A Truly Modular PSU with Lifetime Warranty? Any UK Distributors/Retailers?

[UseItNow]

Hi folks, just came across this on Fudzilla.

I for one have always been a fan of Ultra PSU's since seeing them in a mate's rig a few years ago.
This new X4 line-up from Ultra says it all to me, these seem fully modular - even the fixed 24pin & 4/8 pin connectors are modular!

Couple this with a lifetime warranty! It has to say something about the build quality of the component, wouldn't you say? I for one, would be tempted into getting one for my rig, however, there doesn't seem to be a UK retailer for these, is it that Ultra only serve the US market?

Fudzilla: http://www.fudzilla.com/content/view/16026/1/

What are your thoughts on this?

[nightkhaos]

I still think this is better, even through the warrenty is only 7 years.

[Salazaar]

AFAIK lifetime warranties aren't valid under European/UK law.

[peterb]

Lifetime warranty is meaningless unless the life of the product is specified. If I made and sold a PSU with a lifetime warranty, you wouldn't think it so good if I stated that the design life was only 3 months!

[nightkhaos]

AFAIK lifetime warranties aren't valid under European/UK law.

I thought they specificed it to be a reasonable lifetime period of the product, or something like that... but then we get into the agruement of reasonable and it's gets messy.

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

They look nice PSUs and the fully modular nature for ALL the cables is an excellent move IMHO.

This company sells one of the Ultra Lifetime Series PSUs:

http://www.overstock.com/Electronics...tml?cid=133635

[Saracen]

They look nice PSUs and the fully modular nature for ALL the cables is an excellent move IMHO.

This company sells one of the Ultra Lifetime Series PSUs:

http://www.overstock.com/Electronics...tml?cid=133635

US company though - Salt Lake City. They just ship to the UK.

[Saracen]

I'm a bit sceptical about the limited Lifetime Warranty, too.

Firstly, according to the warranty, you have to ship the PSU to Ultra, which (as far as I can tell) means to the USA. I question whether the cost of that makes it an attractive feature of a warranty fir UK buyers?

Secondly, there's a list of things the warranty excludes, such as (quite reasonably) accidental damage, abuse, incorrect installation, and so on, but the two with the widest scope are :-

- normal wear and tear
- other causes not arising out of defects in the materials or workmanship of Products.

Oh, and the warranty is non-transferable to other people too, and requires a legit copy of the original purchase receipt.

So, essentially, it covers you for breakdowns due to defects in materials or workmanship, excluding normal wear and tear. UK consumer protection legislation offers similar cover, and does it without requiring products to go back to the US first, though only for the "reasonable life" of the product, and you may have to prove the nature of the cause of the failure.

But, by excluding "normal wear and tear", what Ultra are essentially saying is that cover is for the reasonable life of the product but without specifying what that is. Also, of course, they get to determine if the cause is wear and tear or not, and as part of the warranty stipulates jurisdiction is exclusive to the state courts, if you want to dispute their finding under the warranty, you'll be doing it in an Ohio court.

About the power supply itself, I have no opinion. It looks okay, but I know nothing about it. What I would say is that a "limited lifetime warranty" is at least partly a marketing exercise, because the limitations and exclusions limit it to broadly the same cover as UK buyers get from statutory protection anyway. And personally, I'd rather rely on cover from UK legislation, like the DSR and SoGA than a US-based warranty. But maybe that's just me and my preference for an easy life.

[UseItNow]

AFAIK lifetime warranties aren't valid under European/UK law.

I'm aware of that, for example I'm pretty sure BFG have a lifetime warranty policy (http://www.bfgtech.com/warranty.aspx), however, that doesn't apply outside the US & Canada.
It's nice to see a manufacturer have confidence in their product?

Lifetime warranty is meaningless unless the life of the product is specified. If I made and sold a PSU with a lifetime warranty, you wouldn't think it so good if I stated that the design life was only 3 months!

I'm aware of this too, looking at Ultra's site it doesn't seem to specify this, so was a bit of a concern but this also leads me onto Saracens post.

