I wasn't criticizing Kyle et. al. I was laughing at the guy dissing people from Texas to compliment [H] and it's writers. It still makes me smile.
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AMD, Roy Taylor, the Nano, and the Press @ [H]
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I wasn't criticizing Kyle et. al. I was laughing at the guy dissing people from Texas to compliment [H] and it's writers. It still makes me smile.
SeymourGore
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So, how awkward will the next dinner be between Kyle and Roy? Or have they already kiss and made up after the phone call from Roy?
A formerly prestigious site that I stopped reading years ago tested the Nano card in a completely open testbed (!) and concluded:
All of this lets us overlook smaller caveats, such as the R9 Nanos cheap coils, which make the card sound like cicadas in love. The new graphics cards fan also isn't our favorite, since it gets obnoxious once a certain temperature is reached.
Whats also annoying is the lack of HDMI 2.0, which makes it impossible for the card to play some 4K content, and effectively limits playback on current Ultra HD TV sets to 30Hz. Weve weighed all of these caveats in light of the great benchmark results, though, and, in the end, we decided that the award [Editor's Choice 2015] should stand anyway.
The quality and tone of the review is consistent with the reasons I stopped using the site after the original owner, who's famous name it still bears, sold it to some media group.
All of this lets us overlook smaller caveats, such as the R9 Nanos cheap coils, which make the card sound like cicadas in love. The new graphics cards fan also isn't our favorite, since it gets obnoxious once a certain temperature is reached.
Whats also annoying is the lack of HDMI 2.0, which makes it impossible for the card to play some 4K content, and effectively limits playback on current Ultra HD TV sets to 30Hz. Weve weighed all of these caveats in light of the great benchmark results, though, and, in the end, we decided that the award [Editor's Choice 2015] should stand anyway.
The quality and tone of the review is consistent with the reasons I stopped using the site after the original owner, who's famous name it still bears, sold it to some media group.
Fifth Horseman
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In my opinion (and take it with a shaker full of salt) is that the Nano is a solution in search of a problem in the first place. It's no love lost that they won't send the [H] a review sample; anyone with a thimble's worth of grey matter between their ears isn't going to spend the money they're asking for this card when other cards perform as well or better for the money (and will fit in a mini-ITX case).
In short; instead of releasing the Nano, AMD should be pouring their limited resources into creating more competitive products. They need to get out of the mindset of making short-term gains (i.e. cherry picking reviews so they can sell an albatross) and focus on making a product that'll put them ahead for at least one GPU generation.
In short; instead of releasing the Nano, AMD should be pouring their limited resources into creating more competitive products. They need to get out of the mindset of making short-term gains (i.e. cherry picking reviews so they can sell an albatross) and focus on making a product that'll put them ahead for at least one GPU generation.
yeah at least two sites I trust stated those same issues, kind of had a negative tone about the card and then gave it editors choice or gold reward.
I don't know why I care,AMD is digging its own hole.
People like to "all but" say certain things. This AMD guy "all but" said [H] and a couple other sites are "unfair."
People who use weasel-words like that expect to get off on a technicality when they (truthfully) assert that they never actually said what they're alleged to have said, even when everyone understands that what they're alleged to have said was exactly what they meant.
A lot of people indulge those shenanigans and do indeed let them get off on that technicality. If you're unwilling to let people get away with it, all you can do is repeatedly call them on their bs and weasel-words. . . and hope you don't come off looking worse than the person you're calling out in the end.
It's a fine line. . . and opinions will vary about what constitutes "going too far" in pointing out the shitty nature of someone's behavior. Nobody should lose sight, however, of the shitty behavior that instigated the whole thing and where primary responsibility ultimately lies.
People who use weasel-words like that expect to get off on a technicality when they (truthfully) assert that they never actually said what they're alleged to have said, even when everyone understands that what they're alleged to have said was exactly what they meant.
