Hexus.net and Bit-Tech.net Bid Farewell, Former Staff Tease New Online Venture

[davido_labido]

Case in point. Expect more responses like this as we transition away from advertising-centric sites to more unbiased ones.

For those younger members who don't understand, Techpowerup.com is primarily an AMD/Nvidia advertising site.

..and already under new unbiased management. Expect unbiased changes.

What? The guys here are rather unbias, to the point where it can be frustrating, yet I welcome it. Without unbiased media, we won't see any issues before products are released. We are far happier for issues to be bought up with media samples as we usually have only made a single batch by then and we can rectify issues. If they are bias and don't tell us anything other than what we want to hear, we just get shafted when customers get the product.

What?

I have been dealing with computers as an enthusiast since the late 90's. I would say with all my experience, TPU has been the least biased. Yeah, maybe the press release posts are nothing but adverts, but that is how they make money to stay afloat. Their testing methodology is still the best.

Youtubers on the other hand are abysmal for most part. There are good tubers around, but on average they are just giant advert videos.

Can confirm, press releases just go to an inbox then basically get copied/pasted here. We send them the PR, we don't pay for it, it keeps you guys in the know and gives us a platform to do so. Many websites do the same as it is nice filler content and keeps people clicking. It is a win/win and we appreciate it!

Unbiased and opinion reviews are different then paid content.

Remember this. Lots of tech sites are strictly pay for a good review. It is just how it is. Anyone who reads content here regularly will know this isn't a issue at TPU.

The amount of times I reviewed something that clearly has flaws, only to find a perfect score from someone else makes me question the legitimacy of some sites. It's okay to have a opinion and be bias. I welcome those who have a different view as it broadens my own. But being paid for a good review is not okay. We as a community have so little left of legitment tech sites.

Honestly, many tech sides don't allow for paid reviews - at all. Like, even if we want something reviewed quickly and we would like to pay to get it done (I must stress, not paying for a good review, but just to have a review done ASAP so we can get the product seen) the vast vast majority will turn it down and do it for free in the near future instead.

We might do something where we will pay for some kind of separate content, such as a giveaway or some advertising, and bundle the review in with that, but the content and the reviews are separate and on numerous occasions, we have had a review that isn't positive, alongside the paid content. Is it perfect? well, not to those who pay for it, but the integrety of many websites is worth more than the money we pay.

The people who usually give silly reviews saying it is perfect are usually unpaid, but want to continue relationships and think this is the way to do it. Or it's the first couple times they have earned money from a review.
I don't care if our reviews are not perfect, or even if we have a really negative one, as long as the conserns are genuine and the test scenarios are fair. A lot of reviewers (particularly ones that have had a little bit of success, but haven't quite mananged to figure out how to make it pay) seem to think that bias reviews will help them and I have called a couple of people out on them, especially when I see 'cons: NONE'. No product is perfect. I always tried to give at least 2 or 3 negatives to a product, even if they were just very small issues that had no real bearing on the quality or functionality.

I could rant about the industry for hours and hours, especially about how people seem to think, compared to what I have seen in my (almost) 10 years in the industry. Are there shady goings on? Oh, yes, 100%. Usually by the rather large names that don't care where $50,000 gets thrown.
There are many great websites and YouTube channels that do put in the work and do as much as they can to make sure they are non-bias. I know from working for TPU that here is one of them. If I ever had really negagtive or overly positive review, I would mention it to W1zzard or one of the team and they would deal with the fallout from it, or probe me to see if I have missed anything, just to make sure I wasn't missing something. As long as we were being honest, that's what mattered. I really do miss working for W1zzard, he was a very easy person to work for and the guys I have met from TPU have all had a similar mindset. I believe a bunch of others are similar though, it's just we only see the front end, rather than the big picture.

 

[Wirko]

There are many great websites and YouTube channels that do put in the work and do as much as they can to make sure they are non-bias. I know from working for TPU that here is one of them. If I ever had really negagtive or overly positive review, I would mention it to W1zzard or one of the team and they would deal with the fallout from it, or probe me to see if I have missed anything, just to make sure I wasn't missing something. As long as we were being honest, that's what mattered. I really do miss working for W1zzard, he was a very easy person to work for and the guys I have met from TPU have all had a similar mindset. I believe a bunch of others are similar though, it's just we only see the front end, rather than the big picture.

Now that you mentioned that, it reminded me of Hexus' good habit of letting vendors comment on reviews:

Of course you can post in the comment section but this is a nice gesture indicating that vendors' comments are welcome, and more visible too.

When TechReport ended its decline (started when Scott Wasson was given a job offer too good to refuse by AMD) I came to TPU

Hey, me too. Tech Report ... what a painful death. (But we still managed to have some fun during its last days.) It's far better to shut down the shop at moment's notice like Hexus has done.

I'm sure there are many more reasons that TPU will survive longer than its struggling peers

Yes I'm sure it will but ... so many reviews of keyboards and mice and earphones mean one thing: pieces of shiny new silicon that deserve any attention from reviewers are few and far apart these days. No offense to authors, they do what they can, and do it well.

but as a stark reminder to you all that even big sites can fall - please check you have whitelisted TPU on your adblocker.