I thought they specificed it to be a reasonable lifetime period of the product, or something like that... but then we get into the agruement of reasonable and it's gets messy.

See above reply to peterb's post. Oh yeah, to your other post, all I have currently is Corsair PSU's!

I'm a bit sceptical about the limited Lifetime Warranty, too.

Firstly, according to the warranty, you have to ship the PSU to Ultra, which (as far as I can tell) means to the USA. I question whether the cost of that makes it an attractive feature of a warranty fir UK buyers?

Secondly, there's a list of things the warranty excludes, such as (quite reasonably) accidental damage, abuse, incorrect installation, and so on, but the two with the widest scope are :-

- normal wear and tear
- other causes not arising out of defects in the materials or workmanship of Products.

Oh, and the warranty is non-transferable to other people too, and requires a legit copy of the original purchase receipt.

So, essentially, it covers you for breakdowns due to defects in materials or workmanship, excluding normal wear and tear. UK consumer protection legislation offers similar cover, and does it without requiring products to go back to the US first, though only for the "reasonable life" of the product, and you may have to prove the nature of the cause of the failure.

But, by excluding "normal wear and tear", what Ultra are essentially saying is that cover is for the reasonable life of the product but without specifying what that is. Also, of course, they get to determine if the cause is wear and tear or not, and as part of the warranty stipulates jurisdiction is exclusive to the state courts, if you want to dispute their finding under the warranty, you'll be doing it in an Ohio court.

About the power supply itself, I have no opinion. It looks okay, but I know nothing about it. What I would say is that a "limited lifetime warranty" is at least partly a marketing exercise, because the limitations and exclusions limit it to broadly the same cover as UK buyers get from statutory protection anyway. And personally, I'd rather rely on cover from UK legislation, like the DSR and SoGA than a US-based warranty. But maybe that's just me and my preference for an easy life.

Saracen, as you state it's the shipping to the USA that put me off, forget the shortage of UK retailers stocking it or even UK supply if Ultra are marketing/selling here?

I remember when I first got my HX520W, I was almost put off by the USA RMA then, now they have RMA to Netherlands which is still quite expensive (think £12+). However, I went ahead with the purchase for it when Scan sorted out the Direct RMA to them for Corsair PSU's brought from them. As you say "maybe that's just me and my preference for an easy life".

In regards to your second point, I assumed a lot of warranties have exclusions similar to those stated by Ultra don't they? Yes, I am also sceptical when a company specifically states wear and tear but I thought this was a common exclusion, I may be wrong, you would be the very person to ask, as we have done in the past mate!

I would also assume non-transferability of warranty by many other manufacturers?

Finally, in regards to the PSU they do look nice, although I don't know much about them in terms of quality and so on, however, I was more interested in what they have done with the cables in that they are fully modular. Do brands such as Corsair/Enermax/Seasonic have anything like that? Although you could argue is it really required? After all, you would have to plug in the 24pin ATX & 4/8pin CPU cables, so it doesn't make any difference if they are fixed or not but it does look good!

[Saracen]

....

In regards to your second point, I assumed a lot of warranties have exclusions similar to those stated by Ultra don't they? Yes, I am also sceptical when a company specifically states wear and tear but I thought this was a common exclusion, I may be wrong, you would be the very person to ask, as we have done in the past mate!

I would also assume non-transferability of warranty by many other manufacturers?

Oh yes, I'd think so on both points.

I'm not suggesting that they're warranty is underhand or anything. I'd think the terms are pretty much boilerplate, not unreasonable and wouldn't expect much different.

My point wasn't that the warranty was poor or anything. It's more that I think it reflects a different way of doing things in the US, and less reliance on consumer protection that we have here.

