****** - Verified Buyer
4.5
Assemble on carpet in case you drop a part. Assistance with assembly recommended. Very solid desk, great value, very very nice table top, and great for a office station.I purchased this desk 8 months ago to upgrade my Work From Home desk setup and I have no complaints thus far about the product!The desk arrived in two separate packages - one for the base, and one for the tabletop, which was not clear to me from the shipping confirmation. I recommend taking your time with the installation process as the instructions can be confusing. It took ~2 hours for me to set it up with the help of another person. Having an additional hand also made it easier to make sure all the pieces were aligned, and for moving the desk after installation as it's kind of heavy. The most challenging part was inserting the handle used to crank the desk - it required some force to push the handle into the correct position.i prefer manual crank desks over the electric ones that are more commonly found as I've read many reviews of the electric motors failing after a few months of use. The last thing I want is to go searching for the correct replacement motor and messing around with the wiring!Pros:- Fair price- Sturdy construction- well-oiled crank allowing user to smoothly adjust the height- Long enough for a dual 24-in monitor setup and 2 laptops in a vertical laptop stand- Wide enough to set up an A4 size notebook in front of the monitors and keyboardCons:- Complex assembly instructions- Crank handle folds into the base when not in use, which can sometimes be annoying to pull back out in order to adjust the heightI was a bit hesitant to buy this desk as it had no reviews yet, but I bought it relying on Unicoo's other good reviews on their products. Like many folks, my first choice of desks was the Ikea Skarsta standing desk, but they are backordered indefinitely so I wanted to find something similar. My partner has the Skarsta, we set it up together and love it. This desk doesn't *quite* measure up, but is still a good value for the price compared to other desks I researched. If you're coming here for the same reason, I'd say the biggest difference between the Skarsta and this desk are a) ease of assembly (Ikea is notoriously pretty good at making things easy to put together. This was not the case here) and b) size difference (in this case, this was a positive for me. The Skarsta either comes in a 47" or a 63" length. The 55" length here was a perfect in-between size for my small office without losing too much work surface).The pros:-The crank handle is super smooth and quick, it takes very little time to raise/lower the desk. I opted for a manual crank rather than an electric lift as I have more faith in manual mechanics holding up over time, and I'm happy with this desk's sit/stand mechanism so far.-It's a great size. Most of the sit/stand desks I found were only ~24" wide and with my beefy monitor setup I really wanted something larger. This desk is a great size.-It is HEAVY. The parts seem super solid and definitely do not feel cheap. Good value for the money.The cons:-This sunuvabitch was HARD to set up. My partner and I are both reasonably intelligent, handy people (he even has some engineering background) and this desk was a huge pain to set up. It took both of us well over an hour to get it set up, as the instructions were definitely lacking.-It wobbles a bit. There are 4 holes where the bolts are apparently supposed to be attached from the outside-in (first bolt photo). This was the case on 3 of the 4 spots, but one spot when assembled only had the ability to put the bolt in from the inside-out as there was no hole in the inner bar (second photo, where bolt should go according to instructions). Because of this, we couldn't get a really tight connection on the left leg and it wobbles a bit. We finally were able to attach it on the inside and it feels sturdy enough to not be a problem, but the desk definitely wobbles a little when standing. That being said, it's a minor inconvenience and I'm already used to it. Even with the wobble it feels sturdy enough for my setup so I'm not too worried about it.Overall I'm very happy with the desk, especially for the price. I feel confident that it will hold up well enough to get us through the next however-long-we're-working-remotely. It also shipped faster than expected, which was a nice bonus!For the price, this is a good deal. I used a 4mm (metric) hex bit in a ratchet screw driver to assemble along with a number 2 but to assemble. Also, I used my framing saw horses made of 2x4s and some wood clamps to help assemble this because it's heavy and awkward to handle otherwise. The directions in the box are really bad, so I suggest you go to the website or watch one of the YouTube videos of someone trying to figure assembling the desk out. There's this one of a guy who took 3 days on it, but I think he just was very careful. It took me a couple hours. Other than that, take time to really examine each part and see how it works. Another reviewer had trouble with sliding braces covering a hole that a screw goes into, but you can slide the brace out of the way before securing it after that. I did manage to shear off the crank from the gear on me of the two screw jacks. These aren't heavy duty, so if you turn the crank too fast while even slightly out of allignmemt, it will shear. So, you need to be careful. I called the manufacturer on Friday and received a new crank assembly by Monday. So, all is good in that. If the deskboutlasts the company, there are a lot of videos on how to repair a screw jack on YouTube. Also, I think the shaft might be a 7mm hex rod. But you might have better results from the electric model because the machine really can't move all the different directions a human does. The table top the company is melamine, so remember to use pilot holes for any screws you drive into to it. Also, if you blow out your hole, you might need to repair it with some wood filler that takes a screw, an anchor, or some other solution that works. You could probably do that over and over again while the rest of the fiber board lasts. But if you wanted to, you could buy some really nice plywood or hardwood boards at the hardwood store, a planer, and some other tools and make yourself a fairly awesome desk top. You might take you awhile, but then you can enjoy working on it. I saw a video of some guy who put a live edge on one of these adjustable desks. The cord managmemt is minimal, so you might need to add some accessories to the desk to make it work better for you.
