Beware of dealing with PurePower Partners Inc

The story below is true and Zaki Yeh of ProPower is the original inventor of the regenerators,
http://www.ppowerus.com/audio/provspure/
http://www.ppowerus.com/audio/propower-purepower/
read about my bad experience with Richard and Damian Janzen of PurePower here:
https://forum.audiogon.com/discussions/bad-experience-with-purepower-of-canada

I know this is a late response but I do appreciate everyone telling their stories here. I have been perusing power products and remember them from years ago. Their website is still up. Pretty much every US dealer listed on their website no longer carries or advertises their products (or the links themselves are broken). I can still find them on the PartsConnexion website.  Sounds like they should be avoided.

Audiobrian:

Yes, he must be the original designer of the first PurePower units.

Google search on, AC regenerators for home audio, and follow the links on their site.

They are only sold in Europe however!

Probably due to PurePower Canada owning the North American rights.

I found a company on the web called ProPower which builds AC regenerators with battery backup, with units that look identical to PuerPower. I guess this is the Chinese company that produced the units for PurePower Canada before the feud. Now a competitor, I guess. Anyone know of ProPower?

Oops, sorry about that- APC.com makes the line of Uninterrupted Power Supplies, mainly for computers and other appliances at home as well as in large businesses.
But if you call them they can recommend certain items that are well designed for audio systems. I gave them specific detains about my system (my amps make 500W each), and customer service was still able to recommend 3 or 4 different units, none cost more than $1500- most of them quite less.

French_fries,

You said you contacted "UPS" about which units they would recommend. What company is that? What is the full company name, and how do we contact them?

Thanks!

Thanks Alan,

I hope to keep my 1050 running as long as I can. There seem to be no other choices except PS Audio, which also has issues.

I believe the older 1050's were made in Taiwan not Canada.

I think the original design was done by the Taiwan manufacturer (which also makes industrial regenerators).

PurePower may have bought or commissioned, the design from them. Their relations turned bad, and they then "tried" to build in Canada. That was the start of all the problems.

i too was tempted to buy a PUREPOWER 3000 to address brownouts (frequent where i live) to protect my amplifiers. After doing a little research i came upon
all of the customer complaints and demanded the seller get written confirmation that the unit i was buying was the latest and most bug-free unit they had produced up to that time. The company never responded to my emails or the sellers, so i
forget about the whole thing. But i DID contact UPS about which units they would recommend SPECIFICALLY for audio systems with the smallest amount of added noise or other distortion products. they gave me several suggestions and assured me that they would absolutely work extremely well with my high-end system.
Their reputation is pretty good so i think they are well worth a try- and for
tons less money as well. The PurePower 3000 presently retails for $5800 without additional options (better batteries and better power plugs). If
it were only the best possible component on the market it "might" actually be worth it.

Hi Don,

The battery that I ordered (you need three) is made by CSB (China Storage Battery), and the model number is HRL-1234W-F2-FR. The "L" means that it is the premium long-life battery, and the F2, which is very important, specifies the terminals, which match the leads inside the 1050.

I ordered the batteries from Mouser Electronics. Google them on-line and you'll find them. Their service was excellent, very fast, unlike PurePower. Mouser adds "632" to the front of the part number, just in case you need that to order them. The batteries came extremely well-packed, and they arrived in perfect condition.

I assume you have the PDF file with illustrated 1050 battery replacement instructions. It is on the PurePower website. If you have trouble finding it, let me know and I'll be happy to send the file to you. Just provide your E-mail address.

I hope our 1050's keep working!

Regards,
Alan Hayman

A haymam:

I have a 1050 that has worked flawlessly for 5 years.

What is the source of the replacement batteries that you found?

Thanks,
Don C.

A_hayman/Cbachalo: Sorry to hear of your issues and stolen funds. Many have been defrauded by this father and son team and to make it worse, they are arrogant and could not find the truth with a basket and a lamp. I wish you luck in pursuing this; if you find a way to bring them to justice, there are alot of people who would be interested in following suit. Best of luck to you both.

I am afraid that I must add my own account of my recent experience trying to order a new PurePower+ 1500.

My history with PurePower started in 2009, when my ExactPower EP15A self-destructed, the company that bought out ExactPower serviced the unit but did not solve the problem, and the new company then refused to support what they termed “legacy units”, since they lost a lot of money on the buyout and found numerous problems in design and manufacture. I needed to find another solution to protect my music system.

After doing some research, and exchanging E-mails with PurePower, I ordered a PurePower 1050. It arrived promptly, and did everything it was supposed to do: it dramatically improved the sound of my system, and protected it from anomalies on the AC line, including blackouts. I was very happy with it.

After 5-1/2 years, the batteries in the 1050 were depleted and stopped protecting my system from blackouts. When I saw the literature on the PurePower+ 1500, I decided to investigate it rather than replace the batteries in the 1050. I had several E-mail exchanges with both Damian Janzen and Richard Janzen of PurePower; their replies were always prompt and informative. They sent me a list of recommended replacement batteries for the 1050, and battery replacement instructions in PDF format, in case I decided to stick with the 1050. They also offered me a trade-in discount against the purchase price of the 1500, and offered to have me keep the 1050 until the 1500 arrived. Their positive approach convinced me, and I decided to order a 1500 with Wattgate 381 Ag receptacles and the premium long-life battery option.

