Rosewill not so Rosey

brom42

2[H]4U
Joined
Mar 1, 2004
Messages
3,980
My question is why you would risk your system with such a cheap PSU. :confused:

Yay broken forum posting.
 
Buyers Beware:
Rosewill, advertises itself as a ‘manufacturer’ of computer components through their website, ads at NewEgg.com, through people/companies/sites that review products, through non-existent company sites (TRG Electronics) that sells their wares through numerous re-sellers. In these same venues they advertise that they design and engineer their products to the highest level, this is claimed to reduce failures of the products.
Based in large part on their advertising, the fact they have now been in business for appr 5 years and that I had heard they were owned by NewEgg,

I decided to try one of their products, a 750 PSU (power supply unit) on a new system I was to build. I initially test all new components in an existing system, so if there is a problem, I know it is with the new component, which is what I did with this PSU. When I first powered it on there was a loud pop, a hint of smoke and nothing. I immediately killed the power and disconnected everything. When tried with the original PSU, still nothing. Further testing indicated the motherboard, CPU and one of the graphics cards had been ruined, the second graphics card (of an SLI system), would work, but barely and not up to spec).

I filed for an RMA on the product through NewEgg and wrote a review on the NewEgg site so that others would know of my experience and hopefully would be wary of the product.. I was surprised to find that Rosewill responded to the review publically and offered to replace the fried components, with the caveat that they “need some more information”, I promptly wrote them, describing in detail, what happened, and then the real problems began.

After ignoring my initial e-mails, they finally responded. Turns out the additional information they asked for wasn’t sufficient, now the wanted me to dismantle the system and send the components to them so they could ‘test’ them to see if the PSU was the cause of the damage. This sounded both odd and suspicious as I have seen failures of this sort before and, after working/building computers for 28 years know of no way that they could do any ‘tests’ to make that determination without the entire system intact. Problems of this nature normally occur from a short in the system, again, normally, but not always tied to an improperly installed motherboard (i.e. it shorts).

Also on the suspicious side was the fact they wanted me to ship all these components to an individual, actually, t6o the ATTN: of an individual at an address, no mention of Rosewill, NewEgg or anything else just the street address and to the attn of a Mr. Arthur Chou., and to include a copy of their e-mail.
Being rather suspicious now, I googled the address to find it attributed to a cargo company in the Yellow Pages, so I wrote and asked them of my thoughts. A) Why to this address, why not an address listed in the BBB, B) Who is this Mr Chou, that is suppose to do the testing, per their e-mail, he is listed as Rosewill’s manager, and I had found sites where he is attributed to being the person that answers the NewEgg reviews C) what methodology was to be used to determine the cause of failure/damage D) why is there no RMA paperwork, as I was addressing the RMA dept.
The first three questions they ignored, and have ever since, to the RMA question, I was informed there is no RMA paperwork as they don’t have RMA procedures, all are through NewEgg.. I responded by repeating my earlier questions (which were again ignored, and have been ever since), and asked why then, do they list RMA procedures (which mention the paperwork) on their web-site and if so, then how do they abide to their warranties, which in many cases extend far beyond Newegg’s policy of handling returns for a maximum of one year. No response to my questions.

At that point, there was no way I was going to just up and ship over $1,400 worth of hardware to an unverifiable address, to the attn of someone who appears to do everything, and trust them with anything, until they answered my questions. I fully expected that if I did send the components they would claim they never received them (as anybody could sign for a UPS/FedEx shipment, or they would get them, let them sit for a few days (I would now guess weeks) and then claim they had tested and the PSU was not the source of the problem, these thoughts coming from their complete lack of honesty and failure to answer questions.

After a couple more weeks of trying, I filed a complaint with the BBB that Rosewill was just playing games, and in the complaint I asked the same exact questions that I had been asking for weeks, the only response I requested was that they answer the questions, I didn’t ask for compensation of any kind, just answers (I also did ask about all the questionable/misleading/??false advertising issues I had come across by then). As with me, Rosewill has ignored the BBB by not responding.

After trying a while longer, I let them know I would file a more in depth complaint with the BBB and post my findings elsewhere, at which point they conditionally agreed to pay current value for the PSU and the fried components. Their conditions include a full retraction of the BBB complaint (no problem with me if they were going to take care of the matter) and to sign a Non-Disclosure Agreement about the matter, which I again had no problem with, being well versed in these from former government service as well as from testing software/hardware for various companies. I expected a reply along with the agreement the following day. After numerous put offs that their legal department was ‘working’ on the ‘Agreement’ they finally sent it, over six working days later.

