Why Aren't These Cards Reviewed?!

V

VulturEMaN

Gawd
Joined
Sep 11, 2005
Messages
1,017
Thats what I keep asking myself. There are many smaller brand name cards out there (Albatron, Leadtek, Sapphire, Biostar, etc) that you never ever see more than 1 or 2 reviews about.

On the other hand, if you google ASUS 7900GT, you'll get like 20 reviews. Same goes for XFX, Abit, BFG, etc.

I just find it frightening that some reviewers are persuaded by ads and hype that "OMG BFG PWNS ALL" and that's all they review.

I loled every time someone went and said that their BFG 6600GT came OCed and could beat my 6600gt any day. If they had done their homework, my Leadtek one came stock at 550/1120 while theirs came at 525/1050 (and mine could actually OC! lol). And even now in SLI, my cards are doin great (see sig). Wait till I watercool em :D

Today, while looking around at 7900GT reviews, I see one that says that the Leadtek 7900GT Extreme is a great card for the price (300flat), and holds FPS close to the XFX one that is 40$ more.

I just needed to vent that. Sometimes, ya gotta dig to find the brightest jems.
 
One of my goals now that we have more editors is to expand to include more brands. We've got a Sapphire evaluation in the works.
 
Brent_Justice said:
One of my goals now that we have more editors is to expand to include more brands. We've got a Sapphire evaluation in the works.
Click to expand...

:D

Well, don't take me wrong. I didn't mean [H]OCP at all (although you do kinda have a few favorite companies).

I was just talking in general.

Doing google searches for certain companies brings about this:
Leadtek 7900GT Extreme reviews: 1 (AMDZone)
XFX 7900GT XXX reviews: 10+ (too lazy to count)
 
I think almost all of the reviewers get the cards free from the manufacturer so they review it. The smaller companies may not want to give away their vid cards for reviewers. I dunno...
 
heh thiers not much difference between the cards except for clocks and overclockablity, although how much you can overclock a card largly depends on luck, at least thats what I was told, be free to correct me if I'm wrong. (Did manage to get 8150 3Dmarks06 with specs in sig)
 
Sapphire isn't what I would call small. Sapphire is actually manufacturing the BBATI cards IIRC.
 
Aside from relatively small variances in clock speeds the cards are all the same, so it's somewhat of a waste of time to review two different cards just because one comes with a 20mhz OC on the core stock. You don't need a review to tell you that the OC'd one is going to get a couple more FPS than the one at reference speeds.

Plus most websites just review whatever card they are able to get sent to them.
 
Predator_CITF said:
I've heard Leadtek makes more higher quality cards than BFG.
Click to expand...

I've hard Leadtek's RMA department is virtually non existant and that they take a month to "repair" cards.

A search will bring up the thread on here about it.
 
nobi125 said:
I've hard Leadtek's RMA department is virtually non existant and that they take a month to "repair" cards.

A search will bring up the thread on here about it.
Click to expand...

It's pretty much nonexistant because out of all the kids that have Leadtek cards on my campus (12 that I know of), not one has had any sort of problem.

I emailed their tech support once, and I got a reply in 2 days. Pretty speedy imo.

If you have a problem with a card, never let them say "we'll repair it". Tell them you want the money you paid for it. Now.
 
Brent_Justice said:
One of my goals now that we have more editors is to expand to include more brands. We've got a Sapphire evaluation in the works.
Click to expand...

Woot Sapphire. Only card I buy if its on the ATI side.

Out of curiosty, do you buy the cards you review, or are you "donated" them for testing and benchmarking purposes then send them back? I know this is the cases sometimes with review sites.
 
Predator_CITF said:
I've heard Leadtek makes more higher quality cards than BFG.
Click to expand...

Their cards also weigh a ton. Considering how heavy the 'normal' cards today are, Leadtek's version would probably break your board in half.
 
Sly said:
Their cards also weigh a ton. Considering how heavy the 'normal' cards today are, Leadtek's version would probably break your board in half.
Click to expand...