A lot of people indulge those shenanigans and do indeed let them get off on that technicality. If you're unwilling to let people get away with it, all you can do is repeatedly call them on their bs and weasel-words. . . and hope you don't come off looking worse than the person you're calling out in the end.
It's a fine line. . . and opinions will vary about what constitutes "going too far" in pointing out the shitty nature of someone's behavior. Nobody should lose sight, however, of the shitty behavior that instigated the whole thing and where primary responsibility ultimately lies.
About the only time I go there is to compare a wide range of GPUs/CPUs. It's kinda useful if you're looking for performance info across several generations, if you don't upgrade all the time.
But I quit reading regularly a year or so after Tom sold it....guess he decided to become a full time MD.
See this is what I was saying. All Kyle needed to do was prearrange the [H] Editors Choice with a little wink like Toms did, and Nano would've been in the mail. Simple.
But noooo .. Kyle had to difficult and combative like "We're actually going to test the product before rendering any verdict". Not only did he forfeit a free video card but cost himself a free Gaming Evolved t-shirt in 2XL.
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drklu
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I just don't know if you should let Roy's comments reflect AMD as a whole. I think he got his ass chewed for sturring up all this negative publicity for no reason.
AMD made him a vice president and allowed him to post on the company's behalf. While that may no longer be true going forward, what Roy was authorized to post DOES reflect the company at that point in time.
What it reflects is that AMD had and still has no clear PR strategy. This has been a problem for at least the past 20 years I've been following tech.
Good on [H] for challenging them. With some luck maybe there will be meaningful change. The leadership changes at AMD made recently are encouraging.
Of course, another site owned by the same media group didn't mention anything other than a brief note about lack of HDMI 2.0, and even said the card was quiet. They don't really give out awards though. They did, however show a power usage chart using Furmark. They were surprised Nano used the least power, while completely glossing over the fact that clock speed was throttled below 700MHz.
Hmm
ManofGod
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Quoted for truth!
I really love the AMD hardware and their cards are pretty powerful in and of themselves. However, their pricing structure, lack of availability and Roy's mouth are doing them in one bit at a time.
DejaWiz
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I am totally...wait, no...not shocked that it got the kind of review that AMD is clearly manipulating things to get.
"Can we get a Nano sample?"
*zip*
*wipes chin* "Thanks, AMD!" *grin towards camera with tooth sparkle chime*
He only said what most people knew anyway. I feel kind of sorry for him, and I hope he doesn't get into much trouble.
Seconded. I'm planning a build and would snap up a Nano in a heartbeat for $349. I'd consider a Fury at $399 and a Fury X at $449. At their current prices? Not a chance.
No bad products, only bad prices...and AMD's prices this time around suck. I'd bet a nickel that someone started out planning to do what they did earlier: redefining the mid-range. Then the costs creeped up but performance lagged. So here we are with high end pricing and mid range performance.
So you want a fury x for less than a vanilla 980? So do I, but I'm not sure that's reasonable given the market.
I think this whole episode has been un-professional, on both sides. As much as I love [H] and the reviews you guys do, it does seem like you are more hostile towards AMD.
If you are a PR guy, and you have an informational call about the Nano, and someone hangs up, okay whatever. If that review site editor then comments about how they hung up when the price was announced, that then starts to be in the realm of un-professional. Did [H] hang up on a call when Titan pricing was announced, or negatively comment about that?
[H] established itself as already negatively viewing the product, which DOES give the sense that it probably won't get a fair review. Is that absolutely going to be the case? No, but for a company sending out products for free, why would you send one to a review website that has already put out bad press about your new product before it even launches?
You aren't entitled to free review hardware, and whether you like it or not, shitting on a products price before it releases isn't somehow going to increase the likelihood of getting one. And you are surprised and outraged (obvious from your piece) that you didn't receive one, are you serious???
You could have written an editorial about the episode, but you filled it with a bunch of name calling and personal insults, which again points at unprofessional behavior.