Since I had had a positive experience with PurePower when I bought the 1050, I had no reason to suspect that I would have problems when I ordered the 1500, since I had not yet seen all of the posts on AudiogoN and elsewhere discussing the negative experiences that others had had.

Here is a timeline of the progress of my order for the PurePower+ 1500.

—  Monday, June 29:  I wired them $3740. In retrospect, their inability to accept credit card purchases and their requirement of wired pre-payment should have been a red flag, but, as I mentioned earlier, my previous positive experience led me to believe that I had nothing to worry about. If I had seen all of the negative posts, I probably would not have gone ahead with the order.

—  Monday, July 6:  After hearing nothing from them, I E-mailed them.  They responded and acknowledged receipt of the wire transfer, and said that the unit would ship at the end of that week.

—  Monday, July 20:  After hearing nothing from them, I E-mailed them.  They responded and said that the unit had been built and was ready to ship, and that shipment had been held up by a late shipment of batteries.  They said the unit would ship the end of that week.

—  Tuesday, August 4:  After hearing nothing from them, I E-mailed them.  They responded and said that Customs red tape had been holding up shipment.  They said that I would receive tracking information by the end of that week.

—  Tuesday, August 18:  After hearing nothing from them, I E-mailed them.  I recapped the specifications of my unit, my shipping address, and my contact phone numbers, and I asked them to ship as soon as possible. By now, I was getting a sinking feeling that perhaps not all was right with PurePower, and that I might have made a mistake in placing a pre-paid order for a 1500. On a hunch, I checked the AudiogoN forums, as well as other forums, and when I saw all the negative posts, I realized that I had a problem.

—  Friday, August 21:  After hearing nothing from them, I sent them a respectful but strongly-worded E-mail, saying that my patience was exhausted after all the unfulfilled promises and the failures to ship my unit on time, and offered them the option of immediately shipping my unit (which, by their own statement, had been built and was ready to ship for five weeks) or wiring me a refund. I provided my account information for their use if they opted to send me a refund. I also told them that if I didn’t see decisive action from them in a week, either to ship my unit or to wire a refund, that I would contact the American and Canadian authorities and issue a complaint of fraud.

—  Friday, August 21:  That afternoon, I got a terse reply, saying that I would have tracking information by Monday, August 24.

—  Monday, August 24:  I sent them an E-mail, reminding them that they had promised to ship my unit that day. I again provided the specifications of my unit, my shipping address, and my contact information.

As of this posting, it has been seven weeks, and I have heard nothing from them. I don’t understand what is going on over there. Sometimes my E-mails were answered, and sometimes they were not. Whenever they answered, they promised shipment by the end of that week, but not only did they never follow through, they never kept me informed by E-mail of any changes or delays. Is it lack of communication between management, sales, production and shipping? Is it quality control problems in production? Is it gross incompetence? Is it an impending bankruptcy? Is it a calculated effort to mislead and ultimately to defraud their customers? I don’t know. I can only say that four times I was promised shipment of a 1500 within a few days, and four times I heard nothing for two weeks or more; I had to E-mail them to get information, and if I got an answer, the excuse for non-shipment was different each time.

After seeing the negative posts on AudiogoN regarding PurePower customer service, and given the succession of unfulfilled promises from them, I decided that I cannot rely on them to provide appropriate or timely customer service in the event that they do ship the 1500 and I have a problem with it. I realized that I had better keep my 1050 as a backup instead of shipping it to them as a trade-in. Following on this decision, I then did what I should have done originally: I ordered a set of three replacement batteries for my 1050 from a separate battery supplier, not from PurePower. I received them in two days; they have been installed in my 1050, which is back on-line and working properly.

Another consideration: even if they ship me a unit, I might not know what I’m getting. After it was built, if in fact they ever did build a unit for me, my unit may have been cannibalized to provide parts for other units that had been sent back for repair, and then reworked. From my experience in electronics, reworking electronic circuits may introduce problems that did not exist in the original fabrication, such as poor solder joints and lifted eyelets and circuit traces on printed-circuit boards.

I can empathize with Dagordon, the previous poster, who said that he doesn’t like being stolen from. I don’t like being swindled, and I don’t like being lied to or given promises that they apparently don’t intend to keep. I also don’t appreciate the fact that the quality of their customer service dropped precipitously once they had my money. At this point, however, the money that they got from me is not worth the aggravation, the lost time, and the legal expense of trying to force them to provide a unit or a refund. I sent them a registered letter, telling them that I had purchased new batteries and had installed them in my 1050, and that I no longer needed a 1500. In the letter, I told them that since they had defaulted on our purchase agreement, by failing four times to meet a promised ship date after receiving payment, I was canceling my order and requesting a refund. So far, I have not heard from them. I sent a follow-up E-mail, repeating my request for a refund, and expressing concern that the way they are conducting business might destroy the company’s reputation and ultimately the company itself. So far, I still have not received a response. I might follow up with additional E-mails, and I might contact the American or Canadian authorities, but ultimately I may have to chalk this up as an expensive lesson. I would appreciate any other advice fellow AudiogoN-ers may have to solve this issue.

