My Slimbook died. I closed the lid and chucked the laptop into a backpack, and two hours later at the other end of that trip it didn’t start at all. Something I really like about Slimbook is their customer service. My experience is that sending them mail is actually useful, and this time I got back a bunch of troubleshooting advice and a disassembly video. So the machine may be out of warranty, there’s still support and help to repair the machine – good from a sustainability perspective, too.

Matija explains why he chose Slimbook (Pro X 14) this time around, and most of his considerations are ones I share. Or, would share, if I was shopping for a new laptop.

The troubleshooting suggestions from Slimbook were pretty straightforward. My “warranty void” sticker was already scratched open from some previous time I needed to mess around inside the machine so 11 screws later (I’m happy they no longer use tiny Torx heads) I could follow the rest of their guide.

To be fair, I only got to step 3 of their suggestions before the machine worked again:

  1. Have you tried turning it off and on again?
  2. Have you tried turning it off, disconnecting the power supply, disassembling the machine, disconnecting memory, SSD and battery, then getting coffee and having lunch and only after lunch reconnect the memory and SSD and power supply and see if it boots?
  3. Ok, now turn it off again, disconnect the power supply and reconnect the battery. Reconnect power supply. Does it still boot?

I can’t tell if I may have knocked something out of alignment, or if the battery management was briefly confused, but this decidedly low-tech guide has saved me a bunch of money and trouble.

Thanks, Slimbook!