PSA: Be Careful Dealing With Uptone Audio


Just a cautionary note for anyone wishing to purchase anything from Uptone Audio.

 

Over the past 3 or so years I have owned an ISO Regen, two LPS 1’s and two LPS 1.2’s. When they work they are OK. However, when they do not, you cannot really count on any meaningful support from Uptone Audio – under warranty or not – and even more so if you are not in the US. One of my LPS 1’s failed during the warranty period after less than a year of use. It would not output anything. I contacted Alex Crespi of Uptone who arranged for a replacement. I shipped the faulty LPS 1 back (costly). I received a replacement in about a month. The replacement I received had dings on the case that were not there in the first place. I just chalked it up to shipping issues. Two months later, the replaced unit failed again. It would not light up. It had more than a year left under warranty. I contacted Uptone again who requested I ship it back again for replacement. However, they discouraged it and proposed a credit of US$185 towards the purchase of a new LPS 1.2 in lieu of the warranty on the unit which faltered so quickly after it was replaced. Upon further questioning and correspondence with Uptone, it came to light that they had not repaired the unit I had sent in for warranty replacement with new parts. Instead they had replaced the board with parts culled from used and returned units previously sent in for trade in or repair purposes. In short, the warranty is tantamount to having your unit replaced with a used one which may or may not have been faulty in the first place, which they claim to have “tested”. It is no surprise that the unit faltered so quickly after their supposed warranty replacement then. As such, their so-called warranty replacement is pretty much flawed. Alex got defensive and quoted some self-derived metric about the failure rates of their products being extremely low and put the cause of successive failure in my units down to my bad luck. He also said that I had electrically damaged the unit which is baffling since I had used it only with their supplied OEM Meanwell switching power supply which still works fine up till today. To date, in the last 20 or so years of being in the hi fi hobby, these Uptone products are the only ones to have malfunctioned so badly.

 

Wishing to cut my losses and to avoid having to ship the faulty unit back to the US at costly charges when the “warranty” replacement would most likely fail again shortly, I paid the remainder towards a brand new LPS 1.2. Alex made it clear that he would not assist with repair of the faulty LPS 1 and I disposed of it.

 

I received a shipment of the LPS 1.2. However, when I unpacked it, the unit had a clear rattling noise when removed from the box. Upon closer inspection, there was a slight scratch on the front chassis plate and the screws were badly stripped. It was pretty clear that Alex had shipped me a used unit or one that had escaped their seemingly lax quality control. I contacted Uptone immediately and requested that they make arrangements for their carrier to collect the unit from me for return to them and replacement of a brand new unit to me. Alex admitted to their negligence citing size slippages and disparities in their OEM case specifications which caused the misfit and rattling noise and worn out Torx screwdrivers stripping the screws. He was certainly aware of the issues affecting the unit I was shipped. However, he refused to do anything about it. He suggested that he would send me some screws and that I open up the unit myself and mount some electrical tape inside the case to stop the rattling noise. Again, he seemed to be fully aware of the issue and how to fix it. Unfortunately, I am not technically inclined nor do I own a Torx screwdriver. To render those fixes I would have to pay a technician to do so. This is rich considering that I had paid for a new and finished product and was shipped a used and/or damaged one. I wrote back to insist on a replacement unit being sent to me and that Uptone arrange to cover the return shipping costs to themselves. Again, Alex refused steadfastly and got hostile, saying that I was taking advantage of them. How exactly am I taking advantage? I paid full price for a new and finished product – that is all I expect, no more and no less. Alex also stated that he did not wish to lose any money on this sale even though Uptone offers the best customer service possible. His final offer was that I return the LPS 1.2 to them at my own cost and that he would refund me the US$250 I had paid meaning I would have to write off the US$185 credit value on the disposed LPS 1 which he is contractually obliged to repair but had refused to assist me with.

 

In this whole experience with Uptone, Alex strikes me as someone who is simply full of excuses. He pays lip service to providing good customer service but it is really just marketing talk. When it comes to the crunch, he fails to deliver but instead makes excuses and puts the blame on anyone but Uptone and himself. Outrageously, he even believes in his own self manufactured press. I recall earlier correspondence with him on why the Uptone ISO Regen would disconnect from my DAC for no reason, requiring that I unplug and replug the DC cable from the Uptone LPS 1.2 for it to work again. Not knowing that I was powering it with a LPS 1.2, he began by questioning the power supply I used. When told it was a LPS 1.2, he blamed the issue on the Silanna chip Uptone used in the ISO Regen – after all, it was an Uptone supply and he could not blame that anymore. I mean you manufactured this product, sourced and supposedly tested the parts and then sold it to the customer as a finished product for good money. The sheer lack of responsibility, ethics and professionalism!

