An easier way to find online reviews

japan electronics store

I find buying technology can be a really hit and miss experience.

I’m actually looking into buying one of the most obtuse of all products – a decent pair of 5.1 speakers for a home theatre PC I’ve recently bought.

I built the PC and got everything working perfectly but I’ve been using a rather old set of 2.1 speakers which don’t exactly go with the whole setup, especially not when standing next to a decent sized HDTV monitor.

Now, ten years ago I would have happily gone down to my local store, listened to a few sets of speakers and decided which ones I liked best based on my personal preference. The problem with doing that these days is I know I’ll be paying a premium compared to buying the item online. I could go in, listen and then run off to the nearest website but then I’m worried that I could find a better system that the store simply doesn’t stock.

With PC hardware, the numbers tend to speak for themselves. With speakers, there are no real set standards to say how ‘good’ something sounds. The best way to find out is to take a look at user reviews.

I’ve never liked the idea of using just one source for opinions though, even if I really like the site. This normally means having to trail Google for different reviews and I usually end up in more store descriptions and comparison sites than I do decent with reviewsm which can be frustrating.

Something that I’ve recently found that can help alleviate all that messing around are sites like TestFreaks that do all the searching for you. You can throw all your annoyingly named gadgets and electronics at it and it’ll come back with a list of reviews from various sources. It works a little like Metacritic, only for tech. You can also get average prices, eBay links, decent pictures — unlike the horrible thumbnails you normally get in e-commerce sites — and a mix of professional and user reviews.

It doesn’t solve all my problems (I’d still love to hear my speakers first) but it does give me a very thorough overview on if the product is really worth buying. It also saves spending hours on Google, which is always a bonus.

Posted on May 5, 2009 | Filed Under Tech