Friday, April 2nd 2010

Gotcha!

April's Fool!

Guess we really got you guys this time. I will not be leaving the site, nor will there by any of the announced changes. It was all an elaborate April's Fools Joke that we played on you.



Read on for the details...

As most of you remember, NVIDIA's Fermi launch was at midnight my local time, so I posted the review after countless hours of work, watched how our traffic spiked quickly and went to bed smiling and reliefed that everything went well. After I woke up I grabbed my notebook to check if the site might be crashed or something - no everything was fine, I started reading the comments and was shocked to see all the drama about Catalyst 9.12 being used. While I was aware that 9.12 weren't the latest drivers, I was pretty sure that the performance gains were not significant enough to retest all ATI cards and instead not have something like the Metro & Heaven tests (time is limited). After sifting through hundreds of posts all stating the same I did feel quite some anger towards the userbase in general: I was pissed. But as countless people stated in the comments for the "I am going away thread" the comments are just a tiny subset of what people think; happy people don't post comments.
Still with some anger I made my first posts in the comment thread: I think I'm done, I'm quitting and a couple more ... after a while I went away from the PC and started thinking a bit about it. "Let's just prove those idiots wrong". So I started benchmarking the 5870 on 10.3 and posted the results several hours later. As expected the difference was only 2%.
As we moved closer to April 1st I thought "hey, why not use those posts to create an epic April's Fools Joke", talked to my good buddy btarunr about it and he also thought it might be worthwile doing. Bta was the only person to know, not even the TPU staff knew. So the post was made and the story unfolded...

While I had originally planned to come clean some time next week, I realized it would be cruel to let you guys suffer that long.



Thank you all for your amazing comments. I had no idea how appreciated my work is. I am also sorry if you were hurt by it - I didn't mean it. Thanks again guys! and again, don't worry, nothing big will change here. Feel free to express your anger toward me in the comments, the mods are instructed to give you even more leeway as usually.
Add your own comment

407 Comments on Gotcha!

#251
Kreij
Senior Monkey Moderator
I think since BTA was involved in this at the highest level, that giving him a little crap is not out of line.

BTA, you insensitive, uncaring... lol ... I can't do it. LOLLOLOL
Never trust the news guy.

Great job you two. :toast:
Posted on Reply
#252
Marineborn
lol sons a bitch....he needs us just as we need him
Posted on Reply
#253
instron
I almost committed suicide because of that comment!




naw only fooling
Posted on Reply
#254
mdsx1950
instronI almost committed suicide because of that comment!




naw only fooling
I LOL'd :laugh:
Posted on Reply
#255
Triprift
Somehow i just new Bta was in on this well played you two well played.
Posted on Reply
#256
Kreij
Senior Monkey Moderator
Marinebornlol sons a bitch....he needs us just as we need him
Nah, W1zz doesn't need us to succeed and we don't need him to survive.

But the great thing is that he appreciates all of the support we have given him as members of the community on his site, and we appreciate the support he has given us as members.
He's gone out of his way to listen to everyones suggestions and has made changes to the site based on communiity response (unheard of on other sites).

Two words ... TPU Rocks.
Posted on Reply
#257
PVTCaboose1337
Graphical Hacker
Never EVER believe in coincidences guys. This big of news so close to April 1st? Obvious really! You had me fooled though, although a majority of us did think April Fools.
Posted on Reply
#258
Mussels
Freshwater Moderator
PVTCaboose1337Never EVER believe in coincidences guys. This big of news so close to April 1st? Obvious really! You had me fooled though, although a majority of us did think April Fools.
dunno, i think the results are invalid and w1zz needs to do it all over again running cat 10.3
Posted on Reply
#259
n-ster
pfff, I bet it was to see how much he would get offered, and if he doesn't think it is enough, he'd call it an April fool

(EDIT: if anyone didn't get it yet, I am joking :p)
Posted on Reply
#260
PVTCaboose1337
Graphical Hacker
Musselsdunno, i think the results are invalid and w1zz needs to do it all over again running cat 10.3
Yeah w1z cannot review worth crap he needs to redo every review done in the past year because he is biased towards one company. First the deal with ATI to make the NVIDIA cards look like crap, now he has this deal with ASUS and GPU-Z. It is one big conspiracy I tell you!
Posted on Reply
#261
NastyHabits
Thank goodness! That was some joke. I, like many others, am truly relieved. I enjoy this forum and have relied in W1zzard's reviews since I first came on here and was convinced to purchase my Gigabyte P-35 and an HD 3850.

