Product Review: Webetop/Aimtom Multi Function Power Generator Review

[@KurtisBarnes]

Loved the Review!!! Only reason I watch your videos is the detail, precision and care you put into your recordings. Thanks Bill!! Keep it up!!

[@NODARRYL]

I have a need for something small and powerful enough to run a couple of laptops and a lamp when I go out on a call, so I definitely will purchase this device since you've already put a star on it. Thanks.

[@uxwbill]

More than one laptop at at time might be pushing things a little too hard. I had no problem operating and charging a Dell Latitude D630 laptop with a 90 watt power adapter.

[@neilmartin112]

As a Ham radio operator I greatly appreciate you showing the sine wave form. Thank you.

[@TailsFurse]

In their product description it says you can use this for hair dryers. Yikes! They might want to take that off. Pretty neat little device though! Cool that they worked with ya for a review! Very glad ya opted for the " I want to give my opinion " route. I built something similar that runs off of Ryobi batteries. Only mine can only do 40w and 100w peak. I use it to run soldering iron, glue guns, fans, and even peltier fridges! Thanks for your review! Would love to see more honest reviews from ya!

[@uxwbill]

I saw that and wondered if they meant something like those little tiny styling dryers. One of those _might_ be able to run from this inverter. It wouldn't be much fun to dry a full head of wet hair with that, though.

[@AricVogel]

This was a very informative video, I think you did a good job covering both the positive and the negative aspects of the product. I can't think of a use for it personally, since extended power interruptions in my area are very rare and a UPS is better suited for my purposes, but this was still an interesting video nonetheless.

[@Blacklight8001]

A packing peanut in the fan? Huh! I bet the 78 RPM packing peanut is jealous now :P

[@Ladycarib]

I have one since Hurricanes Irma and Maria from 4 years ago. I used it mainly to charge my electronic devices during the aftermath of the storm when we were without power for 2 months. It is still going strong and I still use it to charge my devices during the frequent power outages here in 🇻🇮 Virgin Islands

[@themaritimegirl]

Thank you for speaking your true mind and not selling yourself out for this video. I'd only ever do the same for a sponsored video, which is probably why I'll never be offered a product to review :P The false claim of a true sine wave inverter seems like _too_ obvious of a mistake to make, and it makes me wonder if they were betting on buyers simply not bothering/knowing to check otherwise, and capitalizing on that.

[@TehMG]

Assuming it has Li-Ion cells in it, you need about 4.2V per cell charging voltage. With 3 cells in series this means you need a minimum of 12.6V (plus any loss in the charging circuit) for maximum charging.

[@ColdWarWarriors]

Thanks alot, just got one for xmas and the instructions were a little vague insome parts.

[@Samspianopage]

Hi Bill. Great video still really enjoying them as always. Just occurred to me, this thing might also be great for things like SEPAP machines during a power cut. Kind of an odd thing to come up with LOL just popped into my head obviously you wouldn't want it for more crucial medical uses but it might be good if folk has these little things kicking about for emergencies or for people with illnesses that needed those diagnostics gear like blood pressure monitors and stuff that runs off batteries or plugs into the wall and maybe the batteries have run down at the most inopportune moment. Not that you would let things get to that state hopefully but it's one of the more practical uses for a thing like this. I could think of many more, but given how small this is it's limited to what it could do relative to say a UPS with bigger batteries. Suppose it's safer and the batteries might last longer running something like a Wi-fi router or a small laptop for a few hours should ye need it. If they made bigger versions of it, I can see it having great utility for alot of people. Not that we use them much here over in Scotland but even here I can see them being useful for small electricity needs outdoors like a radio or a portable 12v TV or something.

[@uxwbill]

A lot of the Amazon reviewers comment on their using this product with a CPAP machine. The inverter inside this is likely to be much more efficient than that of a UPS. (Most UPSes are hilariously inefficient, having ridiculous idle current draw figures.) That said, the APC Smart UPS 420 attached to my Internet connection has held it up without failure for several hours.

[@randomrazr]

nice emergancy thing to have.

[@zx8401ztv]

Sounds pretty good to me bill :-D. Yes the squarewave output could do with being smoothed out a little. Big series inductor, no no lol.

