Why so much OCZ hate?

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Liam

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Hey guys,
sorry if this seems like a n00b question, but why does everyone hate OCZ? I mean, i think they make some pretty good ram. I've heard people say it's about their buisness ethics? what did they do? Was this about their 0% silver thermal paste? Well, thanks in advance.
 
Their ram is of questionable quality. I bought 4 sticks of their pc3200 EL ram a year ago, and none of the sticks would run at the rated speed and timings. I sent them back and got some PC3500 that worked good. A few years ago, very little of OCZ's ram would run at the rated speeds, and there were problems with their RMA. They are working to improve though. There is just no reason to get OCZ when Mushkin, Corsair and HyperX is so much better. IMO.
 
I agree with the RAM statement.

Also if I remember correctly, around 1.5 years ago or something, there was an article that upset the community. Something about uncovering the truth behind OCZ.
 
versello said:
Also if I remember correctly, around 1.5 years ago or something, there was an article that upset the community. Something about uncovering the truth behind OCZ.
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I think that was about OCZ before they were bought out by new management and basically became a new company with the same old name. Still don't trust them that much though.
 
Yeah, they've got a history to deal with. On the other hand, it's been awhile since I've seen people going utterly ballistic over an OCZ product. Still, them bad vibes won't go away so easily.
 
mad3d said:
I think that was about OCZ before they were bought out by new management and basically became a new company with the same old name. Still don't trust them that much though.
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they were bought by the same people who founded it or something really dumb like that

same shit, different pile. dont trust em.
 
saturnine2 said:
Their ram is of questionable quality. I bought 4 sticks of their pc3200 EL ram a year ago, and none of the sticks would run at the rated speed and timings. I sent them back and got some PC3500 that worked good. A few years ago, very little of OCZ's ram would run at the rated speeds, and there were problems with their RMA. They are working to improve though. There is just no reason to get OCZ when Mushkin, Corsair and HyperX is so much better. IMO.
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ditto. check de sig, Mushkin, Corsair, HyperX, Crucial. Only ram I'll touch.
everything else belongs in a MAC.
 
One of the things I think I remember is that OCZ created 2-3 "review" websites and always gave their ram the best reviews, etc, lots of false information the directly spread. I havent heard anything bad about them for a long time, and my memory might be completely off on this.
 
DeepFreeze said:
ditto. check de sig, Mushkin, Corsair, HyperX, Crucial. Only ram I'll touch.
everything else belongs in a MAC.
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What the hell is a MAC? Media access control?
 
versello said:
What the hell is a MAC? Media access control?
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I think it was an insult directed towards Apple computers but I could be mistaken. The only memory I ever purchased from OCZ was defective and had to be replaced. The new stuff works just fine I've just don't feel as confident with them as I do with other brands like Corsair, Crucial, Mushkin, etc.
 
Ive actually had good luck with ocz....a few months ago i bought 2 sticks of PC3700 Gold for a buddy and the sticks ran flawlessly at DDR 525 speeds....
 
Anyone who buys OCZ's products should be drug into the streets and beaten. To give your hard earned money to a company like that, who knowingly rips off customers, and does everything possible to escape punishment is flat out ridiculous and spineless. OCZ was featured in one of my text books for a business ethics class 2 years ago, and nothing has changed. New management my ass. Why the hell in good mental state, could anyone buy from them, instead of the many other worthy companies who make a better product on top of it? Why? Makes me sick that our society is willing to look past these businesses' games and continue to support them.
 
djnes said:
Anyone who buys OCZ's products should be drug into the streets and beaten. To give your hard earned money to a company like that, who knowingly rips off customers, and does everything possible to escape punishment is flat out ridiculous and spineless. OCZ was featured in one of my text books for a business ethics class 2 years ago, and nothing has changed. New management my ass. Why the hell in good mental state, could anyone buy from them, instead of the many other worthy companies who make a better product on top of it? Why? Makes me sick that our society is willing to look past these businesses' games and continue to support them.
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Sadly you could substitue the name OCZ in your post with a lot of tech companies or otherwise, and still make the same argument.
 
Wixard said:
Sadly you could substitue the name OCZ in your post with a lot of tech companies or otherwise, and still make the same argument.
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Even more sad is the list would grow immensly if it could be any company, regardless of industry.
 
OCZ can have good product, but they do decieve with their product lines.

Take for example the newly announced Revision 3 PC3200 copper.

Its specified to run at 2-3-3-6, which sounds better than the Revision 2 which was rated to run at 2-3-3-7. That is of course, until you go the website and find out that its only rated at 2-3-3-6 for Intel systems, and 2.5-3-3-6 for AMD.
 
They do have kickass pcb's though. The BH-5 stick they made was definetly the best BH-5 stick ever made. el3500pt limited. The BH-6 stick is slightly better than Mushkin 222 special. And eb 3500 & 3700 kick some serious ass!
 
Then why is OCZ's BH-5 stick overclock better than Mushkin's BH-5 stick? Same with BH-6...
 
