Wootbook, yes/no?

initroot said:
Just had my battery swollen on mine. 3k to replace. Wootbook 2 years old, barely used the battery. Joys!
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Might want to use the battery more in future – I recommend at least 10 - 20% of the time off battery, and 80 - 90% off mains. Keeps lithium happy.
 
capd said:
Might want to use the battery more in future – I recommend at least 10 - 20% of the time off battery, and 80 - 90% off mains. Keeps lithium happy.
Click to expand...
initroot said:
Just had my battery swollen on mine. 3k to replace. Wootbook 2 years old, barely used the battery. Joys!
Click to expand...
Most manufacturers have an always plugged in mode, it keeps the battery charge state at 80% or thereabouts which is the optimal long term storage charge for lithium batteries.
 
airborne said:
Most manufacturers have an always plugged in mode, it keeps the battery charge state at 80% or thereabouts which is the optimal long term storage charge for lithium batteries.
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No thanks.
 
capd said:
No thanks.
Click to expand...

Thanks for letting me know.

It does work though because it's storage at full capacity that kills lithium ion capacity. It's science not a thumb suck.
 
backstreetboy said:
No need to do any of that. Most devices are smart enough these days to stop charging at 100% and redirect that power to the device.
Click to expand...
It's not overcharging the device which is the problem, it is the exponential correlation between charging beyond a certain point and battery wear.

Something like charging to 80% only uses 0.2 wear cycles of the battery, whereas charging to 100% uses 1 cycle. So it is better not to charge to 100% irrespective how you do it in my understanding (fast/slow).
 
So just an update to my previous issue with the screen failing... I took the laptop on holiday and let a child play games on it for extended periods. And randomly the screen would return to looking perfect, like nothing had happened. If I restarted or the display was off for a while, then it would be messed up again.

But I figured out that I could get it to return consistently by running Furmark CPU and GPU stress tests, and after doing that a couple of times it's stayed on for good. I've successfully installed a fresh copy of Windows, I can access my BIOS now. It's all good.

Does anyone have any idea what could have caused that? It wasn't working for like two months or so. Condensation/corrosion? I thought it might be a cold solder joint but surely even the highest temps of 80C+ wouldn't be enough to restore those connections.

I've been in contact with Wootware about it and they'd like me to bring it in so they can give it a thorough check to see if there's something they missed. And I must give props to them, they've been very patient and communicative throughout this ordeal.
 
wcm said:
I have been using this model for around 1 and half years now, using it for mainly software development and gaming. It's been absolutely flawless and extremely light for traveling purposes. Bang for buck, I don't think you'll get a better laptop brand new.

Only cons I got so far are:
1. On Delivery the RAM gave issues, WootWare sorted this out asap.
2. Would have liked one more USB port on the left and the power adapter on the left as well
3. Fans on high speed are quite audible, however this is to be expected on any high end laptop.
4. Second SSD failed about 1 year in, again wootware replaced fairly promptly.

Pros:
1. Absolute beast of a laptop for work and gaming.
2. 2 x nvme 1tb storage which is awesome.
3. Battery life is decent and gets by while I'm traveling.
4. Very light and easy to move around.
5. Lots of customization options
6. RGB is a nice extra
Click to expand...
Update on this review:

I've still got this laptop and it's running well except for a swollen battery as others have stated. Not really an issue for me as I work with it mostly plugged in.

I upgraded to the Wootbook Ultra III 2 years ago

Honestly not many cons from my side thus far,
1. More USB ports would be nice, I use an external USB hub.
2. It's a bit on the heavy side but that's to be expected

It performs exceptionally well and hasn't given any issues.
 
Just chiming in, battery swelled up somewhere early 2023 for the model I bought in 2019, this with it not being in use for about a year and I "forgot" to discharge it to the halfway mark for longer term storage (didn't plan not to use it, just ended up that way).

I've tested with just removing the cable in the battery, works fine with directly plugged into the wall, so took the battery out and now have a lighter device and the trackpad works fine again (had issues with left/right click due to battery bulge). Removal is easy, just the 4 screws and remove downward/towards the bottom, didn't have to unplug anything except for the battery cable that gets removed easily, didn't have to touch any of the ribbon cables.

Only the WiFi card there on the right has a small tape over the screw that goes to the battery, easy to remove, think that's just to help tidy the cabling there. Would consider this a very easy battery replacement if you have a replacement, way easier than the glue nonsense in the Macbook's one I replaced for a friend.

Blurry photo of the swollen battery:
1723968818909.jpeg
Model number is "GK5CN-00-13-4S1P-0", buying this one off Amazon (no reviews, yay), arrives in 10-30 days.

-----------

With this issue 4 years after purchase, would I still have bought the device? Yes, pretty much everything else about the device is good with compromises in the right place for the price point, think the only "real" issue was that needed a BIOS upgrade flash to fix hibernate, and wootware did offer to do that for me back then.