However, I do hope in the future that people will pause and count to ten before posting in anger.
Posted on Reply
#262
DRDNA
lol....Thank goodness...I am an old fart still trying to get over my parents divorce and thought i was going to have to go threw it all over again here in my TPU home:cry: But now all is good and the children have learned a short lived lesson;)
Posted on Reply
#263
Triprift
I can confirm i was 100% fooled just so happy for once i got had lol.
Posted on Reply
#264
Kreij
Senior Monkey Moderator
Well it's been a fun (and exasperating for some of us who bought it) few days.
I'm glad W1zz is not going anywhere soon.

Time to get back to work helping TPU'ers where I can, so I am out of these 4/1 threads.
See you all in the forums. :toast:
Posted on Reply
#265
Triprift
Sure thing hit squad man back to reality.
Posted on Reply
#266
fenurch
Although I was completely and absolutely un-aware of this (due to my lack browsing through TPU forums) but anyway, even the odd time when I look at any GPU tests, I think 'Jeez, how long does it take to even do' since they're usually about 20 pages :D

Anyway, great to know that you'll provide us with your precious intel for yet, longer.

Cheers w1zz

EDIT: A bit off topic but isn't this like the fastest growing thread ever? It has populated 11 pages of rage and appreciation within the last, 8 or so hours (I guess but haven't checked the timestamps). So w1zz, now you know how much we all love you (no homo though for the majority of us anyway)
Posted on Reply
#267
n-ster
ATZAlthough I was completely and absolutely un-aware of this (due to my lack browsing through TPU forums) but anyway, even the odd time when I look at any GPU tests, I think 'Jeez, how long does it take to even do' since they're usually about 20 pages :D

Anyway, great to know that you'll provide us with your precious intel for yet, longer.

Cheers w1zz

EDIT: A bit off topic but isn't this like the fastest growing thread ever? It has populated 11 pages of rage and appreciation within the last, 8 or so hours (I guess but haven't checked the timestamps). So w1zz, now you know how much we all love you (no homo though for the majority of us anyway)
The quitting thread grew much faster I believe...
Posted on Reply
#269
OnBoard
Removes W1zzard from BC2 friends list :( Oh wait you aren't there :p

Well I'll go remove some of my thanks to you, not only you made me sad but you made me read ALL of the 'I'm leaving thread' and wasted few hours of my life :D edit: took out 4 thanks (rest were too usefull to remove :slap:) :)
Posted on Reply
#270
Kantastic
W1zzard we <3 you!
W1zzard we <3 you!
W1zzard we <3 you!
W1zzard we <3 you!
W1zzard we <3 you!
W1zzard we <3 you!
W1zzard we <3 you!
W1zzard we <3 you!
W1zzard we <3 you!
W1zzard we <3 you!
W1zzard we <3 you!
W1zzard we <3 you!
W1zzard we <3 you!


Don't ever pull something like that again or I'll have Black Panther tie you up & do stuff to you.
Posted on Reply
#271
t77snapshot
Kantastic
W1zzard we <3 you!
W1zzard we <3 you!
W1zzard we <3 you!
W1zzard we <3 you!
W1zzard we <3 you!
W1zzard we <3 you!
W1zzard we <3 you!
W1zzard we <3 you!
W1zzard we <3 you!
W1zzard we <3 you!
W1zzard we <3 you!
W1zzard we <3 you!
W1zzard we <3 you!


Don't ever pull something like that again or I'll have Black Panther tie you up & do stuff to you.
:laugh:nice!
Posted on Reply
#273
t77snapshot
erockerHow's that big "N" I carved into your forehead? :p
It was a "Z":laugh:
Dr. Gonzo: "Who said anything about slicing you up, man? I just wanted to carve a Z into your forehead.
;)
Posted on Reply
#274
hat
Enthusiast
entropy13Black Panther is into THAT???
eh?
Posted on Reply
#275
Wile E
Power User
Polaris573You're a goddamn motherfucker you know that? You could have at least let me in on the fun.
That is the most appropriate Avy/user title combo EVER!!!


Now, back to W1z: YOU SONOFABITCH!!!! I was seriously distraught over this (well, that plus the loss of OtherOS support on PS3).

That was one of the more convincing April Fools jokes I've seen.
Posted on Reply
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