My Leadtek 7900GT is a reference design just like all the rest. Just because the word lead is in the name doesn't mean they are heavy.
 
krameriffic said:
My Leadtek 7900GT is a reference design just like all the rest. Just because the word lead is in the name doesn't mean they are heavy.
Click to expand...
lol, exactly what I was thinking
 
i have owned 2 leadtek cards, a geforce ddr and a 6800gt agp. both broke almost immediately, without any mod, oc or abuse. i swore after the ddr i would never buy a leadtek product again, after dealing with their customer support. so in the 3 years between those 2 cards their c.s. remained the same. it took 6 weeks to get a replacement for each because they were "out of stock" at the time. how the leadtek c.s. department was out of stock, while every store had leadtek in stock, i was never able to find out. never found out why it took 6 weeks to get a card from the warehouse to my house, either. their rma process just as bad or worse than dfi.
 
Hey Brent, You said you had sapphire cards for reviews from editors, what about nVidia cards? (eVGA, XFX, BFG) so people can finally see those cards head to head. Id definitely like to see more reviews up there, especially of highend video cards compared with each other and compared with last gen. Like how much of a step is a 7900GT is over 6800GT SLI, etc... you get the idea. More cards to compare in reviews is nice. Maybe different brands too.
 
krameriffic said:
My Leadtek 7900GT is a reference design just like all the rest. Just because the word lead is in the name doesn't mean they are heavy.
Click to expand...

Ya know, i honestly never associated the 'lead' with their cards weight 'til you mentioned it :eek: I've aways read it as lead, as in 'leader'

But i do mean it literally, i'm not updated on their product lineup now, but back then, their cards really are heavier than normal. They're the first company that actually put a card inside a heatsink. No, i'm serious, the heatsink wasn't strapped on, the card was *inside* an enclosed wraparound heatsink with two fans.

Edit: My ti4200 was a leadtek and it had heatsinks on both front and back. Compared to my friends Inno3D's. I think it weighted twice as theirs.
 
well, unfortunately my Leadtek 6800 is being 'fixed' now. gone just over a week, but i'm not holding my breath............

the reviews say the heatsink is copper, but i would tend to disagree, since it's obviously a much lighter alloy of some kind with an almost copper like electroplated coating it seems. if you stop to think about it, no copper ever looked as like that.
 
Sly said:
They're the first company that actually put a card inside a heatsink. No, i'm serious, the heatsink wasn't strapped on, the card was *inside* an enclosed wraparound heatsink with two fans.
Click to expand...

Oooooooo....I want a few of those!

Throw some new fans in em, and lazer them up a bit....but only if they're copper :D
 
Since most video cards are copies of the reference design, there is little reason to review a large portion of the cards on the market. BFG, eVGA and others who overclock their cards out of the factory, or other companies that deviate from the reference cooling designs, are more reasonable to review as they bring something new to the table. Good or bad.

Just my $.02.
 
Dan_D said:
Since most video cards are copies of the reference design, there is little reason to review a large portion of the cards on the market. BFG, eVGA and others who overclock their cards out of the factory, or other companies that deviate from the reference cooling designs, are more reasonable to review as they bring something new to the table. Good or bad.

Just my $.02.
Click to expand...
I completely agree. That's why I was mentioning the Leadtek Extreme edition cards. They're OCed, yet nobody reviews them.

I haven't seen a test of how far these cards can OC past their factory OCs. I guess that's what I'm complaining about. Ya know, why buy that extra 30mhz XFX OC that doesn't OC more for 30$ when the ASUS overclocks 100mhz past it?

I'm starting to think that I'm a Leadtek fan boy :p
 
BFG makes ok cards but mates them with TERRIBLE coolers... IE, bushing led fans that wear out quick.

what really matters these days a quick review won't answer... how long will it breaks?

but when a new core comes out, it isn't about the company that stuck the NVIDIA or ATI chip onto a REFERENCE design board so much as the underly new architecture features and maybe a unique cooling solution.

everyone now factory "overclocks" now a days... but EVGA does some real cherry picking of cores if you are willing to pay.

clock for clock all nvidia 7900GTs are going to perform exactly the same no matter what brand. same goes with ati. back when manufactuerers designed (not just built) their own PCBs it was different though.

.
 