The agreement, their ‘legal department’ worked on for over six days was, according to my attorney, nothing more than a boilerplate fill-in the blank forms available from any one of a number of sources. Yet it took a legal “Department” six days, sound shady to you? Me too, especially after reading it. There are points that aren’t entirely factual and they want me to attest and stipulate to these in this legal document. Obviously, that won’t work.

Of further note, once again, though they claim to be a manufacturer of the products they sell, going as far as to claim the design/engineering behind the products as well as the manufacturing (making), I personally have yet been able to find a single product of theirs that isn’t manufactured by a different company than them, all have had UL numbers on them from a variety of different OEMs (Original Equipment Manufacturer), I have also had other system builders, consultants, techies and engineers check on what Rosewill products they could get a look at and they all ended up with similar results. Not a single product that bears Rosewill’s name is made by Rosewill. As near as I can determine they are, as many have noted on the net, nothing more than a rebrander that buys other peoples products and slaps their name on them.

Another thing that bears note is that, of the OEMs that have been identified, I, myself would never be able to attest to the quality of their products, based on what I’ve seen and read about them, I do know I would not buy their products, nor would I have purchased this PSU if I had looked into it closer.

So in summary, NewEgg owns Rosewill and Rosewill sells lines of products under their name, claiming they manufacture them, when in truth they buy the products elsewhere and in effect ‘brand’ them by putting their label and packaging with them, which can actually drive the price higher, which when you look at what appears to be low prices now, think about it…..would probably be much lower without the rebranding, which may be more indicative of the products themselves.

I believe I have had some positive effect on Rosewill’s misleading advertising, which adds credence to the fact that they know what they have been doing, do to the fact that since until I challenged them on their advertising practices as extremely deceptive and misleading if not completely false in early/mid July they have ceased with what was their semi-standard line they used in responding to customers who complained via NewEgg reviews where they would state that they “Engineer our products”, they have since gone to ‘We try to provide the most reliable products”…problem is, since this began with me, I am also seeing more and more people coming out and speaking out about receiving shoddy PSUs that arrive DOA (Dead on Arrival) or die shortly thereafter. These ‘products’ are suppose to be reliable and with a 3 year warranty or whatever but too many arrive DEAD (lack of or extremely poor quality control and/or poor quality parts).

Additionally please don’t take the reviews posted at NewEgg as being a true representation of the products, my first review, which, granted was extremely critical of Rosewill (they had just destroyed in excess of a $1,300 of components) was rejected by NewEgg on the grounds that it didn’t meet their RULES and criteria. When I challenged NewEgg as to please point out exactly what criteria I wasn’t meeting they went ahead and published it. I know for fact this has happened to others also, and like mine, YES the reviews did meet all criteria. I would hazard a guess that negative reviews of Rosewill PSUs far outweigh any positive or semi-positive reviews, but that NewEgg publishes enough positive versus negative reviews to keep them in line with the quality made PSUs of name brands. You will also see a number of negative where the authors openly state/claim they feel that NewEgg won’t publish their reviews, my guess would be these are people that have had trouble with NewEgg before, reviewed and not been published.
The really sad part is that NewEgg allows this.
Lastly I would strongly recommend those with bad experiences speak out about them.
 
new egg dosent own rosewill, rosewill has been around longer than newegg.. and most of us know rosewill is crap any way, stick to the psu reviews on the front page, you wont be lead astray

 
new egg dosent own rosewill, rosewill has been around longer than newegg.. and most of us know rosewill is crap any way, stick to the psu reviews on the front page, you wont be lead astray

Agreed. Rosewill has always had a pretty iffy reputation. They are the kind of powersupplies you'd expect to find bundled with some $20 beige computer case. One of the few horror stories I can recall that actually involved sparks shooting out of the back of the power supply involved a rosewill...

Only thing I don't understand about your warning is that you seem to think Rosewill has some sort of Brand value attached to it? I can't honestly imagine any positive benefit of a company taking a component a re-branding it as rosewill. In fact I think in almost all cases it would be a downgrade in terms of pure brand worth. If they are in fact doing that is is probably just for logistical reasons.

Seems like they've figured out that they can re-package their trash powersupplies in fancy packaging with LED fans and brand them as being for SLI, etc and sell them at a premium.
 
Of further note, once again, though they claim to be a manufacturer of the products they sell, going as far as to claim the design/engineering behind the products as well as the manufacturing (making), I personally have yet been able to find a single product of theirs that isn’t manufactured by a different company than them, all have had UL numbers on them from a variety of different OEMs (Original Equipment Manufacturer), I have also had other system builders, consultants, techies and engineers check on what Rosewill products they could get a look at and they all ended up with similar results. Not a single product that bears Rosewill’s name is made by Rosewill. As near as I can determine they are, as many have noted on the net, nothing more than a rebrander that buys other peoples products and slaps their name on them.

