Have had both, here's my long saga. EQT was a nightmare from a customer service perspective, after waiting months for a base map, bought their staged tune just to have something besides the cobb OTS maps. Had a vortex in the car by the time they started working on one. At one point Ed told me he's just really slow at street tuning because he's too busy with dyno tunes. Asked if I could switch to his other tuner and was turned down. I will say that EQT seems to emphasize smoothness, and between their staged tune and a couple revisions on a custom tune, it was stock-like.
Eventually I ran into some fueling problems and was fed up waiting for revisions. The car was near the Denver UM dealer at the time, they got me in within the week, diagnosed the issue and had a finished tune on the car (pump gas with a vortex). Went back home, wanted to get the car re-tuned for altitude and 93, so had to go to the dealer in Chicago. Ended up getting sent home on a low boost tune and told I needed to fix a fueling issue. Fastest solution was to order up an MPI kit and have it installed by a buddy of the UM dealer. (didn't want to drive on hardware I'm not tuned for), but due to covid logistics (nothing related to UM except distance) this took a few weeks to get tuned. Added flex fuel and the haldex tune during this, which are outstanding, unique UM features.
Upon picking up the car I let it warm up on the freeway, floor it, limp mode with an overboost code. Text the UM dealer (who's not a mechanic or anything, but he's been super helpful and responsive), insists they had no problems while logging and says Jeff thinks it might be the wastegate actuator. I get home, drop it off at my usual shop, they can't reproduce it and suggest it's a tuning problem. I get the car back and the issue does seem to be gone.
At this point it's getting cold here, summer tires are off and I'm not driving the car much, but the overboost came back. Unfortunately, to troubleshoot it more I'll need a day where the car is A) at the shop or with the UM dealer B) the roads are safe for WOT pulls and C) still overboosting.
Personally, I really like the UM tuning, if it weren't for covid I wouldn't mind the dealer trip at all. The constant back and forth on flex fuel with ecutek is very disappointing, to hear "it's not in the equation" is much worse than I was led to believe last year. Switchable maps are in no way a substitute.
UM has definitely proven themselves on big turbo setups and if you're only 60 miles away, well, I'm envious haha. You can limpmode a weird turbo and even fully wire in MPI before a tune but the brushless pump could be an issue. A 60 mile tow is a lot cheaper than labor if you're gonna diy all that though.
