I tried my 3" pasta cooker last night. It did work.
At 11 1/2 " tall mine holds about 44 oz. of water. It was 38 degrees and my Harbor Freight (6000 BTU) single burner stove the cold water came to a rolling boil in about 6 minutes. I poured it in with 1# of el cheapo brand spaghetti. At
8 minutes the tops were al dente. The bottoms of the... strands were stuck together and "crunchy" in the middle- you have to stir or shake a time or two. After another two minutes the bottoms were OK. If I had stirred, 8 minutes would have been OK.
It was pretty starchy (or "sticky/ slimy" if you prefer). I'm going to guess that the $29.95 TV version comes with instructions that include:
1. "Preheat the tube with hot tapwater." That would certainly help in cooking.
2. And something like, "For even better results..." or, "For a healthier, lower starch..." change the water in the tube halfway through the cooking process.
3. Or maybe a blunt, "Rinse the spaghetti before serving."
If you change the water you loose much of the convience. But cleanup was easier since no heat was applied to the pan with starch
in the water. My little burner would, during the summer, bring water to a boil fast enough to work (you thought that extra information was padding- didn't you?). During the winter I'd need a fire or a much larger or two burner stove to work. Another of the advantages was simplicity- as in one burner for sketti AND gravy. At home you could rinse in hot tapwater and "beep/ nuke" it after adding the sauce.
Higher quality pasta might help too. I intentionally chose the cheapest I could find.
Worth it? Not at the cost of an Earl Schieb paint job... but for the cost of PVC... yeah.
Some other adventurous soul will have compare the merits of spaghetti tubes vs. cooking pots as bear defense weapons!
Bob