I guess what I'm saying, by calling it a marketing exercise, is that it's easy to be seduced by "lifetime warranty", but it should be remembered it's a "limited" lifetime warranty ..... so check the limits. If you do, it pretty much boils down to what we expect in terms of standard coverage anyway. Which leads me to conclude that the way it's marketed, as a "lifetime" warranty is actually a bit illusory, so I'd suggest pretty much ignoring that in the buying decision. I think, and it's personal opinion only, that we're better, or at least as well, served by having UK consumer protection than that warranty. I'd much prefer to have recourse to a UK seller, and if those PSUs were (or maybe are) available in the UK from a UK seller, how much benefit would that warranty be? If the manufacturer offered that warranty in the UK, then they can be held to it here, but if a UK seller were to supply, even with the approval of a US manufacturer, I don't envy the chances of enforcing a US warranty here and enforcing it in the US, from here, would be prohibitively expensive and, I'd have thought, wholly impractical.

All I'm saying is that I think, in deciding whether to buy one, from the US or from a UK seller, I'm not convinced that that "lifetime" warranty makes a jot of practical difference. I certainly would ignore it, because I don't think it'd be worth trying to rely on it in the event of a problem. If I bought, for example, a Corsair PSU that still required despatch to the US to fix, and it went wrong, I'd either expect the UK seller to sort it, or if they had no liability, I'd just write it off and buy another (and probably different) one. For what they cost to buy, I couldn't be doing with sending it back to the US with the inherent costs and time delays.

[Pob255]

I always find it funny when people point out it's not life time, normally limited to 10years in the EU.
Who would honestly still be using it in 10years? this goes the same for memory, graphics cards and any thing else covered by "lifetime" warranties.
A "limited" warranty generally covers parts and labour only, does not cover "excessive" ware and tare. Define excessive? well that's what the manufactor would deside and then you'd have to disprove it.

The big issue is that unless that's a "world wide" warranty then it wouldn't be covered if you imported it anyway, you'd need to get it from a recognised UK resalier.

Ultra had a very good name for high quality PSU's and one of the few who produced fully modular units.
Also their old modular connectors where very good.

that's a UV reactive set, they also came in silver with black connectors
However the new ones look the same as the flat corsair cables, but unlike corsair all the cables are flat even the 24pin atx cable.

They also sell replacement cables in multiple lengths, so no need for additional extention cables if a lead is too short.

Untill we get some UK retailors it's only going to be something that "might" be nice.

[UseItNow]

Oh yes, I'd think so on both points.

I'm not suggesting that they're warranty is underhand or anything. I'd think the terms are pretty much boilerplate, not unreasonable and wouldn't expect much different.

My point wasn't that the warranty was poor or anything. It's more that I think it reflects a different way of doing things in the US, and less reliance on consumer protection that we have here.

I guess what I'm saying, by calling it a marketing exercise, is that it's easy to be seduced by "lifetime warranty", but it should be remembered it's a "limited" lifetime warranty ..... so check the limits. If you do, it pretty much boils down to what we expect in terms of standard coverage anyway. Which leads me to conclude that the way it's marketed, as a "lifetime" warranty is actually a bit illusory, so I'd suggest pretty much ignoring that in the buying decision. I think, and it's personal opinion only, that we're better, or at least as well, served by having UK consumer protection than that warranty. I'd much prefer to have recourse to a UK seller, and if those PSUs were (or maybe are) available in the UK from a UK seller, how much benefit would that warranty be? If the manufacturer offered that warranty in the UK, then they can be held to it here, but if a UK seller were to supply, even with the approval of a US manufacturer, I don't envy the chances of enforcing a US warranty here and enforcing it in the US, from here, would be prohibitively expensive and, I'd have thought, wholly impractical.

All I'm saying is that I think, in deciding whether to buy one, from the US or from a UK seller, I'm not convinced that that "lifetime" warranty makes a jot of practical difference. I certainly would ignore it, because I don't think it'd be worth trying to rely on it in the event of a problem. If I bought, for example, a Corsair PSU that still required despatch to the US to fix, and it went wrong, I'd either expect the UK seller to sort it, or if they had no liability, I'd just write it off and buy another (and probably different) one. For what they cost to buy, I couldn't be doing with sending it back to the US with the inherent costs and time delays.

Totally agree on everything you say here, take note I was under no illusion by the warranty though, it just seemed an added bonus to the PSU's design.