M4d-K10wN said:
Then why is OCZ's BH-5 stick overclock better than Mushkin's BH-5 stick? Same with BH-6...
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I have not seen any evidence to support this statement and frankly, I don't care. If someone offered me some of the older Mushkin Black LVII PC3500 and some OCZ El3500pt Limited I would take the Mushkin without hesitation. The problem with OCZ is that there product is not consistent. Someone will pick some up and get amazing overclocks with it. Someone else picks up the same OCZ product and they can't even run the memory at stock timings and speeds. Their memory has just not shown to be as reliable as memory from vendors like Corsair, Crucial, Mushkin, etc.
 
aug1516 said:
.....The problem with OCZ is that there product is not consistent.
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...yep. That's been my experience with them, as well. Some of the stuff goes like a rocket, some hangs on boot. It's a bit of a crap shoot as to what you'll get. Top that off with some of the worst business ethics in modern history and you have a company I choose not to support.

For workstations / lab machines, I buy Crucial. Period. No regrets.

For OC's / [H]otRods in general, I shop the best buy from Mushkin, Corsair, and Kingston's HyperX series. Memory prices do fluctuate around quite a bit, so the best deal this month may not be next month.

No matter what memory I buy, it runs Memtest86+ overnight with NO errors, or it gets RMA'd.

Have fun - B.B.S.
 
ZenOps said:
OCZ can have good product, but they do decieve with their product lines.

Take for example the newly announced Revision 3 PC3200 copper.

Its specified to run at 2-3-3-6, which sounds better than the Revision 2 which was rated to run at 2-3-3-7. That is of course, until you go the website and find out that its only rated at 2-3-3-6 for Intel systems, and 2.5-3-3-6 for AMD.
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When we changed the spec we made sure it was published clearly that the specs were different for AMD Athlon XP systems. I don't see how we were deceptive, but if you have any suggestions on how we can publish it more clearly, I am listening.

To anybody who has bought an OCZ product and had a bad experience, I'd like to know if you spoke with our tech support. We strive to have the most comprehensive and complete customer support in the industry.

I, along with every one of my coworkers, make sure every single one of the people who buy's OCZ memory is happy. If any of you have had, or are currently using OCZ memory and are unhappy, please let me know.

-Sean
 
Hi Sean... I've been treated pretty well by OCZ, and I like a lot of your products. I personally haven't had too much problem and I like the way you handled the AS paste issue.

How about two marking for the chips: One main identifier with "Intel 2-3-3-6" and another line with "AMD 2.5-3-3-11" or PCXXXX whatever.
 
my ocz ram is great, rated for 266fsb (PC4200) running 1:1 at 271. no complaints from me
 
Hey Sean....you're a brave guy.... :D

Seriously, I know that OCZ had changed ownership and is making a decent try at cleaning things up. My $00.02 is that as long as your stuff does what it's supposed to, and as long as your tech support will stand by the products, you'll do well long term. You have to admit that your firm has quite a "rep" to live down, and this will take time.

In the last two years, I've had two systems with OCZ show up on my bench that kept corrupting the OS install, and one that wouldn't even boot. The data corruptors were proven by Memtest runs and by substituton; as in, the OCZ generated errors in Memtest and eventually plowed the OS, while my "bench" RAM ran fine. Those guys returned the memory and I never heard from them again. I don't know if they got more OCZ or not. The no boot was a new build that wouldn't even post. Again, substitution proved the RAM was the issue. That guy came back with some Mushkin RAM and it runs like the bomb. All these systems were at "stock" speeds - no OC's here.

Good luck - thanks for posting.

B.B.S.
 
B.B.S.,

Thanks for offering up your past problems to me. I can personally promise each and every customer that does buy our product that if for any reason they are unhappy because the product doesn't work as advertised, we will completely take care of them and answer e-mails and phones with hardly any wait time.

Bad parts and incompatibilities do happen sometimes, how we handle it is the name of the game. I think we do a great job in respect to our customer service, but I am ALWAYS open to suggestions on improving our CS.

To note:

We have a Toll Free Customer Support line
We have Forums and live support via AIM
We have technical support e-mail with extremely quick (usually same day, within hours of sending the e-mail to us)

-Sean
 
to be honest, I have to say that while great customer support is an excellent thing to have, I don't think it can make up for a poor and/or inconsistent product, which is what it seems many people have an issue with.

I haven't bought OCZ and I'm not saying this is the case, but an example:
If I buy something from someone and it doesn't work properly, I call up customer service, they are fantastic, send me new ones. Ok, all well and good.
But what if I have to do that 2 or 3 times before I get a good product? Well I still recognize that they have excellent dealings with customers, but I am still gonna be wary/hesitant of the company because I should get a working product the first time, or on the rare occassion, the second time.

