I'm much more used to the new site design now. I was originally rather critical of the design, but now it looks fine. Still, I still feel that your new design made it look much more similar to other tech sites out there, many of which less technical. I guess I still lament that old distinct look that set you guys apart is gone.
In terms of clutter, maybe the pipeline font sizes can be a bit more consistent, and the colors and backgrounds of some text probably can be a bit less contrasty. I do feel that "more pipeline stories" section feels out of place, but I might be in the minority here.
Otherwise, call me a convert. The new site looks fine to me. As a side effect, I started using your RSS feed, which is pretty convenient.
Can you please address smartphone battery life? Who cares about 8.6mm thickness when the phone only lasts a few hours during actual use? The DROID RAZR MAXX set the standard with a massive 3300mAh battery in a 9mm thick phone. IMO that should be the bare minimum. Then 5050mAh in 11mm, and 6600mAh in 13mm.
There's no question a lot of people would be willing to sacrifice stuff like thinness and PPI for a larger battery. Here are some recent quotes from the comments sections of the recent HTC One article on Anandtech, and the GS4 and HTC One articles on Dailytech (all articles are dated Feb 19):
"I really hope they work on battery life...maybe this rant should be at the battery makers...damn energizer bunny."
"I think an S3 Maxx (thicker with larger battery) would be popular with a lot of people. It would have the potential to be their 2nd or 3rd most popular model. It makes sense to me. Everything else has gotten amazing and battery life has remained mostly the same."
"What I would want most is better battery life, minor improvements in video resolution, and better sound quality through the speakers. "
"I'm an extremely heavy user and my galaxy nexus can burn through its battery very quickly, its my main gripe with it. It is also one of the key features I will be looking for in my next phone. I don't need more processor speed, focus on giving me better battery life."
"need to see battery Tests."
"Well, I'm fine with 720p in a 4.7" screen but the battery is the key. If it's not at least a full day battery, then there's no point."
"That User Experience is horrible! Give me the option to double the battery size (Motorola got the idea with the MAX), I'm willing to take the size/weight consequences."
" Now, if they just improve the battery life we have a home run."
" All those updates to the tiles keep burning battery. As for the battery, it needs to be larger. Phones do not need to be so thin you can shave with them. The DO need to last all day (with all day use). I don't think this is "the" phone for me but I hope HTC uses some of these features in future phones (a max battery version would be nice)."
"All these sacrifices for silly 1080p marketing gimmick nobody will distinguish from normal distances. Maybe in one year or two, some OEM will say that PPI race is meaningless and they will give 2x battery life instead. Ironically, HTC did the same with this phone with their camera MP count."
"I'd rather have a larger battery, sane front buttons (HTC logo in the middle, whut?), microSD card, and definitely require inductive charging. I also have no interest in a 1080p screen on a phone. It's a phone. You do not need or want a 1080p screen. You may think you want it, but in reality it just adds a bunch of cost and battery drain, for a very pointless difference over 720p."
And my own comment: "Until smartphone battery life during ACTUAL usage at least DOUBLES (let's say 16 hours, to allow for human sleep/phone charging for the other 8 hours of the day), there will be LOTS room for improvement. I look forward to that day."
Listen to your readership! Help put an end to battery anxiety.
Site redesign - it was very interesting talk about what you guys go through to design the site's appearance. I never really thought about how different advertisers would influence your decisions (or try to).
Personally, I just try to roll with these things, and have adapted to the "new look" well enough. It occurs to me though to say that you didn't build up your audience by having advertisers fight over space and giving us what we want in between their ads, and I think they should understand that you have the kind of site that attracts us, and their ads don't. Whether we come here to find out more about computer parts or mobile solutions or something applicable to IT work, the ads don't draw us here.
So; they should let you build what works for your readership above and beyond anything else. It makes no sense to cater to advertisers by giving them a bigger part of the visual landscape if it interferes with what we come here for. And, their ads are really in their ballpark anyway - what they should be doing is creating ads for people that like to be informed.
Just my thought on that. :) Site looked fine to me before, looks fine now, I'm not that picky, and as long as the writing stays good and I don't have to hunt for the articles I'll be good with what you provide.
