Having been to too many all-inclusives to count...and about 20 different Riu properties...this was my first visit to the Riu Palace Aruba and first visit to Aruba in over 10 years. Here is a breakdown on my thoughts about the property/visit:

Overall Physical-
In typical Riu fashion, the lobby and physical structure of the resort are quite elegant. In my opinion, it's the most "grand" looking resort on the island and probably has the nicest lobby (well, the Hyatt with it's minimalist feel is very nice also). Everything seemed to be in rather good shape considering that the resort has now been open a couple of years.....only issue we had was that one of the elevators was down for 3 days during our stay....making trips up/down from the room rather lengthy at peak times.

Room -
We had a jr. suite oceanfront room and they are good size and relatively modern in design...no fancy flat-screen TV...and we received 2 queen beds pushed together for a monster bed....but suprisingly as with normal pushed together situations...the bed was actually comfortable...even if you could get lost in it. Bathroom was clean and still looked relatively new. Balcony view (Room 816) was perfect....no issues with the new larger electronic safes....all in all, no complaints...what you expect from a RIU.

Food -
Although very subject to each individual, we found the food somewhat disappointing...however most of the people we spoke with enjoyed it.

Breakfast buffet is large with some extras not found at other properties (bagels & lox, waffles, varied pancakes, nice cheese selection, fresh squeezed juice, etc.), we found that the service during breakfast was awful....it was basically self service and very slow when something was requested (water, coffee, etc.)

Lunch buffet was actually better than expected in comparison to other experiences. Large selection of hot/cold items....with a fish, chicken, pork, and beef dish at all times. "Nacho bar" was lacking guacamole during our entire stay which seemed really weird to us. Salad bar was nicely done with large selection. Actually found that service during lunch (although mostly self service), was actually better than at breakfast.

Dinner - we hit the buffet the first night....due to Riu's generally crappy reservation system that annoys me to no end....can't understand why they can't adapt to a better system (either select during check-in or no reservations).....regardless, buffett for dinner was immense and actually very tasty....everything from standards like pizza, pasta, salads, beef, chicken, fish...to some different things like frog legs, make your own seafood stir-fry and more. One of the best buffets I've experienced for variety and quality.

We also hit the steak/seafood restaurant - filet/lobster combo was pretty good for an AI resort. Seafood app platter was well done also. Not earth-shattering...but no complaints. We found the Gourmet restaurant to not meet our expectations....really slow service, small portions, and generally nothing exciting. Italian restaurant was average. We skipped the Asian restaurant, having found them generally to be poor at AIs everytime we ever go.....instead we headed off resort a couple nights for dinner....having a good meal at Madame Jeannette and an excellent meal at Screaming Eagle (food was excellent, although supposidly "hot" restaurant was EMPTY on Friday night).

All in all, food was pretty much as expected...with the buffet being above expectations and ala carte restaurants being below expectations.

Bar Service -
Main lobby bar, both in service and selection was quite good. Pool bar service was generally good but they ran out of both tomato juice and gold tequila on a couple of occaisions. Tequila quality was lacking, but vodka quality was above average with quite a few flavored varieties available. Frozen drinks were plentiful and the wait for service, especially considering the over-booked status was rather good.

Room service -
Horribly small menu, bad food, and long waits. Quicker to go to buffett and bring something back....I know it's a selling point but with the small menu here and the food always available in the sports bar (hot dogs, salad, nachos, etc.) - not worth getting

Entertainment -
We really didn't take any of the shows in, although they looked relatively well attended when we walked by.

Beach/pool -
Beach at Riu is one of the larger beaches on the island....more windy than the Hyatt or Occidental beach during our stay but still not bad. Never ran out of lounge chairs during the week which, considering the number of people, was nice. Beach was clean and well-kept.

Pool is nice but with the wind, could be a wet experience for those with chairs around it. Reserving of the chairs got silly over the weekend when most all were reserved by 10 am or earlier.

Overall atmosphere - I was surprised at the general guest mix. Very few families with small kids.....most of the people were couples in their 20s-40s. Some smaller groups and some older couples/families....but generally was an active/social property with younger people.

Think that basically covers it - was generally impressed with the property, the rooms, etc. Fell in line with my expectations of other Rius in the Caribbean/Mexico.

Glad to answer any questions that you may have about the property....I'm sure I missed some stuff with this review. I also took tours of the Occidental and Hyatt (beautiful property) during my stay and could compare them.

Also, I have dozens of pics of the property if you are looking something in particular.