All this is not to absolve AMD/Roy Taylor of their mistakes. His twitter behavior was confusing, not being clear about why certain outlets weren't getting hardware, and giving one for free for a puff build/review piece (did they know it was going to be posted on [H]forums?) are all poor moves.
Overall I read AT's piece, and Ryan Smith acknowledged in the comments that he wasn't asked to provide a positive review or agree to any restrictions. The Nano is a super niche product, but one that has some interesting points, but due to it's price is as mentioned, super niche.
If you are a PR guy, and you have an informational call about the Nano, and someone hangs up, okay whatever. If that review site editor then comments about how they hung up when the price was announced, that then starts to be in the realm of un-professional. Did [H] hang up on a call when Titan pricing was announced, or negatively comment about that?
[H] established itself as already negatively viewing the product, which DOES give the sense that it probably won't get a fair review. Is that absolutely going to be the case? No, but for a company sending out products for free, why would you send one to a review website that has already put out bad press about your new product before it even launches?
You aren't entitled to free review hardware, and whether you like it or not, shitting on a products price before it releases isn't somehow going to increase the likelihood of getting one. And you are surprised and outraged (obvious from your piece) that you didn't receive one, are you serious???
You could have written an editorial about the episode, but you filled it with a bunch of name calling and personal insults, which again points at unprofessional behavior.
All this is not to absolve AMD/Roy Taylor of their mistakes. His twitter behavior was confusing, not being clear about why certain outlets weren't getting hardware, and giving one for free for a puff build/review piece (did they know it was going to be posted on [H]forums?) are all poor moves.
Overall I read AT's piece, and Ryan Smith acknowledged in the comments that he wasn't asked to provide a positive review or agree to any restrictions. The Nano is a super niche product, but one that has some interesting points, but due to it's price is as mentioned, super niche.
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Deathroned
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^This guy wins the internet. Slow Clap.
ShaithEatery
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All I have to say is... "Red Flag," "Red Herring" beautiful stuff *kisses fingertips*
bigdogchris
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Roy post continuously throughout the day and now has gone silent running on 18 hours.
I don't think it's that. I think he's tired of AMD's downtrending and problems with PR and information. The fact that you're not tearing Roy a new one tells enough for me. Cherry picking review sites for a good review? Did you read any of these reviews btw? They run the nano into the ground and talk about issues with it, and then literally give it an award anyways.
I see a LOT of comments in here about how biased hardocp is, but all i can really think, is that you very obviously haven't been around for the 10+ years i have.
MavericK
Zero Cool
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More disturbing to me than anything are the amount of users on here defending Roy/AMD...some to such an extent that you'd think they must be paid AMD shills. Really quite pathetic.
Poor pricing and ignorant headstrong moves like this are what's going to kill AMD. They have a decent product stack. The 390 is faster than the GTX970, the 390x is close enough to the GTX980 to justify the savings/performance difference. Their pricing breaks as soon as we reach the Fury line. The Fury should have been $450, the Fury-X should have been air-cooled and sold for $550. They could have made the Watercooled version a special limited edition and still sell it for $650, and the Nano should have been $500.
The problem is that the Halo cards are way behind the competition when you consider their current prices. Being Halo cards, this paint the picture for the entire Radeon line being overall a poor value despite it not being true. Had the Halo cards been priced at what I recommended they would have been screaming successes.
I tried convincing a buddy of mine to get a R9-390 over a GTX970, but because AMD is viewed as a poor value with the Halo parts, less well researched people automatically assume that it applies to the entire line, and he ended up getting a GTX970....that's overall slower, more expensive and less ready for DX12 than the $310 R9-390 I was recommending. All because AMD just HAD to charge $100 more than they were supposed to with their Fury cards.
