Tom's Hardware Sold

J

Jason_Wall

[H] Consumer Managing Editor
Joined
Jul 22, 2005
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Hardware review site Tom's Hardware has been sold. While the buyer is yet to be formally announced, rumor has it that TG Publishing, publisher for Tom's Hardware Guide, was bought for $15-20 million.

A formal announcement is to be made sometime this month.

From Omid Rahmat, CEO of Tom's Publishing LLC:

TG Publishing, the publisher of Tom's Hardware Guide, has been sold. We expect the deal to close this month, and will make an official announcement at the appropriate time. We believe that there are some very exciting times ahead for the company, and that our readers have a lot to look forward to.
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Not sure what exactly the above poster was trying to say, other than maybe playing to the ears of the HardOCP community, but Toms Hardware site has some of the best articles out there.

Does anyone honestly think $15 million is thrown around that freely? No, it's not.

There are many good tech web sites out there. HardOCP is just one of many.

I am curious the market value on some of these websites now.
 
thg is a hardware site that is blown way out of proportion. There are many smalltime/freelance sites that offer more wholesome articles.
 
rthefley said:
Not sure what exactly the above poster was trying to say, other than maybe playing to the ears of the HardOCP community, but Toms Hardware site has some of the best articles out there.

Does anyone honestly think $15 million is thrown around that freely? No, it's not.

There are many good tech web sites out there. HardOCP is just one of many.

I am curious the market value on some of these websites now.
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I wouldn't even consider hardocp a real hardware site like anandtech or tomshardware. Whenever I think of anandtech and toms are more formal sites or business sites. I proffer to go to hardocp because the fact that it has the feel of a community based hardware site. Doesnt have close to as much publicity for one side or the other, that I felt anandtech and toms would play on. Still hardocp does pull some !!!!!!sh stuff, I was pissed off when hardocp did that stunt when intel launched the intel core 2 duo(and I am even and amd fan).
 
I'd agree with sc3; [H]ard|OCP is more community based when it comes to Hardware sites, as opposed to thg, xbitlabs, etc.
 
Kuyt said:
I'd agree with sc3; [H]ard|OCP is more community based when it comes to Hardware sites, as opposed to thg, xbitlabs, etc.
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I think we are one of the few "big ones" that give our readers as much direct interaction as we do. Honestly, it just is not any fun if you are not a part of what is going on.
 
Maybe they will fire all the biased a*sholes that work there and bring in real journalists that arent bought and sold like candy at a store.
 
Maybe it will allow the "reviews" that could be done in 5 pages, but are padded (due in LARGE part to massive amounts of ads) out to 15 pages to be trimmed back to something more realistic? I understand the need for ad revenue and all, but THG apparently doesn't know the meaning of the word excessive.
 
eh who cares. As long as the [H] isn't sold I'll be a happy camper. Its the site that brought me into the tech world (and has stayed as my homepage for seven years lol) :D
 
rthefley said:
Not sure what exactly the above poster was trying to say, other than maybe playing to the ears of the HardOCP community, but Toms Hardware site has some of the best articles out there.
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Even when they criticised Aegia's Physx card on a games that uses Havok? They do have some good articles but some are just idiotic.
 
$15 to $20 million? wow, some people really do throw their money away.

personally, i haven't been to the site in years, mostly because i just wasn't impressed with the quality of the articles, and a few made me question the honesty of the site. i agree with the above poster, that while some off some good numbers, i much prefer the more personal sites like this one, sites where i know the reviewers are far less likely to be biased because of corporate politics.
 
rthefley said:
Does anyone honestly think $15 million is thrown around that freely? No, it's not.
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All one has to do to realize the that large sums of money are thrown around lightly is look at all the bankrupt famous people.
 
That $$$ amount is unconfirmed, but if it's in the ballbark someone's getting jacked.
 