[@coondogtheman]

If the voltage of the internal battery was known, like if it was a 12 volts for example, one could hotwire this device to a car battery. DeWalt has a similar device but uses Flexvolt drill batteries to power up.

[@uxwbill]

Sure, you could do that and it would nullify every advantage this thing had: small size, light weight, and decent runtime under load. Car batteries aren't light, nor are they made for deep discharge. An SLA brick is an idea, and if you want that, you might as well get a cast off UPS and bring it back to life.

[@twocvbloke]

Thier description of the thing leaves a lot to be desired, that's a given, but as long as it does what you need it to, then it's not bad, I'd want to replace the deathdapter socket with something more "local" though, my experience of them universal sockets is not that varied, from completely unreliable to barely useable... :)

[@JohnSmith-xq1pz]

Hi uxwbill. I know it's off topic of the video but had to share the miracle I discovered with you. I was at the local value village and found a Pentium 4 era sony Vaio desktop with keyboard, mouse, a 14-15" sharp lcd vga monitor (the old square kind) has onboard sound oddly enough (not great but decent sound quality). Here's the miracle. The system has a 3.0 ghz hyper threaded Prescott and not a single bad cap on the motherboard(betting it had something to do with someone on the design team knowing the "power of the Pentium 4 lol. The side panel is vented right were the cpu cooler is" ) Anyway the system is a "transitional" motherboard with sata and ide pci/pci e. Though it's the same socket and chipset as the asus board my Pentium D had I Don see anything saying it'll support it. So I'll just transplant the pci e graphics card and sound card I salvaged from my Pentium D, find 2gb's worth of ddr ram, a 7200rpm WD blue terabyte drive. Install xpmand presto xp era gaming machine. Assume review video btw. Also I've noticed you've been placing a uxwbill watermark in the corner of your videos now.

[@JohnSmith-xq1pz]

@@sebastian19745 really I always thought (assumed) a Pentium D' could beat even a HT Pentium 4 chip. The 945 is the Pentium D I had for abouts a decade until the motherboard died of what I (assume) from one of it's gone bad plague caps. After a badly needed cleaning it just stopped booting. Would power on forvlike 5 seconds and shut off with no video output post code beep of any kind. A shame too it's original owner slash builder used a really nice board for it (a asus p5ld2 rev 1.02) Hoping this Pentium 4 can fill in the gap somewhat. Though no win 7/xp like the D had, but heck xp is more than enough so still glad I grabbed it lol. Forgot a boy the one thing I thought was funny. The case is pretty much dust free, but the power supply not so much. Intake has some dust the output is caked in dust. I'm betting old owner dusted before selling and I think I know why. The drive has a clean install of xp home from the original OEM system disk. Didn't do the final profile and active stuff. Programs in control panel shows ati software installed but no ati card is in it and the bois/hardware shows intel extremeeeeee! For the on board chipset. Also missing is the 250gb 7200rpm hard drive Google shows listed in the system specs. So someone picked parts from it... not that I blame them I'd do it too lol. So hopefully with a little work I can replace my fallen D with something close.

[@JohnSmith-xq1pz]

@@sebastian19745 Google says max of 2gb ram.but if I'm reading the specs right the board has the same intel chipset D's board did and it's max was 4gbs. Maybe it's because HTs board is ddr and D's was ddr2? Or maybe Google is lying again? Yeah the Pentium D' ran 7 like a dream(even if I let my old man talk me into running 32bit not the 64bit version lol) it was running 7 public beta when I first got it. At the end of beta installed home premium, ran that same installation for it's whole life. I can literally count the major problems Windows had on one hand, it that rock solid. I plan to reuse the Pentium D's Sapphire Radeon HD 3650 (PCI-e, 512MB GDDR2) card if it'll work. The D with that card and shared video memory had a total of 1gb video memory. Ran nfs most wanted (original 2005 black list edition) on max settings no slow downs,frame skips etc. Thing was great. Haven't found anything about Pentium D compatibility. Done think I'll try though. Power supply is marked 305watt and I don't think it's a standard atx psu, I'd pals rather wait to see if I can find the same board D had or one I know would take it. A video could be interesting... Edit D also had a 16gb usb 2.0 flashdrive setup for ready boost. Forgot about that.

