Yeh I was thinking about hardware reviews, and even cooling reviews. One thing hit me, I dont even have an A64 rig. everything I have is still Socket A! So yes as far as knowing and recommending purchases, I do think I am pretty out of date at this point hehe.

But for HTPC, silent computing, I have helped many friends recently get rigs setup and quiet. So those are the areas I am going to be focusing on once I get the site development work behind me. Some day I may even get me one of dem fancy A64's!

You also have a lot of expertise in networking/data backup and storage. I STILL find that to be a bit of a mystery

True, I can look at stuff for that. I mean the Snap server guys frequent these forums quite a bit in the networking area.

Well my point was that we have things other than cooling reviews that we are good at. But I'm not sure that PC hardware reviews are included in that list :)

unless you just want me to talk about my dream hardware configs ;) No.

I am very key on "effective" purchases. Not buying something because you can, buying something because you needed it to do some thing and have it do that purpose well. Thats prolly the biggest mentality difference between myself and the mainstreem kid whos into the hardware scene. This is in much the same reason I am using Socket A's still. They are cheap, effective and get the job done.

I'm pretty much the same, though I still splurge on hardware from time to time.

Everything I know about watercooling I learned from Cathar. Keep him posting and keep his threads alive. He is a sparkling gem.
And you all are as well.
I've been sitting in in the backseat watching procooling for a few years now. Always reading and enjoying but rarely posting. I represent the average joe for sure. I have never had any formal training or any math higher than Algebra 2, but I have managed to craft my own block base and I still plan to finish it when I get the tools. I have been looking to site site to help me in my progress, but all these commercial block review simply do nothing but provide numbers that every other review website will have. The reviews... not so much.
This isn't Consumercooling, this is Procooling.

I don't think that ProCooling wants any part in that, but there's nothing stopping us from opening such a forum.

You have pm.

ben is this going to follow up the awesome success the WBTA had? :)

Oh I have a lot to learn about putting up a website, but working for Yahoo! has helped a lot.

You know, the weird thing is that traffic is still increasing:
http://wbta.us/index.php?option=com_...picseen#msg410

Nothing astronomical, but a steady rise. :shrug:

Joe as expressed a desire to get ProCooling "rocking". You do water block testing for ProCooling so I see no reason why I should do it for ProCooling. Yet I am not going to give up my desire to test. This is why I would do it on my own site. My own site in which I am not concerned with activity as I feel there wouldn't be that much solely on cooling. So with that I will do it for my own site. Also I don't test specifically for other people. I test because I like to. Having results to show is just a product of the hobby.

You already started testing for this site and have had a lot of donated money and equipment from the people that want to see YOU test. So you should be the guy that does it. The real question is what roll do you want ME to do for ProCooling?
A work log is good. I have many projects in mind to do that I think many people would find interesting. Although I find a lack of interest in my projects lately.
I understand that and ok. People might find it odd however we can recommend cooling for hardware we don't know enough about to review.
User reviews could be good. People might come here just for that in fact as it would be uncensored for the most part. Although there maybe more negative input than positive as I find most people with a gripe are more likely to speak up.

User reviews are all well and good... but how would you maintain quality?... Call me a cynic but the world is full of "I just got X. X is awesome. Y sucks because I like X." people. One of Ed's editorials talked about this and how hardware purchases becoming an emotional experience for many these day (aside: much like how not buying hardware is becoming emotional to me as I am becoming exceedingly jealous of people with heaps more disposable income to spend on this stuff)

Long story short... how do you keep user reviews (relatively) objective? And for that matter how do you deal with 'sponsored' reviews?

bah. That all aside, I'm getting excited about procooling getting the ball rolling again - and I think the reader worklogs are an excellent idea. Cheers.

Does the quality of the review really matter that much? If 9 out of 10 people are not satisfied with the product are you gonna want to buy it?

It doesnt always take a test bench resolution of .01c to tell if a product is quality or not.

These people bother me too.

I do agree that there is alot of people with a viewpoint on hardware that I do not understand but if they bought the hardware, tested it and formed an opinion then they should be able to input constructivley to the forums. Most of what you mentioned above I believe comes from people commenting on what they have read and heard instead of witnessed first hand, I like to think of it as the "flock of sheep" phenomenone.

that all goes for cooling and hardware, but especially hardware.

ymboc:
The idea here is to have user reviews and articles be posted via a forum-like interface and tweaked by the author until they are satisfied. Then the Procooling staff (and extended helpers) will see that article and make suggestions/edits/ask for clarification. The author could decide "screw you guys I'm not changing anything" and that's that. Or the author could revise/accept/expand the article and it would then be posted on the site for all to see.

