Where can I buy a dumb dishwasher?!
THIS!
People who pontificate (or allegedly research) ‘facts’ about whether to pre-rinse, all fail to declare their assumptions about how long between using things and putting things in the dishwasher, and how long between putting things in the dishwasher and then switching it on.
There is a world of difference between lightly soiled crockery put in immediately the last mouthful was eaten and the machine switched on immediately thereafter, and heavily soiled dishes left on the side for a few hours while the evening’s entertainment proceeds, and which are put into a machine that takes 3-4 days to fully load before switching it on is gotten around to.
So, less with the “here’s why you should or shouldn’t” and more with the “YMMV depending on…”
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If I don’t wash the dishes before the dishwasher, I don’t get clean dishes. That’s just a fact.
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Had half a dozen or more dishwashers over the years and the idea of plastic innards seems to me to be simply asking for trouble. Ever smelt the inside of a tupperware cupboard full of old plastic containers? I know these may be different plastic formulations, but the stuff is not inert - well, not as inert as a stainless interior, I’d hazard as a guess.
I hear you, but when it comes with the place…yeah.
I do clean it with a good load of citric acid every few months. Seems to work well.
Its replacement will hace a stainless inside.
Dish washing detergents. Particularly powdered or puck style. Are designed to work abrasively as well. Some of the grains in there take longer to dissolve that others, and they get sprayed around the interior along with the water jets effectively sand blasting crud off the plates. As the clean cycle goes they dissolve away, disappearing with the rinse cycle.
Its part of why certain things aren’t dishwasher safe, its one of the most commonly cited reasons to avoid putting kitchen knives in there. And why the logos on, say a beer pint glass, chip and fade off pretty fast at home when they last months or years at the bar. I’ve had issues with aging dishwashers where they weren’t able to rinse away or fully dissolve those gritty bits. Dishes came out covered in tiny, sand like white specs. And they get pretty gooey/mushy if you let em sit. Even longer and they’ll set like concrete.
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I have that same brand! Thanks, Ryan Homes!
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Dishwasher detergent doesn’t work any more, since the formulations changed. You used to be able to get commercial detergent, but even that’s useless now. There is a certain chemical you can buy cheaply and add to the cycle to get perfectly sparkling dishes.
:raises hand:
Trisodium phosphate?
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THIS! The article does in no way take into account the repair and maintenance costs involved with not rinsing your dishes. Where’s the journalistic integrity!? 
To my knowledge commercial detergents haven’t changed too much. Same brands, with the same contents when I started in the restaurant business in the 90’s and when I left around 2 years ago. And that stuff won’t (or wouldn’t) work in your home machine. Or at least not very well, or not without pre-washing the dishes. Because commercial dish washers work on raw water pressure. Everything is scraped off and sprayed down with a high pressure, high heat hose before it even enters the machine. Things run at much, much higher pressure and higher temp than home machines.
If you’re bitching about the removal of phosphates. They were pretty much voluntarily removed from detergents by the 90’s, and they aren’t even technically banned in most of the US right now. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a commercial detergent in a restaurant that wasn’t labeled “phosphate free”.
And given what they did to the wetlands around here. Well good riddance. Stuff is basically fertilizer, lota dead marshes around here and a lot of baymen put out of work from this kind of shit. Only starting to come back the last decade or so.
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#lifehacks 
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Clearly they don’t have water meters!
my dog does all the pre-rinsing in this house.
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it’s the pacific rim of cultures
I say flanges man…
I have asked my dad this many times over the years, but he still insists on washing up everything until it’s clean enough to eat off, before he puts it in the dishwasher. We’ve shown him many times over the years that as long as there’s not loads of food on the plate, and it’s not dried on, the dishwasher will wash it just fine, but the stubborn old sod won’t do it any other way. We all just leave him to his foibles now.
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Have you tried turning the dishwasher on and letting it run through its cycle before taking the dishes out again? 
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KipTW meet Elladan, Elladan meet KipTW
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Here in Norway, on our state broadcaster NRK, run a series digging into consumer issues. Last fall they did a show on dishwashers. And as I recall it the conclusion was: Always rinse the dishes before putting them in, and never use the auto/eco programme for it. The amount of bacteria left on your dishes if you do is staggering, up to 30X accepted levels for the worst detergents. But water saving is not really a hot issue in Norway, since half of the earths low pressure fronts come here to die
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