I have a previous generation Bosch 500 series dishwasher. For my use case I get the best results with the heavy cycle. However I found that adding loose detergent in there for the "prewash" resulted in soapy residue being left on the dishes if used in conjunction with the heavy cycle (but not with the normal and auto cycles).
Alec's dishwasher videos are based on some rather primitive dishwashers. For instance he talks about his test unit not flushing out the spray arms, but Bosch/Siemens filters the water going to the spray arms so it wouldn't recirculate dirty water anyways. Same deal with the prewash. Bosch uses a turbidity sensor to determine how many "prewash" cycles to run and when to reuse the water, something his test unit very clearly does not.
Yeah, I think one has to understand the man to really get something useful of what he says.
He is kind of a cheap man and much of what he says really applies to low-end devices. Some expensive devices may have similar problems to the cheaper stuff but really if you buy a premium device you won't have many of the problem he talk about.
I know this type of person very well. They always have some reductionist approach to things, where for them, the expensive stuff is mostly marketing with added bells-and-whistles and largely works the same.
My experience is that this isn't quite right. Some brands do have a premium that is more related to style/status but if you buy some seriously engineered stuff it will work much better most of the time.
He's a midwesterner so some of that's to be expected. But AFAIK KitchenAid is one of the higher end Whirlpool brands. I just checked the orange big box store and the price difference between the KitchenAid dishwasher lineup and that of the Bosch 300/500 series comes down to what's currently on sale.
For reference I'm pretty cheap too but try to be pragmatic. My fridge is a $600 Frigidaire (AEG/Electrolux) top freezer unit. The main selling point was that another youtuber (an appliance repair guy by trade) pointed out that it still has a mechanical timer. They get mocked by appliance sales droids but the top freezer design is significantly more efficient than the alternatives and the lack of electronics mean that you're more likely to be able to repair it.
I don't know enough about US states subculture to infer that, it's just the opinion I formed watching him.
I agree that KitechnAid is more on the higher-end side, he even said himself that it's kind of a premium device. It doesn't surprise me, because at some point in your life you want to stop with the frugality shenanigans and just want stuff to work if you can afford them.
To be clear that's not a critic, I tend to be as cheap as can be reasonable as well, it's generally a decent way to proceed, to avoid overpaying for useless over-marketed, over-engineered stuff.
I'm just trying to give some context but I think we are in agreement anyway and I do believe anyone who watches him long enough will get the gist of it at some point.
Alec's dishwasher videos are based on some rather primitive dishwashers. For instance he talks about his test unit not flushing out the spray arms, but Bosch/Siemens filters the water going to the spray arms so it wouldn't recirculate dirty water anyways. Same deal with the prewash. Bosch uses a turbidity sensor to determine how many "prewash" cycles to run and when to reuse the water, something his test unit very clearly does not.