MERACH Rowing Machines for Home – Quiet & App Compatible

Just what I needed!
I’ve lost 70 lbs in the last two years, largely thanks to walking or running – sometimes outside, sometimes on a treadmill. Moved from a house to an apartment & the although the complex has a state of the art gym in the clubhouse, this is year five of working hard to not catch C19, and I don’t want to use it. Yes, I could mask, but didn’t love the thought of running with a sweaty mask or having to do trial & error to find the best mask for that job.I’m on the top floor of my building & am not the kind of neighbor who’d wake the downstairs neighbors with an hour of me thudding away on the noisy treadmill. I tried step workouts in a carpeted room, but found myself holding back. I can lift weights or use a rebounder or yoga/pilates, but nothing was really working for cardio.I started pricing ellipticals – that’s basically running, right? Only no impact and no shaking the rafters for the neighbors? There’s a huge price difference, and many of the budget-friendly ones either looked flimsy, or had reviews about parts coming loose or not lasting long. I went to YouTube and found a guy who did a whole How To Not Pick A Sh(odd)y Elliptical. LOL. And he gave a list of half a dozen things to look for before committing and said there was good & bad to be found at all of the price ranges. So I came back to Amazon a little more prepared about what I was looking for. It seemed like I’d have to spend $350-ish and hope mine would not die after a year.Honestly I don’t know how I went from ellipticals to rowers. Maybe a “People Who Look At These Crappy Ellipticals Also Buy…” suggestion? IDK. At first glance, shopping felt similar to ellipticals. There was a huge price range & varying reviews. I did notice that there were fewer complaints about quality, stability, or durability. I went back to YouTube hoping for another How To Buy A Decent Rower video. I didn’t exactly find *that,* but I did find several unboxing videos. I watched rower videos for a few days and noticed that a lot of the positive reviews/unboxings kept mentioning Merach by name.I’m a little slow on the uptake sometimes, so I went googling to see if Merach made an elliptical. LOL. And then I shopped for their specific rowers. It seemed like $350 was going to have to be the budget either way. I was still leaning elliptical for decibel level alone. Some of the rowers were really loud even in the videos.I got a notification that one rower I’d been looking at was on sale & marked down from $399 to $250-ish and there was a $50 coupon. I went to the reviews, which were almost all positive, and one man said his wife likes to work out early in the mornings & that he could not hear her even in the next room. No electricity required was also a huge plus. I decided for $200, it was worth the gamble & hit Buy Now.It took maybe 30 min to assemble by myself & would have gone faster if I had trusted the R/L on the pedals, but I put those on backwards the first time. (That’s on me – it’s imprinted AND marked by a sticker AND in the instructions, but I thought I knew what I was doing. hahahaha)It really is darn near silent. It’s a belt and not a chain, plus I didn’t get a water model. (I’m told those are louder.) Does not need external power. It is really sturdy. The seat glides easily and even that does not make any noise at all. If the display matters to you (it does not to me), you’ll probably want to have 2 AAA batteries on hand. They include two cheapo/trial batteries that the instructions say won’t last long & will need to be replaced. (Seems like a weird thing to cheap out on, honestly, but whatever.) Personally, I put my ipad on the ledge in front of the display and throw on an Apple Fitness rowing workout.I noticed something after mine arrived, and that was that a 3rd party delivery like Amazon voids the warranty. I don’t know for sure that I have no standard company warranty, but I would have asked before purchasing. I did add the extended warranty. Maybe that will help if I need it?One nice surprise. I expected it to be sturdy while rowing. I would have returned it if it was not. But it is also sturdy when upright to be put away. I don’t have to worry about the vacuum knocking it over or anything. It’s sturdy, balanced, and solid. And quiet! A dream! Really happy with the purchase. Now to lose the rest of the weight. Almost to my goal!

Good value
I’m 6’3 and I love that it’s designed for taller people to have full range of movement. I have used it almost daily the last 2 weeks and it takes some getting to used to since I’m under to air rowers but once you do it’s a good machine for the price. My only complaints are the monitor isn’t great compared to more expensive models and I don’t love the foot straps. Overall a great choice if your looking for a cheaper alternative to get into rowing.

Updated review… great machine and support!
ORIGINAL REVIEW: Dead on arrival. Can’t adjust resistance level due to error “E01” and there doesn’t appear to be a way to reset the system.Not to mention the packaging was horrible and literally had to shred everything in order to get all the parts out, making a return in the original packaging impossible.UPDATE: Support was incredibly responsive and replaced the unit without quickly and without issue. The new unit is working just fine and is a great machine so far! I’ve adjusted the rating to a five given the overall experience. Sure there was a hiccup in receiving a defective unit, but they were so quick to resolve the issue, I really can’t fault them for something that probably was caused by shipping. Thanks, Merach!