jaydee:
I REALLY want to avoid further fragmenting our community by having you post stuff on another site. What I was getting at is that we should have thought about how we're gonna proceed so that both of our sets of data are useful and complementary. I think your approach of making blocks with difft designs and comparing them is badass, and it would probably be a good thing to expand. Would that look like you testing lots of DIY blocks from yourself and others along with several commercial blocks as they are released while I focus on commercial products only? Perhaps that makes sense?

ls7: noted, though I never meant to imply that it was necessary for the reviews to be that 'precise'. I guess it was a bit of venting combined with concern as to how to go about keeping (relatively unmoderated) forum based reviews from degenerating in a big stirred pot of shi- err, non-usefullness.

ph: I didn't realise that the publishing process was going to be that structured - much like the guest articles in the past then? Sounds much better than the unstructured approach I was envisioning.

Do you suppose it would be possible for us 'normal' members could peek at the reviews as they're going through the process? (Perhaps at the discression of the author/editor?) It might encourage the potential authors to post since their work would be immediately viewable at least in one form or another (even if not 'officially published'). Plus it would keep the rest of us happy - I remember feeling intensely curious (and somewhat left out) whenever there were in-progress article discussions in the front-page 'pro/forums' block we able to see existed but weren't able to view.

Well it is certainly possible to set things up so that an article that is rated above a certain point by forum readers becomes auto-posted. The concern would be that if you have 100 editors that things quickly become impossible to properly revise and post. We'll think on this I guess.

Yeh, stuff like that adds to something that is already really quite complex. I had to start over last night and re-think how I was going to attack all this, and I am getting some ideas wrote down, but I had to start over on how I was going to handle legacy articles and the new article posting action.

I would have to say the new site is atleast 3 weeks off since I need to learn how to do some stuff I dont know how to do currently ;) But once the sites up everything should be online in one move then. You;ve all waited 6 years another 3 weeks to a month isnt going to hurt ya ;)

As long as new content doesnt get added to WOW then I'm cool with 3 weeks from now. I'll post any wb test data in the forums instead for the time being

That sounds good to me. That way we can keep our own results in check to. I will probably end up redirecting my sites here once I get the work log.

2-3 weeks Joe? Sounds good to me. I need that time to move, re-setup the test bench and redo my die simulator anyway. You guys might want to round up the people you want for staff and start some discussion on what you want them to do before the site opens up. That way they know what to do and are ready when it happens.

man my words keep on getting misunderstood... I guess I ought to get my 'speech' looked at or something... bah.

I dunno, talking to the computer noobs I play with in WoW, I've come to see one thing in them: they're all afraid to water cool because they think there is some kind of astronomically high risk with the water bursting from your tubes and spraying the entirety of your case and parts. Even the people who are semi interested, that's always their first question 'what happens if it leaks???'
I know this is a terribly old and beaten topic around here, but there are new noobs who need to hear it growing up every day. If we are to pick up new readers, we have to keep producing material they can understand and/or find useful. It's sad but true, most people want to be able to look at a bar graph and 'decide' what's best. Think for them, perhaps. Which would explain why all of the terrible kits still sell well...
.02

well those kids you play WoW with prolly think Women are scary, and that big fire ball out side will hurt them. I wouldnt base any facts off people who have lost touch with reality to the point they need to hide in their own lil simulated reality for most of their waking hours.

ROFL.

hmmmm
 

If there are more like me.. there will be people who first visited you site when they were 13 and one day in a net cafe during a typhoon randomly remembered the address.. and boom... here i am, hi!

I have my own computer, and it is a peice of crap, and also about 8,000 miles away.. i will rpobably build a watercooled HTPC like you were talking about.. did i say hi?

hmm Joe so I guess all my credibility is gone?

... the undead.
btw
http://www.pointlesswasteoftime.com/games/wowworld.html
good read.

hehe hey you said it I didnt :)

hahahahaha holy shit, thats good. yep its a disease as much as herpes is in hookers.

WoW issues aside......

I started moving into my new place today and it looks very promising for testing. Room temp inside was 70F without A/C on while outside temp was 88F. That's a hell of a lot better then my current place. My current place is in the sun all day lone. Windows on the east and west. The new place the windows are north and south and has larger building on the sides providing shade. I have to be in there and out of here by the end of tomorrow. Heh, my Apt. is kinda like a big computer case.


So that leaves the die sim rebuild and some minor adjustments to the test bench (plus re-setting it all up) and I should be good to go. My last tests of the WWLE and TDX were pretty on with pH's on the GPH vs. dT graph though so I think I am in decent shape to start testing in 2 weeks. I have spent a long time (couple months) working on my mounting method and I am pretty happy with it.

If all goes well I will have stuff to post once the site has changed over. (WWLE, TDX and MP-05 results)....