Promedia 5.1 Ultra and THX PLEASE TAKE A LOOK!!!

[cmay119]

My thoughts exactly, Satchel. I've had mine for 5 years before they finally started producing the symptoms that others had been experiencing. I sent my Amp to elliot on 10/19/09. I hope to have the amp back this week. I'm very excited as I don't believe there is another PC speaker system on the market that matches the 5.1 ultra's (Unless you consider the iFi a direct competitor).

[trackeer]

Hey All,

I have a set of 5.1 Promedia's, they were pruchased either 04-05 can't remember when as part of a VooDoo PC system, seems HP did them in, lol. After about

5 years they tanked, I am somewhat at odds as sometimes they work, sometimes they click and have lots of static from the sats and if I play with the volume I can make them work, sometimes??? I am a wanna be Audiophile and enjoy decent sound, the Promedia's really do for a PC what decent home Audio does for a Surround Sound System. Whats baffling is the fact the this system failed at all, it does not see tons of use, nor do I crank the volume till the thing clips, it was a desk top system for a High End PC, painted to match, I think thats the real bummer, I have upgraded the PC and actually rather fond of this PC. I am considering popping the system open and checking things out, proably get electricuted, but, then there's the Lawsuit, man dies after looking at the equipment that is known to fail and the manufacturer did nodda about it, sweet, to bad I'l be dead, lmao.

Later

Moe

[cmay119]

w00t! Just received my amp back from Elliot-tronics today. Absolutely awesome to have my amp back up and running. I can't recommend this guy enough. He was very responsive through the whole process and kept his word on the turn time. They sound better than ever now! The sound is more pronounced and accurate and the subwoofer is delivering like I've never heard it do before.

If your amp is failing and don't know about how to fix it yourself, don't hesitate to contact him and get your repair setup. It was well worth it!

[Stocklone]

I own two pairs of ultras. One was a replacement for an original 5.1 that failed. I bought a BestBuy extended warranty after reading the forums. The replacement set and the other set I purchased have not failed yet. It's been quite a few years. One set is in the bedroom so it only gets used at night for a couple hours and the other is on a secondary computer that only gets used every couple days. If they do ever fail, I will be sending them to get upgraded parts for sure. I am so glad I read this thread.

[hanna]

an audio dealer in my town is selling a brand new set of Promedia 5.1 Ultra's for $325 (his cost, he says)...i was thinking about buying them until i came across this thread.

can anyone recommend comparable speakers? or perhaps even the next step down in price?

thanks!

[dgoreck]

I still don't think anything can touch these in its price range. I've had mine for about 5 years now, no issues. For every 1 person on here with an issue, I am sure 100+ where sold, and without issues. *knocks on wood* Same goes with most any reviews on the web. It's the unhappy ones who are vocal.

[satchel]

Mine were $359 from Newegg six years ago. They worked great for over five years then needed repair. Elliot refurbished the amp with mil-spec parts and they now sound even better. You should jump on a NIB set for $325. They sound fantastic.

[mouths of the babes]

I still don't think anything can touch these in its price range. I've had mine for about 5 years now, no issues. For every 1 person on here with an issue, I am sure 100+ where sold, and without issues. *knocks on wood* Same goes with most any reviews on the web. It's the unhappy ones who are vocal.

No, this speaker system is defective by design. For one thing, Klipsch skimped out on the quality of the components on the ac to dc converter in the amplifier. They are exposed to heat higher than the parts are rated. This is most likely why the system has a measly 1 year warranty, while the non-computer speaker systems klipsch sells carries a 2 to 5 year warranty.

Look at the distribution of user reviews at amazon. You can see that half are at the lowest rating while the other half the highest. And the low ratings all complain of the same thing: total failure of the sub or speakers. Statistically speaking, this means something isn't right. Now look at newegg's reviews of the promedia ultra. The star ratings are more positive, but if you actually read the reviews they are negative (Newegg reviewers aren't the smartest). And again, all complaining of the same thing. Compare this to the amazon reviews of Logitech's G51 computer system and the Z-5500. All postive except for very few.

Look at the ongoing thread at Hardforum (its a popular computer related forum) with a whopping 264 replies so far and 42,000 views-- the most in that particular section of the website. You don't see this kind of thing with other speaker systems. Some people have even had their systems break numerous times!