That's common practice among all PSU makers. Corsair PSUs are made by Seasonic and CWT, some OCZ PSUs are made by FSP, some PC Power & Cooling are made by Seasonic and Win-tact, Antec PSUs are made by Seasonic and Delta etc. Rarely does a PSU company actually build it's own PSUs. But these PSU companies do set forth the build specifications and design. For a person who claims to have worked on and built PCs for the last 28 years, it is a bit surprising that you did not about this common practice.

Additionally please don’t take the reviews posted at NewEgg as being a true representation of the products,

This piece of information is known to just about every knowledgable enthusiast here on the forums. A good majority of the reviews written by Newegg reviewers are done by noobs, newbies and people with abosolutely no idea what they're talking about when it comes to PC hardware.
 
new egg dosent own rosewill, rosewill has been around longer than newegg.. and most of us know rosewill is crap any way, stick to the psu reviews on the front page, you wont be lead astray

Rosewill is one of newegg's house brands.
 
After reading tradesmans post, I'll prolly never buy a rosewill psu. Horrible experience. Which brings me to a curious question - why hasnt [H] reviewed some rosewill psu's? I'd love to see what that 750 rosewill can do in the hotbox ! :D
 
I have a Rosewill 550W PSU and have had no problems with it. It is ironic that a person would come into these forums after 4 days and post a lengthy review of a negative experience with a product and a company. Quite frankly, it reeks of bitterness and disappointment and although it makes some valid points about the difficulty of the poster's experience, it is in no way an indictment of the entire company in general. The poster has every right to do so and I am pleased to see some others lending balance to this thread, as I'm sure many customers with Rosewill products have not had the same experience, so I would had to see a viable company blacklisted from a community.

However, the comment about Newegg reviewers seems off-base to me and a bit elitist. It's probably true for a certain segment of Newegg's customer base, but those who care enough to write a review would seem to be more informed than the average bear. How many of those who frequent these forums have posted a review?

Balance, my people, balance...
 
I have a Rosewill 550W PSU and have had no problems with it. It is ironic that a person would come into these forums after 4 days and post a lengthy review of a negative experience with a product and a company. Quite frankly, it reeks of bitterness and disappointment and although it makes some valid points about the difficulty of the poster's experience, it is in no way an indictment of the entire company in general. The poster has every right to do so and I am pleased to see some others lending balance to this thread, as I'm sure many customers with Rosewill products have not had the same experience, so I would had to see a viable company blacklisted from a community.

However, the comment about Newegg reviewers seems off-base to me and a bit elitist. It's probably true for a certain segment of Newegg's customer base, but those who care enough to write a review would seem to be more informed than the average bear. How many of those who frequent these forums have posted a review?

Balance, my people, balance...
It looks like this guy has posted the same thing in nearly every tech forum he could find.

Rosewill is a brand I will stay away from. Their quality is too inconsistent.
 
Sorry about that. but you are preaching to the choir. If you had joined earlier you would have been much more knowledgeable as all your major points are common knowledge to enthusiasts (or at least anyone that hangs out in these forums). On one point I disagree, Newegg reviews are great, as a source of entertainment. I highly recommend ones on memory where the newbies cant figure out why the motherboard reads the SPD chips and sets their 1000MHz memory to 800MHZ and so they return it. Followed closely by 2.2V high end sticks not booting in their Dell which has no memory voltage adjustments. Reading them is better than a rerun of a classic Saturday Nite Live show.

IMO buy Corsair (which as mentioned above has supplies built by an OEM) supplies and you never have to worry about it again. I do, and while I can easily find cheaper supplies the money I save on standardizing my offering to customers (simple to keep a couple of spares around) and not having to worry about a failure (over 20 very high end machines in last 8 months without a problem) and superb customer service if something does happen (based on Corsair response in these forums) is why it pays to find the good products and stick with them. [Yes I am a Corsair fan boy - for damn good engineering reasons]

Frankly I am amazed Newegg agreed to replace the damaged components as every warranty I have ever seen limits the liability to the unit itself and excludes other damages.

Getting anything out of a "legal department" in a week, regardless of how rinky-dink, is a minor miracle.

Newegg "engineers" the product in sense that they approve the "level" of OEMs design/construction/manufacturing process. OEMs will build to your specs or you can sign off on their standard or custom designs. You dont really think that the radio in your car is made by Ford do you ? ( well not in the last 20+ years anyway) .