Leadtek's cards may be good, but their service and support sucks. For this reason, I doub't I would ever buy another Leadtek product again.
 
VulturEMaN said:
It's pretty much nonexistant because out of all the kids that have Leadtek cards on my campus (12 that I know of), not one has had any sort of problem.

I emailed their tech support once, and I got a reply in 2 days. Pretty speedy imo.

If you have a problem with a card, never let them say "we'll repair it". Tell them you want the money you paid for it. Now.
Click to expand...

My leadtek gf2 pro developed memory addressing issues (was never OCed) and when I RMAed it they peeled the serial number off, put back a new sticker, and sent me the same card. it had the exact same problem. i even used a sharpie and marked the card in a discreet place (i do this to all my RMA's to make sure i actually get something new back). i ended up scrapping the card for the analog parts on it. i like tantalum SMD capacitors.
 
Dan_D said:
Since most video cards are copies of the reference design, there is little reason to review a large portion of the cards on the market. BFG, eVGA and others who overclock their cards out of the factory, or other companies that deviate from the reference cooling designs, are more reasonable to review as they bring something new to the table. Good or bad.

Just my $.02.
Click to expand...

As far as I know Leadtek are one of the few companies who do deviate from referance designs by two means:
1)Cooling, they have their own coolers on many of the cards they sell. A good example would be their 6800 Line whihc had massive silent coolers or my current 7800GT which has their own dual sided cooling design
2)Clock speeds. They have almost always sold cards labeled "extreme" offerinf higher clock speeds then referance design. In fact some of their models are only shipped in Extreme form in the states - have a look at Newegg.

I think Leadtek are a subsidary of Foxconn, which produce Motherboards of late but havent had much success acheiving a good reputation for themselves.
Their GPU sales are very strong in the middle east and they are one of the first to launch every new Nvidia GPU here. They also have very compelling bundles for their price point.
I for one LOVE 'em, and will gladly buy another GPU from them,
 
altcon said:
I think Leadtek are a subsidary of Foxconn, which produce Motherboards of late but havent had much success acheiving a good reputation for themselves.
Click to expand...

Willseyvilleny said:
leadtek is a subsidary or parent company to bfg, their addresses are the same lol
Click to expand...

Foxconn, also known as Hon Hai Precision Industry Co, has been around since 1974. They're one of the big dogs in electronics.
They're still on of the major provider of switches and connectors used in electronics.
Their US offices are in the L.A. area (Fullerton)

Leadtek has been around since the late 80's.
Their US offices are in the San Fran area (Fremont).

BFG is based out of the Chicago area.
They've been around since 2002.
VisionTek was NVIDIA's biggest cutomers. They hit the skids in 2002, and some of their employees jumped ship and got in on starting up BFG.
Then Visiontek got some cashflow and jumped to ATI.
Since BFG doesn't make their cards in the US, it's possible that Leadtek or Foxconn could be making their cards, but that's quite different than being in the same company.

Ya'll need to step away from the crack pipes.

I'm just sayin'.........
 
VulturEMaN said:
It's pretty much nonexistant because out of all the kids that have Leadtek cards on my campus (12 that I know of), not one has had any sort of problem.

I emailed their tech support once, and I got a reply in 2 days. Pretty speedy imo.

If you have a problem with a card, never let them say "we'll repair it". Tell them you want the money you paid for it. Now.
Click to expand...



2 days is speedy??

Heck Antec replied my emails in under a half hour--thats speedy. Heck I got a reply from Asus in less than a day when i RMAed my A7N8X.


My RMA thru Leadtek was a nightmare. I was stuck without a working video card for almost two months, till i bought a X800XT to replace it. Then about two weeks after i got the ATI card teh RMA finally came back...what did they do to it..beats me. I got the same Freaking card back, same serial numebers and every thing. My guess they just flashed the bios...who knows. Im never buying a Product from Leadtek or one of its subsidiaries again. I also Loved teh Call the Leadtek guy gave me...I couldnt understand a damn word he was saying--at all.
 
