YEah, that is not a supportable claim. Probably the appliance dealer was speaking colloquially. In any case the federal standard changes pretty regularly, resulting in an erratic dropping of electric consumption requirements.

There are plenty of buttons on the washer (which is a user-interface nightmare of its own). Two help a little: 'Heavy Duty' and 'Extra Rinse'. Selecting both leaves the clothes smelling slightly less of sweat and dirt. And of course when the cycle completes, it turns off to save (miniscule) power. Turning it on results in the default settings again!

Googling it, I see no hack to defeat the settings. Just a lot of talk about strange error codes and how to reset them. Sigh.

OK, I'm curious what kind of model you have. Is it a top or front loaded?

Mine (front loaded) has a pre-wash (2 hour program) or "soaking" mode for extra dirty clothes (4h), and I can select temperatures from 0-90 degrees celsius, but most clothes get clean at 40 degrees.

I had to do an obscure button trick described in the user manual to have it remember the previous settings after a completed cycle, though.

Not in the laundry room right now, but its from Sears, top-loaded (cramped laundry room doesn't permit front-loading), all electronic, has no agitator(!) and is a piece of junk.

Maybe I can find a trick in the manual; thanks for that idea.

OK. I think the lack of an agitator might be the reason for the poor performance, rather than energy or water conservation (unless your washing machine is a top-loaded rotating drum type, since they work the same way as front loaders).

Are we hackers? There must be a way to do a firmware upgrade. Jailbreak your washer! ;-)