>>>I have always heard it as pop-poe or maybe pah-poe. Am I off?
>>
>>Only a little. Try puh-poe with the accent on the 'poe'. When I was a kid in school, I used to sign my essays and stuff as "Edgar Alan Popow".
>
>I just can't imagine the -ow being pronounced as both consonants. It's Popov to me - heck, the name is so frequent here, it usually takes at least a whole page in the phone book of any decent sized city.

And you'd be abolutely right were it Popov and not Popow. ;)