So, my $.02 is that excellent customer service is fantastic, but I don't know that you can base a company on it.

props for being around to deal with us [H] guys and answer questions though
 
You have to be aware that we take many steps to ensure that every single product leaves here without a defect. Believe me, I'd like to never have to do an RMA. Unfortunately, sometimes defects happen.
 
mad3d said:
I think that was about OCZ before they were bought out by new management and basically became a new company with the same old name. Still don't trust them that much though.
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Well that's what they want you to think, but the main person that ran it then is still there now.
 
OCTech said:
You have to be aware that we take many steps to ensure that every single product leaves here without a defect. Believe me, I'd like to never have to do an RMA. Unfortunately, sometimes defects happen.
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Sounds like they're happening too much. I know several people who have bought OCZ recently, ran great for a couple and others got sticks that wouldn't boot. One of the hallmarks of Corsair, Kingston, Crucial and Mushkin is that their products are very consistent. And very good. If you can make a great product 50% of the time, you're still not doing so well. Even 70% of the time. If there's crap making it to the shelves the company has to try harder, and while OCZs ethics do seem to have improved, the consistency is still a problem.


This is similar to a problem people deal with buying camera lenses from russian manufacturers. Some will produce tack sharp images, others won't be able to make infinity focus (same lens model). It's a crapshoot, but they are also a hell of a lot cheaper than Canon/Nikon/Leica/Contax and so on. OCZs ram isn't a lot cheaper, so there's no excuse for this problem, even if you have a good RMA process.
 
Periodically I will go out and buy sticks of ram, and of course I will buy OCZ's as well. That said, it has been about a year since I have done this last. CONSISTENTLY, OCZ's product was not consistent. It would work in this motherboard, but not in this one. It would clock stock here, but run OC 2X in this one. The product is so squirrelly I am one person that simply cannot recommend you buy it. If you bought it and had a good experience with it, consider yourself LUCKY.

OCZ has offered us a lot of money in the past to advertise to our readers and we do not do it because we are not comfortable suggesting it to our readers.

I wonder how many review sites would come away with stellar OCZ reviews if they actually BOUGHT the ram themselves instead of getting sticks from OCZ?????? I am going to guess their glowing reviews would be a lot less in number.

I think you are gambling with your money purchasing and OCZ product. I suggest sticking with Corsair, Kingston, and Muskin for you RAM.
 
I will say it again publicly, if you have bought an OCZ product and were or currently are upset or unhappy with your purchase, please contact me or any of our tech support staff. I can't really offer more than that. As it is, I am open to taking suggestions from all of you.

I more than offer an open, helping hand to any of you who are looking for info or help with our product.
 
OCTech said:
I will say it again publicly, if you have bought an OCZ product and were or currently are upset or unhappy with your purchase, please contact me or any of our tech support staff. I can't really offer more than that. As it is, I am open to taking suggestions from all of you.

I more than offer an open, helping hand to any of you who are looking for info or help with our product.
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I think that's great, and I hope the whole company is as sincere. Unfortunately really helpful support that's easy to deal with isn't going to sell flaky products. Not your fault, but it is a problem for OCZ to wrestle with.

You'll also be battling those who still think OCZ are scheming bastards, and getting the enthusiasts to trust your RAM again will be tricky. If sites like [H]ard (host of the formerly [L]impForum (tm)) buy your ram and give it good marks, that's seeing something good. Sites that actually buy the products they test are generally more neutral and fair with their reviews, and more likely to provide accurate assessments.
 
I want to point out that our product quality shouldn't be considered an issue. Of the many, many memory modules and Dual Channel kits we sell, very, very little come back as defective. The majority of issues I see actually are in regards to incompatibility (people purchasing PC-4000 memory for AMD AthlonXP systems) and so on.
 
OCTech said:
I want to point out that our product quality shouldn't be considered an issue. Of the many, many memory modules and Dual Channel kits we sell, very, very little come back as defective. The majority of issues I see actually are in regards to incompatibility (people purchasing PC-4000 memory for AMD AthlonXP systems) and so on.
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Is that why every major review site and mag failed your memory even at rated speeds?

Oh, except for the ones your company paid off of course. Give it up dude. Maybe your efforts are honest, but your company dug too deep and isn't doing a goddamn thing to dig out. You guys ever decide to actally put silver in your Arctic Silver yet? Your company makes me sick to my stomach everytime I read an article about consumers and investors who've been ripped of. Send Martha Stewart some of your RAM....I hear she has a ton of integrity.
 
Arctic Silver makes our thermal compound now, just to clarify to DJNes.
 
djnes said:
Is that why every major review site and mag failed your memory even at rated speeds?

Oh, except for the ones your company paid off of course. Give it up dude. Maybe your efforts are honest, but your company dug too deep and isn't doing a goddamn thing to dig out. You guys ever decide to actally put silver in your Arctic Silver yet? Your company makes me sick to my stomach everytime I read an article about consumers and investors who've been ripped of. Send Martha Stewart some of your RAM....I hear she has a ton of integrity.
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I still would rather have OCZ BH-6 sticks rather than my Mushkin ones.
 
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