When it was owned by Tom Pabst back in it's advent (around the same time that Scott Hermanson, Anand & Kyle started their respective sites) it was much more informative than it is now with PROPER TECHNICAL articles. Then allegedly Mr Pabst sold out to the almighty currency of his choice to the highest bidders with regards to 'reviewing' products. Thats when most of the hardware community started to get very annoyed at THG and it got a bad name. It wasn't until very recently that I discovered that THG wasn't run by Tom Pabst any more!

More recently the quality of the articles on THG have had very little to do with the computer industry from what I have seen. Articles spotlighting alternative fuels for motor vehicles for one that springs to mind almost immediately. If I wanted to read something like that I would visit a motor related site, not one that is supposedly a major part of the computer world!

I don't participate as much as I used to on any hardware sites anymore like I did in the past (where I was pretty well known worldwide and respected for MY opinions and problem solving), and seeing the quality that ALL the hardware sites have on their forums now, I doubt I ever will get back into regular usage of any site.

$15-20 Million for THG???? Have the 'buyers' been smoking weed & had their brains affected by THC and misread the name?? Or could it be 15-20 million Dollars from a very tiny remote African countries currency that runs out at around $10 Million in their currency to £1GBP/$1USD????

Anything more than the price of the Domain name transfer is way too much for THG at the present time, and the community there sucks big time with major cliques and flamefests galore between all the '!!!!!!s'.

I will stick with Anand & [H] for my requirements, mainly due to that both sites tell it exactly how it is (in the majority unless a Mac !!!!!! tries to write about an non-Mac OS!!!) without dragging out articles over 30 pages & filling everything with adverts (not Google ads, but flash ads in forum posts that completely screw up the reason for reading it due to making it a nightmare to read or comprehend).
 
Does this mark the official end to the long running feud between [H]ardOCP and Tom's Hardware? I remember a few years ago when the big argument between the two sites (was it over benchmarking maybe?) ended with Tom posting a really creepy rebuttal with a gigantic picture of himself on the page on his site, and Kyle putting a ZCP down on them and from that time until now, I don't think the [H] has acknowledged their existence until now.

I know I stopped reading THG a while ago, but is Tom gone now? Will he be gone with the buyout? Did he and Kyle bury the hatchet? Or did the good doctor just leave the scene?
 
I bet you Kyle is thinking of his dream vacation home in Mexico, the last rare new H1 Alpha for sale, and a nice Yacht in the Keys somewhere...

lol
 
THG has been in the dumper for about 2 years now, every since the (before the current) horrific web page update they did about 2 years ago.

The current one isn't much better.

And the tech articles have really stank lately.
 
That site is way too busy. Reviews just don't connect with the Common Geek Type.

20 Million Bucks for that site? Somone has lost it.

I figure 40 for Kyle's Site. He can always review from Hawaii.

Amazing World we live in.

DM
 
I quit visiting that site several years ago. I didn't even know it was still up and running.

Back when CPU performance was important for gaming applications, I got a bit turned off with their "Intel coddling" when AMD was handing them their asses.

I felt that Tom's opinions and reviews were no longer relevant.
 
I agree. I use Hardocp for informal straight from the gut review mentality and Anandtech for formal reviews and the extra information they add to their articles.
 
As someone that visits both THG and [H]ard daily I might be able to give some insight.

As others have mentioned I also visit [H] for the community. I come here and scan the news articles mostly looking for ones that I think will have an interesting discussion... rarely ever even going to read the article myself.

I use Tom's for completely different purposes. Firstly, I _never_ read any comments there... when I have in the past they were just complete drivel and the forum system over there is terrible. What I'm usually reading on Tom's are the slightly non-technical articles on technology (I know that sounds weird). I buy a lot more than computer parts and honestly there aren't that many sites out there doing hands-on reviews of everything technology rated. Sure, their methods aren't very scientific, but sometimes I just want to learn about a new product or get a good comparison between like products (I think Tom's has some of the best comparison articles... especially for monitors).

