Magic Chef MCB17CHB 1.7 Cu Ft Retro Beverage Cooler, Black

The Magic Chef MCB17CHB is a retro-styled beverage cooler that holds up to 68 cans or 16 bottles in a 1.7 cubic foot cabinet. It's the kind of unit that looks right in a galley, a dockside cabin, a cockpit bar, or the corner of an RV. Behind the tinted double-pane glass door, a soft blue LED lights up your drinks. And the whole thing runs off standard 115-volt AC power.

Here's the first thing to know. This is a 115-volt appliance, not a 12-volt one. So it's built for shore power at the dock, an inverter that can carry the load, or genset power. If you're looking for something that runs straight off the house bank while you're on the hook, this isn't that unit. But if your boat spends nights at the slip, or you've got a cabin, garage, or trailer with a standard outlet, it plugs right in with the 59-inch cord and gets to work.

Capacity is the whole point of a beverage cooler, and 1.7 cubic feet goes further than you'd think. Magic Chef rates it at 68 cans or 16 bottles. In the real world you'll rarely load it one way or the other. Two removable chrome wire shelves let you split the space, so you can stand a row of bottles up top and stack cans below, or pull a shelf entirely and drop in a couple of growlers. The shelves come out for cleaning too, which matters more than people expect once a can of something sticky lets go.

The look is retro, and it's the reason a lot of folks pick this one. Gloss-black cabinet, chrome trim, a rounded handle, and that tinted glass door with the blue interior light. It reads as a piece of furniture, not an appliance. That double-pane glass isn't just for show either. It cuts down on condensation on the outside of the door and helps the cooler hold temperature when the room warms up. Adjustable temperature is handled by a simple control knob, so you dial it warmer for a mix of sodas and water or colder if it's mostly canned beer you're keeping frosty.

Think of it as a dedicated drink fridge rather than a wine cellar. It'll chill wine, beer, soda, water, and sparkling anything, and it does a nice job keeping a party's worth of cans cold without you cramming them into the main galley fridge. Because it's a single-zone cooler, everything inside runs at the temperature you set on the knob, so group your bottles and cans by how cold you like them and you're set.

A couple of honest notes on what this is and isn't. There's no ice maker and no separate freezer compartment, so this is a single-compartment beverage chiller, full stop. It won't make ice and it won't keep frozen food. It's freestanding, which means it wants a little breathing room. Give it a few inches of clearance around the back and sides so it can shed heat, and keep it out of direct sun if you can. After you move it, let it stand upright for a few hours before you power it up. That's standard practice for any cooler that's been tipped or transported, and it lets everything settle.

Sizing-wise, it's 19.3 inches tall, 17-1/2 inches wide, and 19 inches deep, so measure your nook before you commit. It slides nicely under a lot of galley counters and into RV cabinetry, but that 19-inch depth is the number that trips people up, so check it. For a dock boat, a lake cabin, a shop, or a game room, the MCB17CHB is a straightforward, good-looking way to keep 68 cold ones within arm's reach. And if you've got questions about whether your inverter can carry it, give us a call. We're happy to talk it through.