I certainly do that - however, I turn on every privacy feature that's built into Firefox, and that's for all websites. Cookies are also deleted upon exit, which means every day. I have no idea if there are negative consequences for those sites.

Ad revenue isn't much but across thousands of daily readers it surely helps as the media industry shifts to YouTube.

One day we'll have a de-video-ing bot that transforms speech into text, extracts relevant still images from the video, edits the text to make it less obvious that it originates from spoken language, divides it up into chapters with titles, and violá, an article! It's just a dream right now but we have AI, don't we?

 

[W1zzard]

I certainly do that - however, I turn on every privacy feature that's built into Firefox, and that's for all websites. Cookies are also deleted upon exit, which means every day. I have no idea if there are negative consequences for those sites.

TPU is designed to work (but with some functionality lost) without cookies, maximum privacy settings, and Javascript disabled. Besides Google Analytics (in GDPR anonymize IP mode) we don't load any external tracking scripts, or track you in any other way. We also serve only in-house ads, from our own servers, no 3rd party ad networks

so many reviews of keyboards and mice and earphones mean one thing: pieces of shiny new silicon that deserve any attention from reviewers are few and far apart these days.

Considering I'm posting 2 or 3 reviews most days nowadays, these are on top of the usual review output

 

[mashie]

I have not visited either of those two sites for probably a decade now.

It is a shame to see the old sites die but we are in a changing world and more and more people prefer to see videos instead of reading (it must be hard or something?).

After [H]ard|OCP closed their doors I have used TPU for my daily news fix and toghether with servethehome it covers my IT needs.

 

[VSG]

Yes I'm sure it will but ... so many reviews of keyboards and mice and earphones mean one thing: pieces of shiny new silicon that deserve any attention from reviewers are few and far apart these days. No offense to authors, they do what they can, and do it well.

That's because I am aiming to beat the record for most reviews in a calendar year! Case in point- one more published just recently

 

[W1zzard]

That's because I am aiming to beat the record for most reviews in a calendar year! Case in point- one more published just recently

congrats sir

@Darksaber

edit: all-time totals

I wonder who else has done more than 1000 reviews. Maybe Hilbert

 

[lexluthermiester]

TPU is designed to work (but with some functionality lost) without cookies, maximum privacy settings, and Javascript disabled. Besides Google Analytics (in GDPR anonymize IP mode) we don't load any external tracking scripts, or track you in any other way. We also serve only in-house ads, from our own servers, no 3rd party ad networks

And those of us who care about our digital security and privacy are grateful!

 

[VSG]

congrats sir

@Darksaber

edit: all-time totals

I wonder who else has done more than 1000 reviews. Maybe Hilbert

Wow I expected last year would have been very slow, but also 2018 and 2019 huh? Also, Aris is next in my line of sight

 

[arni-gx]

today, its so sad to hearing some news like this..... i hope both of them will coming back online, again......they have much good review articles about all hardware PC.......

 

[ir_cow]

@VSG your review count alone puts mine to shame. Only if I could clone myself

 

[awesomesauce]

hexus.net will be missed. had great design et clear layout

been there for some review and was helpful

 

[Darksaber]

@VSG congrats on cracking the top score! I was completely unaware that I was on the top, but am happy mine stood for 14 years

 

[DeathtoGnomes]

I remember when I found Bit-tech back around 2003-4 -ish, someone I was chatting with in Everquest 1 has told me about it, we were discussing case modding. There were some really fantastic builds posted there, and a lot of them. I learned about custom PC fabricators like MNPC.com, and there was one other person that stood out from, I think, Teexas that did custom plastic waterblocks. I participated, or tried to, in one was a design contest that used Sketchup, my first time using it and was dumbfounded, no idea how to start.

Sad to activity go the way of the dodo. I cant remember what name I used there, but I still get the email newsletter.

 

[erek]

are they selling any review kits?

that 2990WX would be a nice kit

 

[mechtech]

When TechReport ended its decline (started when Scott Wasson was given a job offer too good to refuse by AMD) I came to TPU - mainly because I'd already been reading the site for years, but also because TPU is more than just news/forums - it has useful things that will hopefully ensure its survival:

• GPU-Z is one of the most popular utilities out there, almost everyone dealing with graphics card tuning uses it and MSI afterburner.
• TPU is also the #1 English-speaking GPU BIOS repository on the net. I don't think GPU BIOS flashing is going away any time soon.
• It also has tier-1 contributors such as Aris, chief engineer at Cybenetics and 1usmus of Ryzen DRAM calculator fame. Even if they aren't exclusive to TPU it's great to see them so directly involved with the site.

I'm sure there are many more reasons that TPU will survive longer than its struggling peers but as a stark reminder to you all that even big sites can fall - please check you have whitelisted TPU on your adblocker. Ad revenue isn't much but across thousands of daily readers it surely helps as the media industry shifts to YouTube.

And now Scott's moved on to Intel!! All following the Raja.

car = biggest waste of money, i barely drive 2000 km a year, so no

yep, especially in northern Ontario Canada where the salt and salted sand roads disintegrate it in 10 years.

 

[Ferrum Master]

yep, especially in northern Ontario Canada where the salt and salted sand roads disintegrate it in 10 years.

You are not the only ones with this cancer. It even spoils my boots, not mentioning the cars.