At any rate, I'll probably continue going to Toms for fringe technology reviews... but when I really want to know something inside and out I come here (those new PSU reviews are really nice BTW!).

Friedmud
 
some of the posters here are really making me shake my head. THG has been utter crap for about the last 3 years. i find that they like to write articles without all the info - such as the ageia physx article where they were blaming problems with the GRAW engine on physx which has nothing to do with the flaws they were pointing out, or an article regarding some of the first dual core cpus about a year ago - tried to claim that amd had nothing for the server market in the dual core flavour i believe when i was reading it on my opty 165 rig....the list goes on here! i stopped reading them because i got sick of their huge bias towards intel. i even remember an old review of the first P4's and athlon xp's where not only was the athlon cheaper but absolutly mopped the floor with the P4 and they actually tried to make up BS reasons why the P4 was better.

so they got sold? cool! hopefully someone will send all the monkeys they use for journalists back to the zoo where they belong.

as for the [H] yes i admit they've done some stinker articles and reviews, but they've also done some really excellent ones as well. i find the PSU reviews wonderful myself. there's more bad than good here but like many i also get a second opinion from somewhere like anandtech if i'm considering buying or want more in depth info.
 
Ockie said:
I bet you Kyle is thinking of his dream vacation home in Mexico, the last rare new H1 Alpha for sale, and a nice Yacht in the Keys somewhere...

lol
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Yea really.

Anyway I stopped reading Toms a while ago. Didn't like the articles. I just didn't think they were doing a good job. I just never went back to see if they got any better. Still good for the owners if they get that much cash for it.
 
XamediX said:
I agree. I use Hardocp for informal straight from the gut review mentality and Anandtech for formal reviews and the extra information they add to their articles.
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Yep.

As someone who once bookmarked every computer/techno site on the web, I eventually deleted them all in favor of the [H] and Anandtech.
 
Hey Kyle, whenever the time comes, (really wishful thinking here) I'd love to get my hands on some shares in this site. I know it's corny, premature, outrageous and/or probably not even possible...but if there's ever a possibility, I want in. That's how much I believe in this site.

If anything, just take what I'm saying as a compliment because I think HARDOCP is worth 10 times Tom's site. :D
 
$15-20 million for an established website seems like small potatoes. THG used to be good when Pabst wrote a majority of the reviews a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away. I haven't taken anything they've posted in the past 4 years to heart.

Keep up the great work Kyle and Co.!
 
last time I used THR was for a monitor review i think. it was a 10-monitor comparison....of course, the review didn't compel me to buy any of the items.

a better product research experience could be had by just searching the forums here and finding out what real people with nothing to gain thought of it.
 
ScytheNoire said:
$15 to $20 million? wow, some people really do throw their money away.

personally, i haven't been to the site in years, mostly because i just wasn't impressed with the quality of the articles, and a few made me question the honesty of the site. i agree with the above poster, that while some off some good numbers, i much prefer the more personal sites like this one, sites where i know the reviewers are far less likely to be biased because of corporate politics.
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I agree... The last time I visited Tom's was back in the day when they had a video of the pencil tricks for the AMD xp1700+ and the a few other unlocknig video's:eek: That seems like a ton of money to me
 
that is crazy amounts of cash. and yet we still see reviews where the hardware is setup on a kitchen table :rolleyes:

per that, you folks here are set for life. I would think your selling price would be bigger? are you tempted to sell?
 
fenderltd said:
I agree... The last time I visited Tom's was back in the day when they had a video of the pencil tricks for the AMD xp1700+ and the a few other unlocknig video's:eek: That seems like a ton of money to me
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Same here...I never visit there these days.

Several of the original sites that got me going at the start are now gone:

voodooextreme.com
agn3d.com (Any word on Jeremy Allford?)

I hate to see favs like the [H] and Anand change/go away but it is probably inevitable. Tom's just went to complete crap several years ago.
 
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