 

As an example of Alex being purely a marketing act, you can see on the Computer Audiophile forum how he derides Sonore’s optical module and Optical Rendu, since Uptone now makes a competing product. Recall, Uptone came into existence making derivative products such as USB fixers and power supplies to be used with Sonore’s series of streamers – the hypocrisy of it all.

 

I appreciate that others may have had a good experience dealing with Uptone Audio but unfortunately, that hasn’t been the case with me. Uptone strikes me as a bucket shop. There are lots of cottage industries and artisanal products in hi fi and that is fine and good, so long as they are run with honesty, integrity and professionalism and not at the expense of unsuspecting customers. Pete of Triode Wire Labs is a great example of a fine one man show company who provides great customer service. Uptone is definitely NOT - YMMV!


mikey8811
I know this is unrelated to the specific issue at hand BUT I am thinking of purchasing a cartridge from high-end-turntables in Switzerland and trying to determine their credibility before sending out payment. Anyone have any experience with them? Thanks
OK, I did finally wade through the entire mess, but it is very interesting, or else I just lead a dull life. I’d be interested to hear what @thyname thinks, which seems to be that Alex/Uptone is being improperly maligned. I am now of the opinion that mikey8811 is clearly in the right. This could explain why, as stated, "The vendetta runs very deep." I also think @terryakhan might want to either go through the entire mess too, or else understand that mikey8811 has been into audio equipment for 20 years, and has apparently only been upset with his dealings with Alex at Uptone.

I read the post from Alex (@crover) right after my posting, slightly interesting that it is an "ancient log-in account" yet has only one posting, but that could be something on Audiogon’s part. I also will have to disagree with the " This is a baseless campaign by a person who we treated well (as we do all our clients) but has some other agenda." I guess that will depend on your definition of "treated well."

One thing that jumped out to me, mikey8811 was trying to fix the old LPS 1 that had failed, his electronics guy found one problem, did the repair, but that didn’t fix it, so he needed two little capacitors, only found in the U.S., so he asks if they could be sent to Alex and just put in with the new LPS 1.2 he’s getting. Alex’s response, 10/17/19, "

Dear Y A:

I have already told you that it is not possible for us to assist you in repair of the original LPS-1. The special price offered to you to upgrade to LPS-1.2 is in lieu of any and all repair obligation regarding your old unit.

We do not stock those capacitors at our facility because we use a turnkey PCB assembly firm who handles ordering of all parts to our exact specifications.

I am very busy with EtherREGEN launch right now, so please do not ask again about LPS-1 repair advice."

OK, and this is BEFORE mikey8811 has paid for the new LPS 1.2, and Alex is telling him to forget about any assistance, even putting two little capacitors that are sent to him from an outside source, into the package for mikey8811. That should have been the point where mikey8811 started to question the wisdom of continuing to deal with Alex, but of course he’s got a lot of money already sunk into the junky LPS 1 that was supposedly "repaired" but really wasn’t. I’m thinking Alex should have been embarrassed enough that the LPS 1 failed so quickly to make the effort to help, but he wasn’t. Of course, on 9/18/19 Alex says "We are sorry to lose you as a client," which would thus leave mikey8811 with the junky LPS 1 that wasn’t working.

I had to chuckle at mikey8811’s comments, 100% accurate, in his 9/16/19 email to Alex,

Dear Alex

Thanks for your reply.

Let me see if I understand this correctly.

The LPS 1 is still under warranty as are many others out there. However, you do not have any new circuit boards for it. Instead, the circuit boards are from previously faulty units albeit now repaired or traded in ones. This is because the LPS 1 has been superceded by the LPS 1.2.

Correct. Though the board we installed in your replacement was from a trade-in. It was not a board that had been repaired.

My repaired unit’s replacement circuit board (not new) was thoroughly tested at your facility and yet it still failed after 3 months of use at best. You state that the failure rate of LPS 1’s are 3%. I guess I must have fallen into the really unlucky camp because I have literally had 2 units fail within a short time frame.

Correct.

" Correct." As a person who loves math, the odds of a 3% occurrence happening twice are 0.09%! Not even as good as the odds of you picking a winner on a Play-3 lottery, which of course I don’t do but that’s another discussion.