[@JohnSmith-xq1pz]

@@sebastian19745 Yeah 2gb plus a flashdrive for max virtual ram would be fine for xp-my inspiron 1300 run that- Yes the motherboard has 4 ram slots color coded. A Pentium 4 HT running windows 98... hmm tempting especially since somewhere our old copy of 98se is hiding downstairs. Grew up in the 9x era, as tempting as that wouldn't be. Much more tempting to have a xp desktop again. If I ever go win98 again I'd rather recreate the Pentium II 233mhz we had. 1gb sd ram voodoo banshie 16mb pci model and a sound blaster live value sound card. Was the best machine ever had for my dos-9x era games.

[@richardhudson3014]

Cool finally a new uxwdill video we need more of these from you uxwbill!!!

[@uxwbill]

Whatever you're using to tell you about new videos isn't working. And...say what you want about me, just spell my screen name correctly.

[@travis4798]

This should be badged as a power supply rather then a generator seeing as how it has a limited run time and has to be recharged. Other then that the inverter definitely needs work to stand up to it's name. I've seen waves like that in dieing power supply's that have true sine wave outputs. It could be faulty or might not have proper filter capacitors and resistors to smooth out power, it looks like the supply is trying to create sinewaves just not as clean as it should. Or maybe it's stepped sinusoidal waves which they should specify in the manual? Two things I'd like to see improved, increase run time, say several hours rather then one with a bigger battery pack to live up to it's claim as a "generator". Or a bigger battery with the same run time because 100 watts is nothing these days. A modern smartphone or laptop will drain that battery in no time if your on a trip. A smartphone will drain it in about 8 hours, a laptop about 2-4 hours with a flat battery. Not to mention not being able to do much more then run lights off it. 250-500 watts, at least one hour, then we're talking. Price isn't bad so can't complain too much.

[@uxwbill]

Only in a very crude sense do I think one could really consider this to be a UPS. It's not designed to detect and deal with powerline anomalies. The closest you could get would be to simulate a dual conversion UPS by charging the "generator" while you power loads from it, and you probably can't charge it fast enough at full load to keep the battery up.

[@travis4798]

@@uxwbill Yep I meant to put power supply rather then ups lol.

[@MichaelFlatman]

I think it's acceptable for it to not charge at 12v, since really you should have the engine running to charge it, 14v.. as otherwise your vehicle battery might flatten. (although it would be nice to see some low voltage cut off protection, along with boost converter to allow you to charge even whilst engine off to a certain extent)

[@uxwbill]

I *did* have it plugged into a running vehicle, every day as I drove to work. After several weeks of this, it never managed to get past about 50%. It should use a boost converter if one is necessary. It can definitely buck high voltage input, as part of the integrated solar charging controller.

[@MichaelFlatman]

@@uxwbill yeah should have a boost converter then.. Damn I thought this was a new video, KZbin brought it up randomly :P never seen it before..

[@uxwbill]

I'll put it to you this way, it's a *relatively* new video. :-)

[@Madness832]

Since it has a "universal" AC outlet, is it capable of 220/240v?

[@uxwbill]

There is no user accessible control for such. I'd not be surprised if a 220/240 volt version exists.

[@neilduncan2274]

This is pretty much the scaled down mobile variation (when including a solar panel) of my armada of solar panels hooked to the house.

[@TheRealCelerate]

One thing I would like to see on a future model, if the hardware could handle it, is the ability to jump a vehicle with a dead battery.

[@Browningate]

I've got a "DieHard" unit that does a lot of the same things as this product, and also offers jump-starting. It ran about $150 brand new, if I'm not mistaken. I've not had to jump start anything yet, but I have used the power inverter and tire pump a few times. It also has a USB power supply and flashlight, similar to the unit that UXWBill reviewed, but relies on a Sealed Lead Acid battery.

[@Wolfhound.]

not sure how i feel about it seeing some dishonesty from them and all give you a car charger but it cant and wont charge from a 12v source and saying it has a true sign wave e but does not so they are just talking it up again so it makes me wonder what the bull crap factor is on the inside are you willing to take the case apart and give your opinion of the insides and build quality and stuff

[@uxwbill]

Wolfhound I am less inclined to see it as dishonesty and more as simple design mistakes. ("Never attribute that to malice which is adequately explained by stupidity.") Perhaps I am unavoidably biased by having received the product at no cost. It appears to be true that it won't charge from a 12 volt source, but it will charge (however slowly) from the electrical system of a running car (>12V). I do plan to produce another video to look at whatever's inside, if I can do so without wrecking it. I did not do so here because I was not sure what the seller would think and most people do not care.

