SereneLife Smart Rowing Machine

Out of the Box Setup: Received the rowing machine and put it together yesterday. The directions were very clear and the majority of the screws/bolts/washers were already in their holes so you didn’t have to worry about matching up sizes to specific components. The most annoying/time consuming part about assembly was taking it out of the box (there is a lot of plastic, tape, and styrofoam packed in tight). Only issue I had during assembly is that the front slide rail cover is plastic that sheared when I screwed it together (hand tight). It still holds together since there are 3 other screws for that piece, but not too great that the plastic is that brittle. I am a woman in my mid-20s and was able to put the entire unit together on my own without help/an extra set of hands. I would highly recommend using your own Phillips Head screwdriver instead of the one that comes with the machine (using a magnetic tipped one made things even easier). The unit came in a pretty heavy, awkward shaped box that was 47”x31”x11”. The machine is made in China for those who were asking. Machine Features: The display is very nice, bright, and easy to read. The “smart” model is totally digital and does not have a knob to manually adjust resistance. If you want more than just the light fan resistance, you will need to have the unit plugged into a wall. It does have the pull feedback of an air/water erg, but I haven’t gotten into many of the programs yet, so I can’t comment on difficulty/resistance at the higher levels. Using manual resistance or changing to a different program is very straightforward. You start by picking the manual mode or your program mode, press start, and then adjust the resistance further if desired. The display will show the little hills and valleys that are typical for preset interval modes on an exercise machine (see picture of display). The seat is very comfortable and the machine seems very sturdy and well built other than that one piece that sheared. I specifically got this into so that I could stand it up against a wall without having to fold it up, and that’s great, but it does look a little awkward and very tall standing up. This unit is not one of the ones that folds but it has small rubber feet on the flywheel so that it can stand vertically. Use/Function: Now for the “bad” (but hopefully fixable!).... I have used a lot of rowing machines ranging in quality and type before so I know this isn’t normal. This one makes a very prominent clicking/ratcheting noise whenever the belt is pulled or retracted. The noise is to the point that I’m nervous to do a full workout on it because I don’t want something snapping. I’m not sure if it just has to be “broken in” to spread the lubricant through it’s gears, or if there is a mechanical problem. With reviews on this rowing machine and similar ones citing the metal spring that provides some of the mechanical resistance snapping after hearing a weird noise, I decided to play it safe. This was an issue straight out of the box, so I contacted technical support about it. I will update this review once I hear back. Overall, I think this could easily be a 4-5 star machine, I just need to be able to use it before I can fully review function.