It really doesn't matter if the supply of Fiji chips is low, price them correctly, get good press and have the entire AMD Radeon line benefit. Instead they overpriced their Halo cards, got heavily criticized due to their ludicrous prices, then have that stench stink up the entire line and make the entire Radeon line look like a poor value. Not everyone is going to buy a $550 Fury-X, but if that card got good press, a lot more people will be looking at the R9-380 and R9-390. Business 101, Roy should know that, AMD should know that.
Imagine if the 4870 was priced at the same $450 as the GTX260, instead of the reasonable $300 it did launch at? AMD would have been laughed out of the industry....kinda like what's happening now.
It amazes me that for the Fury, AMD had two peices of history to re-enact. Either repeat the 2900xt and release an underperforming overpriced card, or repeat the 4870 and release a high-performing, well priced product.
I could replace Roy TONIGHT, and turn AMD around....that man is a joke and is making AMD a joke over is arrogant ignorance about the industry.
The problem is that the Halo cards are way behind the competition when you consider their current prices. Being Halo cards, this paint the picture for the entire Radeon line being overall a poor value despite it not being true. Had the Halo cards been priced at what I recommended they would have been screaming successes.
I tried convincing a buddy of mine to get a R9-390 over a GTX970, but because AMD is viewed as a poor value with the Halo parts, less well researched people automatically assume that it applies to the entire line, and he ended up getting a GTX970....that's overall slower, more expensive and less ready for DX12 than the $310 R9-390 I was recommending. All because AMD just HAD to charge $100 more than they were supposed to with their Fury cards.
It really doesn't matter if the supply of Fiji chips is low, price them correctly, get good press and have the entire AMD Radeon line benefit. Instead they overpriced their Halo cards, got heavily criticized due to their ludicrous prices, then have that stench stink up the entire line and make the entire Radeon line look like a poor value. Not everyone is going to buy a $550 Fury-X, but if that card got good press, a lot more people will be looking at the R9-380 and R9-390. Business 101, Roy should know that, AMD should know that.
Imagine if the 4870 was priced at the same $450 as the GTX260, instead of the reasonable $300 it did launch at? AMD would have been laughed out of the industry....kinda like what's happening now.
It amazes me that for the Fury, AMD had two peices of history to re-enact. Either repeat the 2900xt and release an underperforming overpriced card, or repeat the 4870 and release a high-performing, well priced product.
I could replace Roy TONIGHT, and turn AMD around....that man is a joke and is making AMD a joke over is arrogant ignorance about the industry.
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JayteeBates
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It's amazing that people either cannot or will not understand it isn't about them getting a review unit. It is about [H] being called out as being unfair and biased. [H] style may not be your cup of tea but they are not unfair or biased.
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I care very much about what AMD did. I really do not care about not getting a card. Reading is fundamental. You should give it a try before commenting on the article.
Hornet
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Kyle wrote this article as a response to Roy Taylor's comment, not [H] not getting a sample. That issue was already known sometime ago, and Kyle never wrote any article about it.
Roy's behavior wasn't confusing, but downright stupid. You don't accuse review sites of being biased and use that as an excuse to not send them a review sample. Because now you're telling the world that you are cherry picking your reviewers, and that doesn't bode well with the kind of consumers that are in PC market where hardware reviews are very important in our purchase decisions. In fact for most of us, reading reviews are a mandatory check point when we make our decisions. Therefore, you wouldn't want to be burning bridges by throwing accusation like that around.
According to Bit-Tech's review, the card is suffering from coil whine issues:
( http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/graphics/2015/09/10/amd-radeon-r9-nano-review/1 )
The Nano isn't even a super niche product. It's a product for a market that does not exist. If they reduced the price $200 you MIGHT have something that makes sense but as currently priced, it's the biggest boondoggle I have seen in quite some time. An OCd mini 970 runs neck and neck at 1080p with these cards for $300 less.
How on God's earth do you design this product without HDMI 2.0? Seriously?