Heh i don't care about BFG quality becouse at least here in Poland i can get 7800gt for the price of their 7600GT OC (and that's some uber 20 Mhz increase of clock over 30-60 bucks cheaper galaxy or leadteak ones :D )

But what pisses me off is fact that you get shitload of reviews about 1900xtx or 7900gtx but you strugle to find a more than a few ones about 7600 gs same with 6600 non pro (like 90% of reviews with 6600gt and only a bunch with 6600).
Considering 1900xtx is like 1-2% of the market (or other ultra high end cards) it seems to be totaly wrong. Also such little beaties are usually way more interesting overclockers than high end stuff.

Same for the mobos everyone gets excited over asus uber super deluxe board yet you can't find how well does it's 50% cheaper non deluxe version do.
 
WhyYouLoveMe said:
I think almost all of the reviewers get the cards free from the manufacturer so they review it. The smaller companies may not want to give away their vid cards for reviewers. I dunno...
Click to expand...
yeah, that's about what happens a lot of the time ;)
 
send me something I will review it.

I will write a very nice 7800gs (with vf900cu) review!
 
vanilla_guerilla said:
i have owned 2 leadtek cards, a geforce ddr and a 6800gt agp. both broke almost immediately, without any mod, oc or abuse. i swore after the ddr i would never buy a leadtek product again, after dealing with their customer support. so in the 3 years between those 2 cards their c.s. remained the same. it took 6 weeks to get a replacement for each because they were "out of stock" at the time. how the leadtek c.s. department was out of stock, while every store had leadtek in stock, i was never able to find out. never found out why it took 6 weeks to get a card from the warehouse to my house, either. their rma process just as bad or worse than dfi.
Click to expand...

This is why you buy BFG instead.... BFG has excellent support, and the time I talked with them on the phone the guy was pretty knowledgeable and his theory on the cause of the problem ended up being correct (power supply).

eVGA has the 90 day trade up, and from what I've seen with people needing to RMA some of the 7900gtx oc cards, they got quick help from eVGA.

The off brands, you might save $20. But then you might end up wishing you had a paid a little bit more and went with a company with more solid support.
 
Leadtek used to be more popular.

Same with Diamond, Hercules, Guillemet, Elsa, etc. Back in the GF2 days I and family members had sevearl GF2 cards by Leadtek.

Only mine had a fan failure, and it was as easy as a call and they shipped a replacement right out.
 
I will say, I'd like to see something like the support test [H] does for OEM systems, only for all reviews (motherboard and video espicially). I know I've dealt with the Leadtek support way more often than I'd like. I upgraded a buddy of mine's system with an A400 GT TDH, which has since needed to be RMAed 4 times. They're slow to respond to email, and "repairs" take weeks; the entire process usually takes a month. Of course, dealing with support would probably really slow down the review process, so it might not be practical. With everybody just pulling the reference design these days it really comes down to price and support for me.
 
RadCliffeX said:
2 days is speedy??

Heck Antec replied my emails in under a half hour--thats speedy. Heck I got a reply from Asus in less than a day when i RMAed my A7N8X.

My RMA thru Leadtek was a nightmare. I was stuck without a working video card for almost two months, till i bought a X800XT to replace it. Then about two weeks after i got the ATI card teh RMA finally came back...what did they do to it..beats me. I got the same Freaking card back, same serial numebers and every thing. My guess they just flashed the bios...who knows. Im never buying a Product from Leadtek or one of its subsidiaries again. I also Loved teh Call the Leadtek guy gave me...I couldnt understand a damn word he was saying--at all.
Click to expand...
Alright...your RMA sounds bad :p

But as for 2 days being speedy? LOL yea it is...
My emails I've sent out:
Zalman: 3 weeks
ASUS: 2 weeks
MGE: 8 days
Samsung: 4 days
Leadtek: 2 days
Monsoon: 1 day
OPTI-UPS: 10 minutes :D (It was amazing!)

But as for the rest of the people complaining about geforce2 cards, I woulda given the company another try by now.

I'd rather save money and get a better product than spend an extra 40-50$ on an product (when that could go towards cool glowy cables! :p).

If I ever have a problem with the cards, I'll let ya know and we'll write a review on the RMA :p

better yet, [H] could prolly pull that off for us, if they were up for reviewing a Leadtek card :D
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top