The 9/17/19 email from mikey8811 follows along the same thinking,
" Dear Alex

Thank you for your candour.

I will be traveling to Melbourne, Australia for work in 2 days. Do you have an authorised agent or distributor there with stock of the LPS 1?

If so, would I be able to do a one-to-one swap so I may lower the costs of return and repair.

I do not have high hopes for the longevity of the repaired unit given my previous experience and your admission of the poor quality of available parts and will probably have to write it off if it becomes defective once again. I am just hoping to minimise my losses from this experience.

While I appreciate your honesty and apology, I do hope you can also appreciate my point of view. My experience with the Uptone LPS 1 has not been the best to say the least and to chalk it down to my bad luck is something that leaves a bad aftertaste. To be honest, this is the only item in my Hi Fi setup to have malfunctioned in the last 20 years if my recollection serves me correctly. While I do enjoy the sonics of the LPS 1.2 in my system currently, I am wary about its longevity given the above. At this juncture, I am hesitant to throw more good money after bad and am unlikely to want to purchase another Uptone product. Again, this is no personal slur on you. "

Also note, nobody has referenced these emails by mikey8811 here, though they are at the other site.

So, after this ridiculousness, mikey8811 STILL continues on and buys the LPS 1.2, putting another $250 into it and the difference being the $185 warranty that Alex won’t have to honor, as discussed previously.

This is also noteworthy, Alex has referenced that he works on 100% markup, which means the LPS 1.2 costs 217.50 to produce, and he pays $35 shipping to Malaysia, so at $250 he’s losing $2.50 on this fiasco, and not having to bother repairing AGAIN the LPS1 that mikey8811 has. Quoting from @crover 1/10/20 post, " And since the retail price of our products--at only double our actual costs-- "

So immediately upon receiving it mikey8811 says there is a problem, even stating he believes it isn’t new. This is the only place where I’ll disagree, although I can’t state definitely until I see more evidence, I’m believing it was new. The pictures are fairly grim regarding the screws, and chuckling again, mikey8811 says "Here are the photos you didn’t include, which clearly show the damage." So Alex posts this massive amount of information, but leaves out the photos?

OK, even with the questionable screws, that is fairly technical but from the photos looks to be a legitimate complaint.

The ultimate deciding factor though is the "0.1mm too short" circuit board as stated by Alex in the 10/28/19 email and mikey8811’s logical response:

" Any rattle you hear is only from the entire circuit board not being held firm in the slots by pressure from the front/back plates. The PCB has close +/- tolerance for length, and sometimes a few are just 0.1mm short—enough to keep the end plates from holding it steady. We have a trick to fix that (a bit of electrical tape along the inside of the front plate is enough thickness), but perhaps we missed your unit or the temperature is different in your environment"

mikey8811: "There is a recurring thread where you tellingly seem to know exactly what has caused the damage. Yet are not decent enough to take responsibility for your own negligence but rather ask me to open up the unit myself and mount electrical tape. As mentioned, I am not technically inclined nor do I own the implements necessary to fix issues with the used and/ or damaged unit you sent. I would have to pay a technician to so so which is ludicrous as I paid for a new and finished product which was clearly not shipped as such.

There is only your word that there are no loose parts and your words have been proven to lack credibility.

Good customer service only happens when you perform it. Not when you just talk endlessly about how good it is. "

I loved what Alex said, "the temperature is different in your environment!" Does he make them in Alaska? Also, they didn’t "perhaps we missed your unit," they did miss the unit.

So a refund is due, it should be $435 because that is what mikey8811 has into it. Alex’s claim that mikey8811 has already gotten the money back is false, because Alex is challenging the claim. If the credit card company decides in favor of Alex, it is only because mikey8811 has’t shipped the unit back at his own expense, which really should be paid for by Alex for sending a clearly defective, by his own admission, unit.  And if mikey8811 did ship the defective LPS 1.2 back, even getting the $250 back from the credit card company, he's still out the $185 repair he's due for the junky LPS 1 that Alex sent him.

As a final disclaimer, I have never met nor dealt with either person.


@the_treble_with_tribbles  Thank you for taking the time to go through the copious email chain.

Thanks also for your impartial reading of the situation.
As I mentioned, it seems unlikely that I will see my money back but do hope that people will see the issues here for what they really are.
i did not read all that stuff
 When a small priced product is returned The repair is to expensive to fix .  So the company just sends a different one  in most cases .  You just got unlucky.   Let's move on 
I am not sure that the credit card company will side with the buyer as long as he has the replacement LPS-1.2 in his procession.