Care to give some feedback that is perhaps constructive and it might help us improve on what you perceive to be a poor review? What 'proper' tests should have been included? Why is it pandering to Scan? What are the untrue comments, have you tested this system yourself?
Before I start I'll just quote what I wrote over in the PC Gaming section where this review is also linked and being discussed:
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I will say this though, I do not know everything there is to know and am happy to be called out on anything I have written. More often than not I'll be able to justify why I've written or done what I have, other times I may well just have to hold my hands up and say I did wrong. Hindsight is a wonderful thing. Any of what I say is not meant in an offensive or personal manner, only that I was disappointed with what I read, as well as why, in the hope that you can become better with more experience.
Ok, my feedback in full then:
I'm not a fan of the summary right at the beginning of the review but that's just personal preference, neither is it particularly my point or reason for being disappointed. The system is described as being "relatively quiet", or in the "Home Cinema Integration" section we're told the system is "quiet", and that is about as generic as you can get, especially when a recommended usage for the computer is to use it as a HTPC despite being marketed towards gamers and the Cons section stating the GPU's cooler could be quieter. This brings me onto the other point of people generally wanting HTPCs to be low power draw devices, along with being quiet, so I'd have expected a forum devoted to this sort of thing to measure both sound levels and power draw.
During the quick run through the connections on the back, the review fails to mention that the motherboard has an analogue 7.1 output, instead preferring to say it has "the usual coloured audio connections". Again, I'd expect better from any reviewer, let alone one on AVForums. The on-board wireless is also mentioned but we're never told what standards it conforms to - is it 802.11n? Are we meant to go off and look that up ourselves afterwards?
Greg then moves onto the SSD and the amount of available space. He doesn't mention how much space the user is left with after Windows 7 has been installed on it. Had Scan turned off hibernation and some other tweaks to get the most available space as well as the other tweaks for the best performance and lifespan from the SSD? The wireless connection was stated to have been used and stable but the throughput was never tested or even any attempt at describing whether it was tested from sitting next to the access point or sat in the garden shed.
The review then moves into a closer look of the system and the cooler, as well as the distance between the cooler and the 18cm exhaust fan, is mentioned. From here it is then stated that the CPU cooler's pushes air towards the 180mm fan, which is then expelled from the case but, unless the Akasa AK-960V2 is different, the majority of coolers like this blow down on the heatsink, rather than sucking air up through it. I'm happy to be proved otherwise on this one but is this the case here as well? Greg then goes on to state that the case has "almost 300mm of space" for a graphics card, though also states that any graphics card, including dual GPU-based ones will fit despite the longest reference one being 305mm. Just to confuse everyone a bit more, the "Upgradeability" section says there is exactly 300mm of space - what are readers meant to believe here? Still on the graphics card, the review says that the vents are right next to the graphics card's fan allowing it to expel air from the case with ease but the cooler on this graphics card, as with the vast majority, blows air onto the heatsink and PCB therefore making that vent an intake. Mentioned here as well is there being 400W of power available for the graphics card, how did you arrive at this number?
We now move onto Battlefield 3 and CoD: MW3 and some crucial pieces of information are missed out. Settings are mentioned but the resolution is not, as many here will know this can be the difference between being bound by the CPU or the GPU as well as being the difference between being reasonable in expecting the system to run it or being completely absurd. The average frame rate is shown but the minimums are also really needed (the maximums would be nice but aren't needed as much), especially as this was mentioned as being an issue when running at the Ultra pre-set in Battlefield 3.
The upgradeability bit fails to mention one key thing that many people often wonder about pre-built systems and that is the status of the warranty should you wish to tweak it yourself. Will the system's warranty be void if I overclock the graphics card (as mentioned was possible earlier in the review), or the CPU, or change the memory etc.?
The test results page is where the review really falls down though. We are told the computer can boot to the desktop in 17 seconds but we're also told it boots to the desktop in 13 seconds, then shown a screenshot with it doing it in 18 as well. Was the 17 second figure given because it was the average, or it was your favourite of the lot or what? It was said that some programs can cause it to be slower but what has caused the differences here? In addition to this, we have absolutely nothing to compare it with. Those in the know will know it's pretty damn good but no-one else will, or, they may do and just not know how much of an improvement it is over a mechanical HDD booting under the same conditions. The other issue that arises here is the testing methodology, when does the program start counting the boot time? Is it as soon as Windows gets around to starting it and you're therefore getting fairly random results or is it done in a way that the times are always grouped closely together?
Onto the Super Pi test now and the review suffers two issues, firstly the running theme of saying it's a great result yet having absolutely nothing to compare it to. Even if the test was run at the CPU's stock settings vs. the overclocked settings it's at least something! The other is more of a technical detail but is it stated that the test is "purely a test of core clock speed", yet it isn't exactly. It's a test of the CPU's single threaded ability which, among other things, is effected by the clock speed. It otherwise implies that older and/or inferior architectures at a higher clock speed will perform better than this system.
Ignoring the fact that the WEI is not a favourable benchmark tool, as stated, the results are described as impressive, again, without any comparison to anything at all. The section then goes on to state that a score of 7.9 is not achieveable unless "you have at least an 8 core processor such as the i7 range, overclocked too", while it would be nice to see a source cited for this, there are currently no i7-branded chips with 8 cores. There are some with 4 cores and thanks to Intel's Hyperthreading technology, 8 threads or 6c/12t in the Sandy Bridge-E class.
The 3DMark 11 results are fairly similar to what I've said before, there are no comparisons to anything else and nothing to clarify the comment about the gains given by overclocking the CPU to 5GHz. Most importantly though, is that Futuremark sell the Advanced Edition of 3DM11 in GBP, which would have been better to say thanks to being a UK-based site. I do have to wonder here though, has Greg/AVForums purchased the Professional edition of 3DMark 11 which is licensed for commercial usage?
To save me repeating myself over and over, the ATTO and PassMark test suffer from what every other test has suffered and that is that there is no comparison at all.
Finally, we're onto the temperatures and it would be great to see how both the CPU and GPU manage under 100% load, such as when encoding a video or playing a game where the GPU is utilised to its maximum. We're back to noise again here as well and told that under load the system does become noticeable but we're able to drown it out, this is the case with most computers but the main factor being how load the sound has to be to drown the computer out.
Overall, there are some minor issues such capital letters (GHz and MHz) and such other issues that would give a much more professional review if consistent.
I'll be the first to admit that I've been picky in some of what I've written above, having said that, there are also some glaring issues that end up making it, in my opinion, a disappointing review. The pandering to Scan bit was probably a tad on the harsh side, which I apologise for. The better way of putting what I meant was that maybe AVF aren't exactly prepared or equipped to give a fair review and comparison to computers. What would have been a better kick start to AVF doing computer reviews would either be a round-up of what multiple places have for a set price-point or what a retailer has to offer in terms of their pre-built range and then the review going into detail over what the performance (as well as any other) differences are. To answer your question, Phil, no, I've not tested this exact system myself but have reviewed other pre-built systems so know what is involved.
Going back to one of the other questions asked by Phil, the tests I would have liked to have seen would be the ones where there are solid and set benchmarks that can easily be compared to other systems, not only now to give greater depth to the review but also to future reviews.
I will also admit that I'm a hard person to please as I can be quite pedantic. Again, I intend no offense to be taken by this but for it to be used to improve future reviews.