my hand. When I plugged it into the charger, I couldn't figure out if it was working or not. I had to search further into the instructions to learn that there was an indicator on the front of the handle, which might not respond for 15 minutes. When I checked back it was working but hard to read. It was very dark and I had to actually pick up the unit while it was charging to read it. The SmartGuide was much harder to set up. There was a cover on it which I had trouble removing because I thought it was the back for the batteries and needed to slide off. After fighting with it for 15 minutes and almost giving up it just came off and I realized it was the attachment for the wall. The yellow thing was a piece of double faced tape to attach to it. When I opened the battery compartment there were two batteries already inside - apparently totally dead. I replaced them easily with the extras included and the unit automatically turned on. On the back are two extremely small buttons to set the timer. I had to press with my finger nail, which kept slipping off as I tried to see the image on the front. There was no reason I could see that these buttons needed to be so small or in the back of the unit. I was frustrated and annoyed by the time I got the brush and the timer set up.

DAY 1

Because of the lighting in my bathroom I had trouble reading the SmartGuide so I had to move it around a lot. I have not yet attached it to the wall. When I took the brushes out of the package they were not marked, so in the future I won't know which brush is which. But today I used the Pro White brush. Once you press the button the unit goes by itself, stopping every 30 seconds to remind you to move to the next quadrant. The SmartGuide also shows that. At the end of a minute I got a smiley face and at the end of 2 minutes I got a wink. I brushed for an additional minute to see what would happen, but I guess a wink is as good as it gets. The brush fit comfortably in my hand, and cleaned nicely and was gentle on my gums.

DAY 2

I used the same head today and again found it to be very gentle on my gums. I'm diabetic and my gums bleed easily and most electric toothbrushes irritate my gums a lot. So this is very nice. My teeth feel very clean, but I have been using a manual tooth brush and clearly an electric works better. After 30 seconds the brush hesitates letting you know you need to move to the next quadrant. The SmartGuide shows you that too. So I closed my eyes to see if the hesitation would be sufficient to move me on and it was. I'm wishing I had the other heads to test.

DAY 3

Ok I know the tooth brush cleans well, but this SmartGuide is truly a waste. Here are the suggestions I now have for some changes to the tooth brush and the SmartGuide.

• The contrast needs to be changed to make both the brush and the SmartGuide easier to read.
• The 30 second hesitation needs to be more defined or even turned into a beep.
• I really don't need a Wi-Fi to tell me when to change my quadrants. It would have been far more valuable if it told me which teeth I had actually missed or didn't spend enough time on.
• If the holder has a space for 4 heads, at this price there should have been four heads included. Or since those are special heads which would not be right for everyone, then two sets of brushes should be included so two people could use the brush.

DAY 4

I really like the toothbrush. The plaque is definitely going away and my teeth feel very clean. The SmartGuide is not gaining my favor.

DAY 5

I didn't even look at the SmartGuide.

DAY 6

Apparently up to now I've been using the wrong head with the wrong setting. So today I put the Floss Action head in and used the everyday deep cleaning setting. Maybe I'm just used to the Whitening brush, but I like it better. It seems gentler. At this point about 90 percent of the plaque around my teeth seems to be gone.

DAY 7

Today I used all of the brushing modes which are supposed to address varying oral care needs. Icons appear on the SmartGuide to show you the different modes. As with the rest of the display, the icons are hard to see and are only pictures with no words. They are good displays of what they do, but I would still like to have words under the icon.

So, whats the verdict?

I have used the Oral-B for one week every day. My teeth feel clean and look great. My gums feel healthy and are not sore. Toothbrushes are supposed to get your teeth and gums clean and keep them healthy. This toothbrush does that very well. I intend to keep using it.

The SmartGuide is another thing entirely. From the frustration I experienced when getting it out of the box, to the problems seeing the display in my bathroom light, to the really limited info it gives, I have found no redeeming features of this addition. Sure, it's kind of cute to have a WiFi'd tooth brush. But that's where it ended for me. If you want this to have any value at all, fix the display and have it indicate which teeth have been missed while brushing. Moms would like that and kids will think the Wi-Fi is cool. The tooth brush heads and the icons need to be labeled. As a psychotherapist I have to remember things for a living, but there is no way I will ever remember which head is which, or what those icons do. Even with those fixes I still would not use the SmartGuide.

Love the tooth brush - hate the SmartGuide!