An unfortunate aspect of this situation is that, as far as I know, PurePower is the only company that manufactures (or, possibly, manufactured) an AC regenerator that not only is designed specifically for audio systems, but also incorporates the functions of a UPS. Some posters have had problems with the 1050, but I seem to have a good unit; the only problem I ever had with it was some audible vibration of the top cover from the internal fan, which I solved by putting an issue of Fanfare on the top cover to damp the vibration. After the unit was broken in, though, that problem went away, and the fan now runs more quietly than it did when the unit was new. The 1050 makes a substantial difference in my music playback system, which sounds as good as ever, and the 1050 has already protected my system from a power outage with the new batteries.

I hope my 1050 never fails, but if it does, I will look elsewhere for a replacement rather than sending it back to PurePower for service. I would welcome information on any other company that sells such a unit, and that could be an alternative to PurePower.

I would advise anyone contemplating the purchase of any PurePower products, or the return of any product to PurePower for service, to exercise caution.

BTW....add Isotek and Bybee to the list of GOOD companies with great products to consider.

Just saw the price list you must be referencing Audiobrian; unbelievable they would actually raise their prices with so much negative feedback out there for them. That takes 'stones' to say the least....

Dagordon: Your experience or similar has been lived by others; unfortunately, there are way too many threads and stories that are all the same with this small company. Best of luck to you....

I noticed PPP pricing has recently increased by about 25%. Quality control and customer service remain suspect. Audience, Torus and Furman, amongst others, make excellent conditioning products and have top tier customer support...for what it's worth.

PurePower Canada has officially earned the title of the single worst company I have ever had to deal with. They are either stunningly incompetent, or simply criminal. The degree of incompetence would have to be so great, though, as to be virtually impossible to believe, which makes me think the latter (they are criminals) is the more likely scenario. I can only conclude that they have knowingly stolen my PurePower 2000. I am writing this as a warning to others.

I purchased a PurePower 2000 many years ago and it worked fine, but I decided to sell it as I switched to a different power conditioning solution. I sold the unit to someone, and he claimed it would not work on battery backup. As my only explanation was that the batteries must have died, I ordered replacement batteries from PurePower to be shipped directly to the buyer at my expense. The batteries were never shipped. I repeatedly tried to contact PurePower, to no avail. Weeks went by, and the buyer filed a claim with PayPal and returned the unit to me.

At some point PurePower finally responded to my emails and apologized, offering to do a complete workup on the unit and replace the batteries. This was in May 2014. I (stupidly) shipped the unit to them then, and they have had it ever since (over a year).

I've called them approximately every week for the past 6-8 weeks. First, I should say that they hardly ever answer the phone, and if you think they're going to return a message or an email, good luck to you. When they do ultimately answer the phone, each time it's the same story -- they have the unit right there, it will ship "tomorrow", there was a delay because they didn't have the right packaging material / they were moving / the moon phase wasn't quite right / assorted other nonsense.

I can only conclude that they are simply never going to send it back to me.

At this point it's not about the money -- I just don't like being stolen from. I'm likely going to pursue legal action against them, even if it ends up costing me more in legal fees than the price of the unit.

In the meantime -- BEWARE. 

Is the company still around?

I had a PP2000 for quite a while and loved what it did for my system. At one point before this thread started, earlier in 2013, I took a brand new 3000+ demo unit (that my dealer had paid PP for and wound up waiting MANY months for delivery of, having to threaten legal action along the way himself) in for a couple of days to try it out. It introduced a ton of noise and even a bee-hive buzzing sound from my speakers. After alot of back and forth, Richard claimed that it must be something wrong with my system, which was fine with the old PP2000 up and running ironically enough, and that the plus-unit was fully testing and worked perfectly. Suffice it to say I never succumbed to their brand of logic blaming my system and never upgraded to the plus-unit. I'm leaving alot of details out but over a multi-year period there were many threads, calls, unreturned calls, etc..for both my dealer and I that bear out the same type of b.s. with PP as is mentioned above. In short, I would never again purchase one of their products nor would I suggest anyone else do so. Buyer Beware.....

I would file a complaint with BBB and the AGs office of consumer affairs as well as doing the small claims thing.

Call Nicky Santoro

Kick butt on them Turkeys HELLO!!!

Yep, those guys are the "King" of B.S. stay far away.

good to know ,they must be overwhelmed! very bad way to do biz,,5 months is too much to wait

This is a never ending story from this company.
I suspect they are using parts of your unit to fix others and so on.
Good luck!

Audience is a much better unit with GREAT service!!

From what I gather, they are a father and son team? Sounds to me like they are in over their head. That's why I am very leery of the small manufacturers.