Good to hear Nvidia is getting the FCAT tool into more neutral hands. Altruistic or not, FCAT will make better products for all of us, regardless of the company behind the video card. As we have clearly seen, AMD is not about to treat this as a non-issue, they are working hard on it and will catch up shortly - and both will get better at dealing with this problem from here on out since the tool will become a standard testing method used by every good hardware review site.
Thanks Scott Wasson at Tech Report for leading us to better testing methods!
Concerning site design: Is it me, or is there no longer a direct link to /pipeline/? If I type it into the address bar, it works just fine (http://www.anandtech.com/pipeline/).
Perhaps make the "PIPELINE STORIES" title (next to "submit news") into a clickable link to /pipeline/.
Happy to see another podcast. As much as I love mobile phones this was a nice shakeup! I think the new site design looks great on all devices, especially my Android phone and tablet. Now what you really need is to update the forums. It's really jarring going from the slickish main page to the throwback aesthetic of the forums!
Comments on redesign: 1. Pipeline: A. The smallest font and color imply that I've read those stories. Recommend making the smallest font larger and blue. B. There is a little up triangle (invoking a bubble from a cartoon) which comes from submit news, where logically it seems like it should follow from the left text. Also, for consistency sake, I would make "Pipeline News" Blue and "submit news" either white or orange. C. I think there should be a "more pipeline news" at the bottom of that section. 2. When you paginate you should create a floating side bar to the left that is a navigation section. 3. I like the darker grey borders. 4. I think having a floating "anandtech logo as you scroll down work look spiffy, but that's eye candy. 5. I never use the two rows of navigation. Since I have a 16x9 monitor it uses a substantial amount of vertical real estate. Do you have statistics on number of visitors who use those links? I think you could almost get rid of those completely or consolidate to one line.
Nice Job! One more thing.. can you guys please increase the horizontal length of the mp3 embeded player .. right now it is very narrow so it is difficult to navigate within the player.. just make it wider so that it becomes easy to jump in the middle.
For the HTC One & GS4 review, could you guys do a Airplane mode H.264 playback battery life test at 200nits? I know a lot of people who use their phone to watch video during long flights.
I'm not sure if this is the correct place to provide feedback on the website redesign. First off, it looks great. Secondly, when using my phone to access the site I have some issues navigating around. I use a SGS2 4.0.3 with Chrome. When I try to select a category from the drop down, such as Smartphones, that works great. However if I try to select a subcategory like HTC, I just zoom in. I don't know if this is user failure, a issue with mobile chrome, and a minor issue on the site, but I thought I would bring it up.
Your dedication to quality content is highly appreciated.
The site layout looks good. My only feedback concerns the grey-on-grey color scheme for the Pipeline: higher contrast between text and background would be better. Thanks for mentioning the issues with Chrome on Windows; I just tried the site with IE and it looks much better.
Is there a formal way to submit questions for the podcast other than adding a comment? I'm not aware of another avenue so here goes...
Can you guys discuss iPhone 5 cold weather performance on the next podcast? I live in Minnesota and my iPhone 5 is unusable outside after 30 seconds. If the temperature is below freezing, the phone displays a low battery warning and shuts off immediately, even if the battery has 50 or 60% charge. To be fair, Apple states that the operating temperature is 32° to 95° F, but I never experienced this with my iPhone 3GS. Are other modern smartphones susceptible to this issue? If I had known about this problem I would have thought twice about buying this phone.
I'm not a gamer, more of a science programmer. For me, GPU-CPU "hybrid" computing plus mobile computing is the whole game. Well, data center and big storage is in there, as well.
So THANKS for a great podcast on the NVIDIA GTC and recent GPU news. Looking forward to my eyes glazing over with Brian's techno-Glossolalia next time.
Your readers got you the advertisers in the first place. Placing the needs of your readers ahead of your advertisers will be a win win for both. It is about the best product for the people who use the product, and that should not be influenced by advertisers. Congratulations on your huge success, but remember it was your readers, not your advertisers that brought it about.
I was surprised too, when listening to Anand's explanation of the redesign. It seemed to me he had the priorities backwards. Anyway, I have settled myself on RSS feed as primary source of the information (about the site) as a consequence to the redesign, which, technically speaking, might not be what the advertisers wanted.
