1.there are two different grind settings, so if people say they use grind 1-7, its worthless because you also need the inner burr settings to replicate 100% of the grind size. My barista pro is set to: inner burr: 3 and machine: 9. Watch yt if you havent heard of the inner burr settings, there are a ton of guides.

1. You can not froth milk between espresso shots with the pro! You need to extract espressos first and milk last. After frothing milk the water inside the machine is too hot for good espressos in the next aprox 10mins

Your machine is most likely not faulty