I don't need to tear Roy a new one, Kyle did enough of that for both of us. However, he could have done it in a more adult way. Not because we should be pitying AMD, but because it would be more professional. I have read Anandtech's review, and TomsHardware's conclusion (which carries much less stock then AT's).
You mentioning you have been around for 10+ years in the [H] community just confirms your bias to [H]. This is not necessarily a bad thing, it just shows both your commitment to the editorial team, and that they have earned your respect through their reviews. I haven't been around the [H] community for that long. I appreciate the fire & conviction that [H] has in their reviews, but some of the language is over the top and I'm sure it's scorching some bridges.
Can you honestly say that if you were in PR or relations at a company, and saw a comment like Kyle's regarding hanging up on the Nano call, that you would move that company to the top of the list for review hardware? On top of that, this inflammatory article just confirms not sending [H] a Nano was probably the right move. Hell, at this point, does anyone really believe that if [H] did acquire a Nano that the review would be fair??? Kyle is clearly personally invested in this conflict, despite how much he says he doesn't care.
Based on the reviews I've seen, the Nano packs a lot of performance into a very small package, something that AMD should be lauded for, but at a price that does not make sense for most people. The same could be said when the Titan X launched, that it gave a lot of performance, but financially did not make sense in most applications. Do you think the Nano would get the same Gold award, I doubt it, even though this is an impressive piece of engineering with a halo price, much like the Titan X.
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Kyle, did that read that right? [H] pulled an [H] user's review / build log of a Nano because they did not get to review it first? if that's the case, that seems really petty. I don't get why you would punish the [H] user who put the time in to build / review around the Nano... unless of course you feel that his/her post in the build logs forum somehow would be considered representative of the [H]? ... or maybe you felt that he/she somehow influenced the [H] not receiving said sample? both seem really far fetched.
... even if he/she is a die-hard AMD fan, and posted a review that was clearly biased, since when does the [H] censor/limit user's reviews / build logs?
After all, you guys are going to review one still, right? Surely as soon as it's available?
Sure hope so, be interesting to read a truly fair and comprehensive review - IMHO, the best site for GPU and case reviews online - once you've had the time to write one.
... even if he/she is a die-hard AMD fan, and posted a review that was clearly biased, since when does the [H] censor/limit user's reviews / build logs?
After all, you guys are going to review one still, right? Surely as soon as it's available?
Sure hope so, be interesting to read a truly fair and comprehensive review - IMHO, the best site for GPU and case reviews online - once you've had the time to write one.
JayteeBates
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The Titan cards (of which I own both Titan and Titan-X) are the absolute top performers for a single GPU solution. That is award worthy really without question. I won't speculate on what an H review would be for Nano but I would trust [H] to lay out the good and the bad.
This I think is the biggest issue with how this went down. If you were a company launching a product, and you saw a review site write an inflammatory comment about the price prior to it's launch, are you going to look at that site and say:
"Oh yeah, I'm sure they are going to give us a fair and un-biased review!"
Forget about whether [H]/Kyle favors or hates AMD, or is biased towards NVIDIA (neither of which I am asserting as true). Can you tell me that that would be your view if you were at AMD's PR department? From their point of view, it doesn't matter how fairly the specifics of the test are, or whether that sites community believes they are one thing or another. They see a pile of possible review sites, and are going to send hardware to ones most likely to be fair or positive.
Lest we forget, AMD/NVIDIA/INTEL aren't in the business of providing you with amazing products at cut rate prices, they are in business to SELL HARDWARE. That's it.
If this is really all about being called not fair, and not actually about not getting a Nano to review, read the above, that should be clear enough.
I agree, I'm not saying that the Titan X didn't deserve it's reward. However, the Nano seems to be an absolute top performer for it's size. That being said, having read the recent [H] reviews of AMD hardware, I wouldn't give it a snowflakes chance in hell of getting a reward.
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SilverSliver
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What article is this, precisely? Please link it. All I saw was a forum post in response to another comment about the price.