Resonessence Labs Out of Business?

[Dr Tone]

4 hours ago, Norton said:

Thanks, still a RL owner?

No, sold my Mirus Pro Signature a little over a year ago.

[Turnerman1103]

I also own the Mirus Pro . In regard to they’re closure   I don’t believe Reasonesence acted with integrity . Had I known that they would close up shop just a couple  of months after I upgraded to the Pro version I would never have invested my hard earned $$$ in an upgrade  . 
After much investigation I was finally able to get in touch with Hans Looman who I believe  helped design the original Mirus .
Hans informed me that he is working on starting up a repair depot for Reasonesence.  Lab products . He said he would keep me informed . When I find out more  I will share that info . 
I also was finally able to get in touch with Mark Mallinson who was not at all forthcoming and  very obtuse . He offered zero help . 

[Norton]

2 hours ago, Turnerman1103 said:

I don’t believe Reasonesence acted with integrity

Absolutely.  One thing I’m not clear about.  If you sell expensive products, including upgrades,  with a long warranty period factored into the purchase price, is it compliant with Canadian company and consumer law just to shut up shop and disappear? If the warranty is part of what is being paid for and if it cannot be honoured then the consumer surely should have some redress?  I also wonder where  it leaves dealers who have sold customers expensive Resonessence  DACs in the last 3 years that need service under warranty?
 

But again, the lesson here is don’t spend big bucks with small companies unless you are affluent enough not to care about  warranty, service or resale  value.

[Marcner]

Any luck on locating where Resonessence Labs products can be repaired? I have a Mirus Pro. Lights up and will show bit rate of attached source etc but no output from either XLR or RCA outputs. Hope to revive or I have a very expensive paperweight

[Turnerman1103]

Hi yes I did find the engineer who worked for Reasonesence Labs and did their repair work  and upgrades . His name is Frank H (250)  763 3172 or W (250)  869 0808 . He tells me is willing tip repair on Reasonesence products. 
Best,

Drew 

[Norton]

53 minutes ago, Turnerman1103 said:

Hi yes I did find the engineer who worked for Reasonesence Labs and did their repair work  and upgrades . His name is Frank H (250)  763 3172 or W (250)  869 0808 . He tells me is willing tip repair on Reasonesence products. 
Best,

Drew 

Good news thanks.  Is there an email address too for us on other continents?  I’m getting nervous, what with Marcner’s report above and a guy on Head Fi  whose Veritas has packed up.

 

Not sure how much use it would be, but it would be good if ex Resonessence  staff could at least make available the various firmware and drivers on a file sharing site so that owners can download copies to keep (like a responsible company would have done in the first place when closing down).

[Norton]

1 hour ago, Marcner said:

Any luck on locating where Resonessence Labs products can be repaired? I have a Mirus Pro. Lights up and will show bit rate of attached source etc but no output from either XLR or RCA outputs. Hope to revive or I have a very expensive paperweight

As a Mirus owner I feel for you.  If you bought new through a dealer in the last 3 years I would have thought it worth going back to them for repair or refund.  Don’t know where you are located, but in the UK, even if out of warranty, a small claims court might provide redress on the basis that it is not reasonable for  you to have to write off a 3 yr old  $6k DAC.  I’m still wondering about the legality of RL just walking away from warranties that would have been factored into purchase price,  especially if they just decided to stop trading rather than going bankrupt.

[Turnerman1103]

Sorry I have no email . Perhaps if you call Frank he can give you his email . Frank was very helpful . He made it very clear to me that he worked for Resonensense only - he was not an owner .  
Through lots of perseverance I was finally able to contact the ex owner of Reasonesence Labs  - Mark Mallinson by phone. He offered no help. He was very coy basically told me I was out of luck and please don’t contact him again. Our conversation didn’t end well. Very poor business practice . 

[Norton]

13 minutes ago, Turnerman1103 said:

He offered no help. He was very coy basically told me I was out of luck and please don’t contact him again

Ironic really that people bang on about the perils of “chi fi“ when it’s actually a premium Canadian  brand treating it’s customers like this...

[Turnerman1103]

Agreed . Mark Mallinson was obviously quite surprised and uncomfortable that I had tracked him down. He was disingenuous and very coy in responding to my pointed questions. Not impressed . Hopefully his poor business practices will catch up to him in his next venture .

[Marcner]

7 hours ago, Turnerman1103 said:

Hi yes I did find the engineer who worked for Reasonesence Labs and did their repair work  and upgrades . His name is Frank H (250)  763 3172 or W (250)  869 0808 . He tells me is willing tip repair on Reasonesence products. 
Best,

Drew 

Drew

Thanks for the information. I will definitely give him a call. Shame aboutResonessence Labs. The Dac was great while it worked.

[Marcner]

6 hours ago, Norton said:

As a Mirus owner I feel for you.  If you bought new through a dealer in the last 3 years I would have thought it worth going back to them for repair or refund.  Don’t know where you are located, but in the UK, even if out of warranty, a small claims court might provide redress on the basis that it is not reasonable for  you to have to write off a 3 yr old  $6k DAC.  I’m still wondering about the legality of RL just walking away from warranties that would have been factored into purchase price,  especially if they just decided to stop trading rather than going bankrupt.