Sorry for your troubles and your observations are pretty much correct but a simple post here asking about Rosewill (or just a search of the forum) before you "decided to try one" would have saved you a lot of pain.

I sincerly hope you now hang around here, its a very valuable resource when considering any kind of computer product. Some "filtering" of replies is necessary but there is a huge base of expertise that is invaluable.

In the intrest of balance, there are posts of Corsair units failing, not many but some and of course there are other very good brands. And I have used the Rosewill 550 stallion unit mentioned above in a budget system because of the review and the customers budget and it is still working fine. I would not use any other of their models (due to lack of a reviews on a commercial load tester and internal construction details) and I would not put one in my personal machine.
 
I have bought a few minor Rosewill items (sd card readers, cheap cases, cables, etc.)and I got to say they do what they are suppose to but, usually nothing more. However with something major like a psu I would stick with a major player just for the peace of mind of dealing with a known quality. All computer products have their failures out of the box, it's just the major companies have better QC and less of them.
 
I appreciate the replies, and was a bit wound up when I made the original post..But to clarify, what really gripes me about Rosewill/NewEgg in this matter is the complete lack of honesty/integrity. The original offer in response to my review on the Egg's site was nothing but fluff, If you peruse their reviews the often offer to exchange PSUs to people who have already junked them, gotten a refund, RMAed them, etc...it's a done deal, but Rosewill 'offers' to exchange the item, They advertise themselves as a manufacturer of their products, but everything is off the shelf OEM products. They won't answer direct questions about anything. Management won't deal via e-mail, only over the phone, but not if it's recorded. They have ignored the BBB complaint (two weeks overdue now. And I just got an e-mail from a CS Manager at NewEgg saying he thinks that though it was a bad start, he thinks Rosewill has stepped up to the plate. Don't see how, they want me to sign a legally binding document, that basically says I am attesting to the fact that they 'Manufactured' this PSU, when for fact it's made by ATNG. There have been so many more lies it's ridiculous. Sorry for rambling. But if you have a few free minutes, drop them an e-mail and ask them, what exactly do they manufacture, not what they buy off OEMs. I've asked numerous times, and as with the BBB have been ignored.

Thanx
 
Don't know about their PSU's, never had one, but their external hard drive enclosures, case fans, and wireless router cards are pretty nice and have lasted since I have owned them. :D
 
My general rule is Rosewill + Electricity = Fail, my one friend had a similar experience where he asked me advice on building a pc and one of my guidelines was don't use Rosewill and he calls me the night he received all his parts trying to figure out why his pc won't even start up. He bought a rosewill psu and it didn't work, period, luckily his roomate had a psu around and voila working pc. Another friend bought a stick of ddr ram and went through 3 rmas before he just gave up because none of the sticks would work, tested on multiple machines. I have used a bunch of Rosewill cases and am generally quite pleased with them, especially that new shorty one that fits atx, and their fans do work surprisingly. It is a little frustrating because they are generally sold as Neweggs house brand, whether they actually are or not, and newegg would only "recommend" good products right?
 
So they send you an NDA and you refused to sign a piece of paper that has no effect on you other than the fact you can't publicly state your feelings about rosewill? and you get ~$1500 for signing said document?

You shoulda signed the piece of paper. I already knew rosewill sucks, but at least if you had signed someone would have gotten some $$$ out of it.
 
I have ran dozens of rosewill psu's in the past with great sucess, but they were on low cost boxes (cheap folding boxes) that I could afford to lose. I would never put a rosewill in a system i depend on or have invested a significant amount.
 
Buying a rosewill psu is like playing slots. Sometimes you get a really good rebadge, and others you get some shit that blows up you entire rig. To me, that's not worth it. Spend the extra $ and get something good and peace of mind.
 
Some time ago, I posted a comment on this website complaining about my purchase of a Rosewill power supply unit and other matters involving Rosewill. Having been in continuous discussions with Rosewill in regards to my complaint, I’m happy to inform you that Rosewill and I have come to a mutually agreeable conclusion to the issues that instigated the complaint.
 
Some time ago, I posted a comment on this website complaining about my purchase of a Rosewill power supply unit and other matters involving Rosewill. Having been in continuous discussions with Rosewill in regards to my complaint, I’m happy to inform you that Rosewill and I have come to a mutually agreeable conclusion to the issues that instigated the complaint.

Since you didn't state what those terms were, we will assume they're paying hush money so you'll quit bashing their shitty products.
 
if it hasnt been ripped apart and survived the beating of its life by jonny guru then i wont buy it... simple :D

ive seen a couple of rosewill PSU's do a good job but as most people know on here it all depends who's manufactured that specific model.
 
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