[@ibrahimafuye3956]

Hi Bill. Thanks for the quality review. I got mine short-circuited and I haven't been able to reset it to serve AC purpose. I have been using the DC alone for a while now. Do you have a suggestion on how I can restore the AC function? Thanks for your feedback.

[@uxwbill]

I can only guess that some internal component has been damaged. Under normal circumstances, the inverter should just quietly shut down with an overload or short circuit. You'd have to trace the circuit and see how feasible a repair was. Truthfully, though, I'd send it back and get a replacement.

[@ibrahimafuye3956]

@@uxwbill thanks Bill. I am sure am way past the return window.

[@quertize]

Maybe cells used are not Li-ion but LiFePo, taking that it worked well in cold conditions. Did you take it apart?

[@uxwbill]

It's light enough that I'd seriously doubt it. There is likely to be a future video where I explore it in further depth, treading well into non-sponsor-approved territory.

[@kenoger2866]

great review Bill !! Would you happen to kn ow the weight of the unit???

[@uxwbill]

No more than a couple of pounds. It's much lighter and smaller than I expected, given the capability.

[@ethicalman2823]

Hi Bill if target AC Output need is 100-240 V and 2.9 to 1.2 A how long can it last, practically

[@sarahshubby6724]

did they pay you to review the device or just send it to you for free under the condition that you review it?

[@uxwbill]

They sent it to me free of charge, after several false starts caused by Amazon screwing things up.

[@alirobe]

Looks just like the AIMTOM PowerPal

[@uxwbill]

More likely than not, this same thing is sold under many different names.

[@alirobe]

Definitely the best review I have seen of it

[@noelj62]

Where's the sexy girl in tank-top? This is a power generator, there must be a girl 😆

[@uxwbill]

. . . .

[@bansheemania1692]

Battery/converter.....Till battery tech gets better. I get refurbished deep cycle for 50bucks. 2000invert from harbor freight. Used Many Many times

[@circletech7745]

so what you're saying is after 8 years of making low quality videos on a Sony handyman I too can receive free stuff? lol. Never change uxwbill.

[@samdibsyd6183]

Hi mate would this charge up my electric scooter it’s 2000w motor 48v battery the charger the scooter came with is a 100w 240v.

[@uxwbill]

I'd say you'd want a much stronger power bank/generator than this. You'd be running close to its limits, and there isn't much headroom before it shuts down.

[@samdibsyd6183]

uxwbill okey thanks for your advice I really appreciate it.

[@jamesveach6918]

This product on eBay ranges from $165 to $375 wow for the same unit

[@rogersowers9837]

Only $108.00 on Amazon!

[@cleefrodlyaugustin1307]

Would there enough power to turn on a tv ?

[@uxwbill]

Depends upon the type of TV. A portable set should work just fine, as should most LCD TVs.

[@letsnotplaywithelectricity9346]

Moving on up to sponsored videos huh? Big time Bill lol! Congrats, product is chinese crap though... 100W? Nah (:

[@uxwbill]

It's certainly true that there isn't much surge capacity available from the inverter. I can't say they weren't pretty honest in their advertising. It never faltered when running the 100 watt bulb, nor when I tried the same runtime test with the box fan. Nor did it blow up when I tried doing stupid things, like plugging an old refrigerator into it. I plan to look at how it fares over the long term, and if I think I can get it apart without ruining it, to produce a video showing what the internals look like. I didn't expect it to do as well as it did, so it's a winner in my book.

[@letsnotplaywithelectricity9346]

@@uxwbill Yeah, I probably should have worded that a little bit better. It does as advertised according to your tests. I guess it's the "as advertised" I was more in disagreement with. 100 watts just seems like a novelty product to me. Something in a larger capacity might very well be worth it.

[@uxwbill]

They do make a bigger one. Whether or not I can scam one for review remains to be seen. The seller did say they were interested in having me review future products. I don't know if they actually watched this video or not, though they did request to see it before I made it public and they claimed to have liked it.

[@Bhebhe-Japan]

how long it will last for a fan?

[@uxwbill]

It depends entirely upon how much power the fan uses.