The owner of the website that contains the schematics to these systems explains problems with them on his pages.

And finally, look at this guy on e-bay talking at length about the heat issue.

What's really depressing is that the higher rated components which could prevent the damage to the rest of the amp cost about a dollar or two more than what they used! Klipsch became greedy and, because of that, ruined many hundreds, if not thousands of people's audio systems and wasted tens of thousands of cumulative hours of their customer's time. Instead of issuing a recall, Klipsch decides to discontinue the system and sweep the problem under the rug. Personally, I will never buy another item from them again and I will tell everyone who asks about this company not to buy from them. The management should be ashamed of themselves.

[hhendricks3]

I also sent my Amp to Elliot and it's been about 3 months now. I was getting response to e-mails, now nothing. I wouldn't care that it takes so long it's just in several e-mails he promised they would be shipped the next day or two with a tracking number..........and alas no.

I used him because of some recommendations I had through this site, but it should be a big BUYER BEWARE !!! Now I don't know if I'm out $118 and NO Amp or what.[bs]

finally got Amp back and seems to be doing good. LONG wait but he DID come through

[puddytat99]

I also sent Elliott my amp!!!!! When I emailed him multiple times to inquire about service, shipping, payment he was immediately able to respond and give details. He told me the turnaround time on the amp repair would be 20 days from the time it was shipped. It is now past that allotted time and I've emailed elliott several times and have gotten no response. I would far greatly prefer to have a working amp than to have to go through the process of a dispute with pay pal and my credit card company. From what I read here, his promised 20 day turnaround doesn't seem to happen very often, but declining to reply to customers is very bad business. I found elliott through these forums and I will post my experience here as well.

[vertices]

He's had my amp since end of July. Sent it back once after 2 months worse than it was. I sent it back OCtober 5th with a promised 5 day turn around this time and he's yet to respond to any emails. So he has my money and my broken amp, and it's been over 4 months.

Just a note for anyone else going through this, I just got off the phone with the Cedar Hill Police Department. It's ~$200 to file a civil suit so not really worth it, but you can send Elliot a letter via certified mail demanding that he return your functioning amplifier, or your broken amplifier and your money within 10 days.

At the same time, send a copy of this letter, along with who you are, contact info, description of your issue, and a copy of the certified letter receipt that you sent to Elliot to the following address:

Cedar Hill Police Department

285 Uptown Blvd.

Cedar Hill TX, 75104

Wait 10 days. Then if you haven't received your repaired amp, or your broken amp and money back, contact the Cedar Hill Police Department at 972-291-5181.

Essentially you have to send this final ultimatum demand letter and prove that you did. Once he doesn't comply, the local authorities will get involved.

I'll be sending out my letters tomorrow.

[drich73]

Please just respond I really want my amp repaired I thought this was a good thing and not a scam this is the last contact I have had:

----- Original Message -----
From: "elliot-tronics.com" <eliott4113@yahoo.com>
To: drich73@comcast.net
Sent: Thursday, November 4, 2010 9:32:29 PM
Subject: Re: status

OK, I'm still working on your amp and should be finished by next week, you'll get an e-mail with the fedex tracking info after is shipped. Regards, Elliott I really just would like my amp

[wydopn]

Guys, I just came across this thread while searching for others that have had problems with Elliot Tronics - did you ever get your amp back? My last email response from him was in August stating he would send them back in a week. The I spoke to him in September and again October and I still haven't received my amp back. I also contacted PayPal to ask for their assistance in at least shutting him down? This is absolutely nuts based on the feedback and others I have spoken to? Seems like this guy went from Klipsch repair rockstar to straight thief? By the way, I did speak to a Klipsch representative who did make a call to Elliot on my behalf which was nice, but I never heard if he got a response from him or not.

[trackeer]

LOLOL,

I have not been back here in some time, I recieve blips about the goings on with this guy Elliot and to be honest my Pro-Media system sits in a closet collecting dust,

I have fired it up on a few occasions and it would work and then promtly shut down, as one previous poster stated you can polish shit forever and in the end it's still shit.

I think Klipsch should have stepped up and done the right thing and fixed what appears to be a faulty product especially relevent to the number of failures, shit if this was any other number of products with a small fraction of the failures would have prompted a product re-call!!!!!