I thought the redesign has always looks great. I didn't even notice the modified contrast. I don't think you need to apologize for updating your site, Anand. Great work as always! Best tech site anywhere. Never dumbed down for the lowest common denominator.
I was with OmniPoint/Voicestream/T-Mobile for 10+ years, and I'll tell you why, with my first Sprint contract about to expire, I won't go back; their coverage map. They do not differentiate between 3G and 4G on their map. To me, that is extremely shady and borderline dishonest. The idea that 3G and 4G can be lumped together is absolutely laughable. I simply have no idea what kind of coverage I would get if I went with them, so it's not even a decision.
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hammer256 - Monday, April 1, 2013 - link
I'm much more used to the new site design now. I was originally rather critical of the design, but now it looks fine. Still, I still feel that your new design made it look much more similar to other tech sites out there, many of which less technical. I guess I still lament that old distinct look that set you guys apart is gone.In terms of clutter, maybe the pipeline font sizes can be a bit more consistent, and the colors and backgrounds of some text probably can be a bit less contrasty. I do feel that "more pipeline stories" section feels out of place, but I might be in the minority here.
Otherwise, call me a convert. The new site looks fine to me. As a side effect, I started using your RSS feed, which is pretty convenient.
sherlockwing - Tuesday, April 2, 2013 - link
Finally More Podcasts!!! Thanks a lot and keep up the good work!flyingpants1 - Tuesday, April 2, 2013 - link
Can you please address smartphone battery life? Who cares about 8.6mm thickness when the phone only lasts a few hours during actual use? The DROID RAZR MAXX set the standard with a massive 3300mAh battery in a 9mm thick phone. IMO that should be the bare minimum. Then 5050mAh in 11mm, and 6600mAh in 13mm.There's no question a lot of people would be willing to sacrifice stuff like thinness and PPI for a larger battery. Here are some recent quotes from the comments sections of the recent HTC One article on Anandtech, and the GS4 and HTC One articles on Dailytech (all articles are dated Feb 19):
"I really hope they work on battery life...maybe this rant should be at the battery makers...damn energizer bunny."
"I think an S3 Maxx (thicker with larger battery) would be popular with a lot of people. It would have the potential to be their 2nd or 3rd most popular model. It makes sense to me. Everything else has gotten amazing and battery life has remained mostly the same."
"What I would want most is better battery life, minor improvements in video resolution, and better sound quality through the speakers. "
"I'm an extremely heavy user and my galaxy nexus can burn through its battery very quickly, its my main gripe with it. It is also one of the key features I will be looking for in my next phone. I don't need more processor speed, focus on giving me better battery life."
"need to see battery Tests."
"Well, I'm fine with 720p in a 4.7" screen but the battery is the key. If it's not at least a full day battery, then there's no point."
"That User Experience is horrible! Give me the option to double the battery size (Motorola got the idea with the MAX), I'm willing to take the size/weight consequences."
" Now, if they just improve the battery life we have a home run."
" All those updates to the tiles keep burning battery. As for the battery, it needs to be larger. Phones do not need to be so thin you can shave with them. The DO need to last all day (with all day use). I don't think this is "the" phone for me but I hope HTC uses some of these features in future phones (a max battery version would be nice)."
"All these sacrifices for silly 1080p marketing gimmick nobody will distinguish from normal distances. Maybe in one year or two, some OEM will say that PPI race is meaningless and they will give 2x battery life instead. Ironically, HTC did the same with this phone with their camera MP count."
"I'd rather have a larger battery, sane front buttons (HTC logo in the middle, whut?), microSD card, and definitely require inductive charging. I also have no interest in a 1080p screen on a phone. It's a phone. You do not need or want a 1080p screen. You may think you want it, but in reality it just adds a bunch of cost and battery drain, for a very pointless difference over 720p."
And my own comment:
"Until smartphone battery life during ACTUAL usage at least DOUBLES (let's say 16 hours, to allow for human sleep/phone charging for the other 8 hours of the day), there will be LOTS room for improvement. I look forward to that day."
Listen to your readership! Help put an end to battery anxiety.
Sabresiberian - Tuesday, April 2, 2013 - link
Good to have a new podcast! Thanks :)Site redesign - it was very interesting talk about what you guys go through to design the site's appearance. I never really thought about how different advertisers would influence your decisions (or try to).