Appreciate the thoughts. I am in Northern California. I had bought it used and sent it for the pro upgrade while Mark Mallison was still there. Companies go out of business all the time, so buyer beware, I guess, but didn't see this coming.

 

[Turnerman1103]

The issue is that Reasonesence continued to offer the $1500 upgrade knowing full well that the company was going to close their doors . A money grab . That was the shady and unethical part . My upgrade was completed 1 month before they closed . If I had known they were going out if business I would never have invested my hard earned dollars in the upgrade . I started having issues with my Mirus a couple of months after the upgrade . I called Reasonesence to arrange a repair . That’s how I discovered they had disappeared off the face of the earth without offering any option for future repairs . When I spoke with Mark Mallinson about this he really didn’t give damn .Sleazy .

[rwwjr44]

I bought one of their early models shortly after it was released. I enjoyed the sound but my interface with company people wasn't very good and often sporadic. I sold the unit for a good price and moved on.

[Pablooo]

I had my dac upgraded to a signature series by Ahmed Rizki in September last year. The transformer is replaced by a better one, but a 120V version was used instead of 240V.  As a result, the DAC had to be returned from the EU to Canada.  This is quite a careless mistake and you would expect the freight charges to be reimbursed.  But that was not possible according to Ahmed.  After a discussion, I was offered a voucher for the next purchase. A month later, RL was gone.

 

I am still very happy with the dac, I haven't heard a better one in my system. And luckily there seem to be possibilities for repairs should it break in the future. Telephone numbers of a repair service are already shared in this thread, via this link you can also read about a company that is willing to repair old RL dacs: https://www.head-fi.org/threads/resonessence-labs-concero-discussion-review-thead.634760/post-15644716

[The Computer Audiophile]

It’s hard to believe some companies do stuff like this. The internet has a very long memory. Those involved are one Google search away from being exposed and their future endeavors turned upside down. 

[Norton]

20 hours ago, Pablooo said:

I had my dac upgraded to a signature series by Ahmed Rizki in September last year. The transformer is replaced by a better one, but a 120V version was used instead of 240V

That’s’ odd because I had the same upgrade done and like you it was returned to me (in UK) incorrectly set for 120v.  Obviously being in Canada, they have to test at 120v and certainly  slapdash not to change back before shipping to customer, but the DAC is designed to switch between voltages simply by flipping the fuse holder under the flap on the back panel* and changing over the fuses (which is what I did when RL sent me new fuses) so I have no idea why yours had to go back to RL again.  Unless maybe they produced a 120v only domestic version and a dual voltage version for export?

 

*dont ever do this unless you really have to as it’s virtually impossible to remove the fuse holder without breaking it.

[Pablooo]

1 hour ago, Norton said:

That’s’ odd because I had the same upgrade done and like you it was returned to me (in UK) incorrectly set for 120v.  Obviously being in Canada, they have to test at 120v and certainly  slapdash not to change back before shipping to customer, but the DAC is designed to switch between voltages simply by flipping the fuse holder under the flap on the back panel* and changing over the fuses (which is what I did when RL sent me new fuses) so I have no idea why yours had to go back to RL again.  Unless maybe they produced a 120v only domestic version and a dual voltage version for export?

 

*dont ever do this unless you really have to as it’s virtually impossible to remove the fuse holder without breaking it.

I had to check the email conversation with RL to answer that. Here's what they told me once they received the unit back again:

 

We received the unit and it was working on 110V but not on 220V.

The power transformer was faulty and we replace it with new one. The power module was working fine but we replace it with a brand new one for you. The unit is now working on both 110V and 220V.

[Pablooo]

2 hours ago, Norton said:

 

*dont ever do this unless you really have to as it’s virtually impossible to remove the fuse holder without breaking it.

I did twice 🙄

[Marcner]

I talked with Frank Szabo and he indeed is available to repair Resonessence products. I believe this is something he does on the side. I sent off my Mirus and will report back on how it goes. He can be reached by email at [email protected].

[Turnerman1103]

That’s great to hear .

[Pablooo]

54 minutes ago, Marcner said:

I talked with Frank Szabo and he indeed is available to repair Resonessence products. I believe this is something he does on the side. I sent off my Mirus and will report back on how it goes. He can be reached by email at [email protected].

Great, thanks for sharing this.

[Norton]

Great news, thanks.

[tlwafer]

https://www.resonessencelabs.com it looks like they are back in an new format, the union jack is on their new site. did they move or were the bought? there are no legacy products on the the site.

[The Computer Audiophile]

32 minutes ago, tlwafer said:

https://www.resonessencelabs.com it looks like they are back in an new format, the union jack is on their new site. did they move or were the bought? there are no legacy products on the the site.

The domain is owned by a shady company named Soderman Marketing.