I have a high efficiency dishwasher and the recommendation is that you use special detergent and use a cleaner especially meant for dishwashers every once in a while. If it is so inefficient that it doesn't clean itself, how can it clean the dishes....truly it doesn't clean nearly as well as my old one and I have to wash on high temp, heavy duty, to get them reasonably clean and run some things twice...efficient??? I don't think so! I do use Lemishine which helps to keep the water spots at bay.