I used this thing for like 10 hours a day , of which 3 hours was probably gaming for most days for a good 4 years, that's pretty extreme for most gaming laptops and yet it held up well. Fan curve is all right (better than my old Lenovo Y5070), could install hardware vendor drivers (e.g. Lenovo didn't update their Intel display drivers, so if hyper V was enabled you had a ghost 3rd screen, was great), the screen for the price point is a good IPS with 144Hz (this was not that common in 2018/19), and then two m2 SSD slots (you can see I filled them with 1+2TB). The WiFi/BT chip is also good since Intel one.

Literally only complaint was that microphone is meh, boot BIOS side takes a bit too long (but I used hibernate/sleep 99% of the time, so whatever, same resume as all other laptops), and the camera is shoddy. Speakers were all right, you'd need a proper Macbook to compete of the same gen.

Love typing on this thing, but think they changed the keys for later models to get it thinner. The software for controlling lights is meh, but I don't ever really use it, and the light bar at the bottom would have been way cooler if could have done something like use it as battery indicator or something, usually just have it off.

Also this generation of intel, recommend always running a light undervolt, adds like 10% to performance for the CPU and extends the battery life by half an hour while less fan noise. I set this up for a few friends to just be on start-up with task scheduler.
 
Johnatan56 said:
Just chiming in, battery swelled up somewhere early 2023 for the model I bought in 2019, this with it not being in use for about a year and I "forgot" to discharge it to the halfway mark for longer term storage (didn't plan not to use it, just ended up that way).

I've tested with just removing the cable in the battery, works fine with directly plugged into the wall, so took the battery out and now have a lighter device and the trackpad works fine again (had issues with left/right click due to battery bulge). Removal is easy, just the 4 screws and remove downward/towards the bottom, didn't have to unplug anything except for the battery cable that gets removed easily, didn't have to touch any of the ribbon cables.

Only the WiFi card there on the right has a small tape over the screw that goes to the battery, easy to remove, think that's just to help tidy the cabling there. Would consider this a very easy battery replacement if you have a replacement, way easier than the glue nonsense in the Macbook's one I replaced for a friend.

Blurry photo of the swollen battery:
View attachment 1751709
Model number is "GK5CN-00-13-4S1P-0", buying this one off Amazon (no reviews, yay), arrives in 10-30 days.

-----------

With this issue 4 years after purchase, would I still have bought the device? Yes, pretty much everything else about the device is good with compromises in the right place for the price point, think the only "real" issue was that needed a BIOS upgrade flash to fix hibernate, and wootware did offer to do that for me back then.

I used this thing for like 10 hours a day , of which 3 hours was probably gaming for most days for a good 4 years, that's pretty extreme for most gaming laptops and yet it held up well. Fan curve is all right (better than my old Lenovo Y5070), could install hardware vendor drivers (e.g. Lenovo didn't update their Intel display drivers, so if hyper V was enabled you had a ghost 3rd screen, was great), the screen for the price point is a good IPS with 144Hz (this was not that common in 2018/19), and then two m2 SSD slots (you can see I filled them with 1+2TB). The WiFi/BT chip is also good since Intel one.

Literally only complaint was that microphone is meh, boot BIOS side takes a bit too long (but I used hibernate/sleep 99% of the time, so whatever, same resume as all other laptops), and the camera is shoddy. Speakers were all right, you'd need a proper Macbook to compete of the same gen.

Love typing on this thing, but think they changed the keys for later models to get it thinner. The software for controlling lights is meh, but I don't ever really use it, and the light bar at the bottom would have been way cooler if could have done something like use it as battery indicator or something, usually just have it off.

Also this generation of intel, recommend always running a light undervolt, adds like 10% to performance for the CPU and extends the battery life by half an hour while less fan noise. I set this up for a few friends to just be on start-up with task scheduler.
Click to expand...
What did Wootware say about the availability of them supplying a replacement battery?
 
w1z4rd said:
Three years later, the screen went, the battery went, the webcam went, the keyboard is failing. Too expensive to repair. Wont be buying another anytime soon.
Click to expand...
What does Woodware say regarding such extensive failures?
 
w1z4rd said:
I dont know, I never emailed them again after they quoted me R4000 to replace a swollen battery.
Click to expand...
I’d at least email them with the extent of the issues, they might have noticed that gen had developed some known issues and they may be willing to help out in some way. That amount of failures on a modern laptop is very unusual.
 
ponder said:
The wootbook is a rebrand of some make I can't remember now, you should be able to source batteries in the EU or alliexpress etc.
Click to expand...
The previous post, sorry it's long, but it has the link:
Johnatan56 said:
Model number is "GK5CN-00-13-4S1P-0", buying this one off Amazon (no reviews, yay), arrives in 10-30 days.
Click to expand...
The Wootbooks are rebranded Tongfangs, other suppliers in Europe also rebrand their laptops so parts aren't really an issue.
 
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