I for one will NEVER purchase another Klipsch product again and why any of you would bother is beyond me, the Pro-Media speaker set was hardly cheap for the product type and for a company like Klipsch to ignore it's failings hardly justifies any continued consumer support on my end for sure. The nice thing about the Internet is you can literally reach out and touch someone and if enough folks do just that you can touch Klipsch where it will hurt the most, $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$.

Best of luck with your repairs if anyone has interest I will gladly sell you my set up, they came as part of a PC setup from VooDoo PC since purchased by HP then promptly assimilatted into HP's mainstream crap they build. But anyways, they are painted a nice Black to match the PC which I still own and have occasionally upgraded only to keep pace with today's technology not because a particular part failed "cough"!!!!

Gooid Luck

Moe in NH

[Youthman]

I for one will NEVER purchase another Klipsch product again and why any of you would bother is beyond me

I agree that the promedia (from my experience) appears to be junk with a faulty design. I too wish Klipsch would have stepped up and recalled to correct the problem. But just because one product they make stinks, doesn't deem the rest of their products as junk. There is no doubt in my mind that Klipsch makes high quality speakers. I just will not be buying another promedia system. []

[satchel]

I believe it is such a great sounding piece of equipment that I will pay to refurbish it again someday! It dang sure won't go back to Elliot but I will give Henry Koch in Minnesota a shot at it with his experience upgrading parts and adding a cooling fan setup.

[trackeer]

LOL,

No intent to insult your audio/video setup, as I see you have Klipsch speakers but had it been that I went on this site and saw a few random failures and a few folks bitching and moaning about a purchase that failed I would agree with you. But, Klipsch built the products and put their name on the end result and apparently sold a crap load of these systems and may I add they were not inexpesive and then a massive fall out occurs and luckly for them these weren't cars, car seats, and any number of other items or they would have been required by law to re-call them and for all we know if the failures could have caused fire or property damage a recall could have been intiated!!! So, in this case I stand by my comment and feel that one bad product may not make a company a bad but how they handled the problem makes them very questionable at the least, so NO I WILL NEVER BUY KLIPSCH PRODUCTS AGAIN, how do you say POOR customer service deserves nothing less than no customers at all!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

PS, want to buy some more KLIPSHIT, I have a really nice set of Black Painted Pro-Media speakers and a Non-Functioning Sub/AMP

[Youthman]

No intent to insult your audio/video setup

None taken

So, in this case I stand by my comment and feel that one bad product may not make a company a bad but how they handled the problem makes them very questionable at the least, so NO I WILL NEVER BUY KLIPSCH PRODUCTS AGAIN, how do you say POOR customer service deserves nothing less than no customers at all!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I don't know the statistics on how many sold vs how many complaints. People tend to voice their complaints much more than they voice their praises. So to say that Klipsch is not responding appropriately is unfair unless you personally know the numbers. They honor their warranty which is all a company is responsible for.

Good luck with your search for new speakers. There are many other options out there.

[jmartone]

I got the PMU 5.1 from Dell back in 2005 when I purchased my XPS Gen4 dream system. I often leave the entire system on for days. In 2009 I began to hear crackling/popping both when I was listening to something and when the system was idle (espcially noticable when idle). Eventually the subwoofer just quit altogether. However, the 5 satelites still work fine. So now I've basically got a 5.0 system. Anyone else experience this? Suggestions.

I really love the sound of this system. I not heard anything that comes close to it (for the price). I just bought myself a Christmas present (Mirage MX) for my home theatre. They sound great but can't touch the PMU what I really want to do (and what I've wanted to do for years) is hook my PMU 5.1s up to the home theatre. Like many others, I've been searching for a DD-5.1 or DDTS-100 (but that's for another post).

Regards and Happy New Year.

[Mister_Clean]

Well, you can still use the sats for the Home Theater, but to be honest, most of the Subs made for Home Theater are far superior to the Sub for the ProMedia 5.1 Ultra. The sats would sound fine on a Home Theater Receiver though and in fact I still use one for my center Channel, no issues at all. You can actually even get better sound out of of each sat. Mirage are suposed to be nice though, but I have not heard them myself, I use and love Definitive Technology Speakers and JBL speakers as well. My Vote, is use the Sats (or atleast try them out) and then sell your Klipsch sub for parts.