Hardware Reviews Lacking

Yousaif

I will always check out DH for reviews of hardware that I am looking to buy. I have found them to be well written and well thought out. I have but just one complaint.

It is really looking like this site has been overrun by Intel-only mobo and processor reviews. While I understand that the Core2Duo is the hottest thing around, there are still some of us that despise Intel (maybe too strong a word)- OK steer clear from Intel products as much as possible.

The last AM2 board round-up was midrange boards with the Nvidia570 chipset. The last processor review was the FX60. There have been many quality releases since those reviews were published.

How about throwing us AMD builders a bone a bit more frequently?

Zardon

Well im not sure how you mean our reviews are "lacking", recently we have reviewed graphics cards from both major players, we have reviewed chipset coolers, power supplies, cases, CPU coolers, as well as attemping to branch out into more diverse areas such as reviewing trackir mouse replacements and other gadgets.

We currently are being offered nothing from AMD because there quite frankly hasnt been anything worth reviewing lately as we are awaiting the new AMD series of processors and their launch - many of their products have been just clock changes and price reductions. We are going shortly to the press launch of the R600 and will have a review up ASAP - although I doubt that aspect of AMD hardware is really what you mean.

Incidentally I would like to say that I do understand your point - specifically with AMD mobos (although we are working on some for publishing in the near future), however this is the first complaint we have received about this so its obviously an opinion only shared by a few? (or people aren't letting us know).

Give me a list of some products you would like to see reviewed.

Veridian3

HI,

Thanks for the feedback, Zardon has hit on the main issue though and thats lack of decent (or new) products coming out of AMD for some time. That will change a lot this year with the R600 and new CPUs however the last 6months or more has been pretty barren.

The good news is that 3rd in my list of reviews is a AM2 motherboard review featuring a few new boards/chipsets, and as a stop gap there was an AMD chipset in our recent 775 board roundup...

Zelig

I could do with a round up/comparison of 24 inch 1920x1200 LCD monitors. Seems prohibitely expensive if you don't get free samples though.

Yousaif

Zardon, I don't think that its a situation of not many people care, just a situation that many of us don't take the time to voice our opinions.

What I was specifically speaking to is the lack of AMD-compatible mobos and AMD processors under review at DriverHeaven. I find it hard to believe that AMD wouldn't pony up a processor or 2 if someone was to approach them, and I find it hard to believe that the motherbaord manufacturers wouldn't give up a motherboard or 2 for a comparison.

I'm not trying to point any fingers here, but its just that I get the impression from you that you really don't give 2 sh**s about this.

I mean, how can you do a good review of AMD's next gen Barcelona core processors when no one here has reviewed anything since the FX60? Your reviewer won't have anything more recent to compare benchmark results with. The FX60 review was from February of 2006. Since then there have been 3 Intel reviews.

Sorry if I struck a nerve. Kind of seemed that way from your response.

Zardon

I always care about DH and our content, but you have to understand that we review products in these specific sectors which are appealing to the masses and our particular memberbase - which for the last 6 months has been Intel's product range, not mere clock bumps and pricing restructuring from AMD. We don't have masses of reviewers, just a high quality small team which devote themselves to reviewing the hottest products we can get and those we think will appeal to as many people as possible. We are also trying to diversify as much as we can into other "gadget" areas which people seem to like.

I am not sure why you think I dont "give a sh*t about this" or that "you struck a nerve", myself and veridian3 were merely trying to explain why we haven't reviewed many AMD processors and motherboards, then we also detailed that we have AMD motherboards in the review queue which should appeal to you. I also asked you which products you would like to see on Driver Heaven.

I think thats a pretty decent response to your original question is it not? I certainly didn't swear in my replies to you or accuse you of anything, so I really do think you need to relax a little bit.

Incidentally I don't think you need to worry about the quality of our forthcoming cpu reviews, we have a wide array of hardware at our disposal, quite a lot of it never gets reviewed because we simply don't have the manpower and need to concentrate on priority products. We also spend frequently much longer reviewing products than many other sites, that is how we have reported and helped solve publically documented issues in the past with motherboard manufacturers. We are extremely thorough.

Your opinion is extremely important to me, and all this feedback helps us ascertain future reviews. I for one am really looking forward to AMD's answer in the CPU sector, it has been a one horse race for far too long.

GutterPunk

Its the same reason why they have probably done more nvidia reviews lately than ati as ati hasn't done much other than the revisions of the 19xx series. AMD has came out w/ the 6000+ which will only compete witht he 4th fastest intel proc which isn't what most people (well in my opinion) want to see. Who wants to see a review on an AMD tbird 1.2 ghz?! I imagine it will be overrun once amd releases their new socket and product line including the r600. 88xx series will just slowly dissapate. Thats what I see.