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Alienware Admit Trying to Fiddle Reviews
An anonymous reader writes "Alienware seem to have admitted threatening review sites with no future hardware unless positive reviews are written about their products. Hexus.net attempted to obtain a recent Alienware system and were rebuffed in an email claiming that their last review had scuppered the chances of them getting any hardware to review in the future. Follow-up emails confirmed this was part of Alienware's global marketing strategy. " I've read through the whole article and it would appear that the above is what the rep said. Now, granted, one would hope that's one person in that company, but still bad form.
Consumer Reports magazine has the right idea... If you're going to review and test products, you need to obtain them the exact same way, and through the same channels, that end-users do. Even if a manufacturer can seemingly be trusted not to withhold new products from reviewers to retaliate for a bad review, it doesn't mean they're not "cherry picking" the products they're sending them!
Especially in cases where there are high numbers of D.O.A. or malfunctioning units, reviewers simply don't catch this problem if they're only receiving pre-tested, pre-selected samples for free evaluation.
Not true. I've given very poor reviews of kit and the manufacturer still supplies me with new product to evaluate. I've never had the 'Alienware' problem myself. The only thing like this is if the review is for a magazine/website that the PR company or supplier may think doesn't have enough clout in which case you'll get the 'sure, it's in the post' line and no amount of chasing will make anything actually turn up.
One thing I would add though and this is purely anecdotal, I work within the UK market and there, it is an often repeated statement that US magazines can have very different standards for reviews and often print what the manufacturers give them to print rather than writing the copy themselves. No idea if it's true or not.
I want a list of atrocities done in your name - Recoil
At least that's what I gathered from the ones I've seen...
May contain traces of nut.
Made from the freshest electrons.
You should check Apple's latest prices, now that we can do apples to apples comparisons.
I think you'll find that the hardware is relatively fairly priced, although most is higher level (except for the Macbook - still using a Core Duo - bah). $2500 for a dual Woodcrest system? That's an awesome price.
Now, for the upgrades, they're on the order of Dell's pricing - far too expensive for what you get.
The cesspool just got a check and balance.