I always find it funny when people point out it's not life time, normally limited to 10years in the EU.
Who would honestly still be using it in 10years? this goes the same for memory, graphics cards and any thing else covered by "lifetime" warranties.
A "limited" warranty generally covers parts and labour only, does not cover "excessive" ware and tare. Define excessive? well that's what the manufactor would deside and then you'd have to disprove it.

The big issue is that unless that's a "world wide" warranty then it wouldn't be covered if you imported it anyway, you'd need to get it from a recognised UK resalier.

Ultra had a very good name for high quality PSU's and one of the few who produced fully modular units.
Also their old modular connectors where very good.

that's a UV reactive set, they also came in silver with black connectors
However the new ones look the same as the flat corsair cables, but unlike corsair all the cables are flat even the 24pin atx cable.

They also sell replacement cables in multiple lengths, so no need for additional extention cables if a lead is too short.

Untill we get some UK retailors it's only going to be something that "might" be nice.

Nice to know that the Ultra PSU's are regarded well.

In regards to your point about the use of hardware in say 10 years, I agree that it probably wouldn't be in there long enough to utilise the 'limited warranty of that term'.

[BUFF]

Nice to know that the Ultra PSU's are regarded well.

I don't know about their current range but they've previously had more than their fair share of doorstops.

[UseItNow]

I don't know about their current range but they've previously had more than their fair share of doorstops.

That's blunt, care to divulge? Thanks.

[Saracen]

Totally agree on everything you say here, take note I was under no illusion by the warranty though, it just seemed an added bonus to the PSU's design.

I think that sums up what I was trying to get at - the "lifetime" seems like a good feature, rather than actually being one, at least, over here.It might have more meaning in the US, as I'm far from conversant with whatever consumer protection legislation they have.

....

Who would honestly still be using it in 10years? this goes the same for memory, graphics cards and any thing else covered by "lifetime" warranties.

Well, me. I still have, and use, some old machines. If they had lifetime warranty on them or components, I'd expect them to be honoured. And to be fair to Ultra, they do stipulate that if a component isn't realistically replaceable or repairable and the warranty applies, they'll refund the purchase price. I'd expect it to be pretty rare for them to need to honour that, and I take your point, Pob - users with machine that old still in operation will be the exception, not the norm.

....
The big issue is that unless that's a "world wide" warranty then it wouldn't be covered if you imported it anyway, you'd need to get it from a recognised UK resalier.

I'm not so sure about that. It's certainly the case that many manufacturers, like Canon, have components that carry worldwide warranty and components that don't. IIRC, their "pro" L-series lenses for cameras have a worldwide warranty, whereas their domestic lenses usually have regional (such as North America, or even USA) warranties that aren't valid outside the region they were sold in, and for one of those (and I have a couple of US lenses I might add) you'll either end up paying over here, or shipping (or in my case, taking) it back to the US.

The crunch point is not so much whether the warranty is worldwide or not, but whether it's geographically limited or not. In other words, Canon explicitly restrict their warranty on domestic lenses to cover in that region only, so if you want cover, you comply with the warranty restrictions. The Worldwide warranty that Canon offer on some products goes further in that it provides worldwide cover at local service centres.

So for a Canon worldwide warranty, you can get it serviced/repaired at authorised canon centres local to where you are, not where you bought it.


Ultra seem to be a halfway house. I read their warranty and they don't (as far as I could see) restrict it to US buyers. So I;d expect that European owners would be covered and that it would be honoured. But ... they do stipulate that you have to return the product to them at your own expense. So they're kind of a hybrid between the canon-type local and Worldwide warranties in that they don't lock it down to US customers as some Canon warranties do, but don't provide in-country service facilities like canon do for their Worldwide warranties either.

Note - Canon is just an example - the above arrangement is hardly rare for multinational manufacturers.

[TAKTAK]

Lifetime in the USA seems to mean an appropriate lifetime for the product (however long that may be)

And it usually translates over to the UK as a 10year warranty, from most of the companies offering lifetime warranties in the US

I'd just stick with a decent PSU that is readily available in this country, one that is tried and tested by many people

Saves prating about if something does go wrong...