Personally, I just try to roll with these things, and have adapted to the "new look" well enough. It occurs to me though to say that you didn't build up your audience by having advertisers fight over space and giving us what we want in between their ads, and I think they should understand that you have the kind of site that attracts us, and their ads don't. Whether we come here to find out more about computer parts or mobile solutions or something applicable to IT work, the ads don't draw us here.
So; they should let you build what works for your readership above and beyond anything else. It makes no sense to cater to advertisers by giving them a bigger part of the visual landscape if it interferes with what we come here for. And, their ads are really in their ballpark anyway - what they should be doing is creating ads for people that like to be informed.
Just my thought on that. :) Site looked fine to me before, looks fine now, I'm not that picky, and as long as the writing stays good and I don't have to hunt for the articles I'll be good with what you provide.
Good to hear Nvidia is getting the FCAT tool into more neutral hands. Altruistic or not, FCAT will make better products for all of us, regardless of the company behind the video card. As we have clearly seen, AMD is not about to treat this as a non-issue, they are working hard on it and will catch up shortly - and both will get better at dealing with this problem from here on out since the tool will become a standard testing method used by every good hardware review site.
Thanks Scott Wasson at Tech Report for leading us to better testing methods!
rhx123 - Tuesday, April 2, 2013 - link
The pricing with the 7790 is awful in the UK.The cheapest 1GB 7850 is £126 here
The cheapest 1GB 7790 is £120
I know you said that at this range budgets are fixed, but someone would be mad not to spend £6 more for a huge amount of performance.
The 650Ti boost is also priced rather close the the 660 in my opinion here.
rhx123 - Tuesday, April 2, 2013 - link
Hell, you can get a 2GB 7850 for cheaper than an overclocked 1GB 7790.REALfreaky - Tuesday, April 2, 2013 - link
Concerning site design: Is it me, or is there no longer a direct link to /pipeline/? If I type it into the address bar, it works just fine (http://www.anandtech.com/pipeline/).Perhaps make the "PIPELINE STORIES" title (next to "submit news") into a clickable link to /pipeline/.
maximumGPU - Tuesday, April 2, 2013 - link
finally! felt like forever since the last podcast!add me to the count of those who are now used to the redesign. The black on white was the biggest hurdle and that was taken care of very early on.
FallenCow - Tuesday, April 2, 2013 - link
Happy to see another podcast. As much as I love mobile phones this was a nice shakeup! I think the new site design looks great on all devices, especially my Android phone and tablet. Now what you really need is to update the forums. It's really jarring going from the slickish main page to the throwback aesthetic of the forums!jdonnelly81 - Tuesday, April 2, 2013 - link
Comments on redesign:1. Pipeline:
A. The smallest font and color imply that I've read those stories. Recommend making the smallest font larger and blue.
B. There is a little up triangle (invoking a bubble from a cartoon) which comes from submit news, where logically it seems like it should follow from the left text. Also, for consistency sake, I would make "Pipeline News" Blue and "submit news" either white or orange.
C. I think there should be a "more pipeline news" at the bottom of that section.
2. When you paginate you should create a floating side bar to the left that is a navigation section.
3. I like the darker grey borders.
4. I think having a floating "anandtech logo as you scroll down work look spiffy, but that's eye candy.
5. I never use the two rows of navigation. Since I have a 16x9 monitor it uses a substantial amount of vertical real estate. Do you have statistics on number of visitors who use those links? I think you could almost get rid of those completely or consolidate to one line.
caleblloyd - Tuesday, April 2, 2013 - link
Put Reddit/Youtube/Urban Dictionary style Up Vote / Down Vote comments on the site!avner - Wednesday, April 3, 2013 - link
Nice Job!One more thing..
can you guys please increase the horizontal length of the mp3 embeded player .. right now it is very narrow so it is difficult to navigate within the player.. just make it wider so that it becomes easy to jump in the middle.
sherlockwing - Wednesday, April 3, 2013 - link
For the HTC One & GS4 review, could you guys do a Airplane mode H.264 playback battery life test at 200nits? I know a lot of people who use their phone to watch video during long flights.eBauer - Wednesday, April 3, 2013 - link
Podcast wasn't the same without Brian, but still great!Jef7.Elemental - Wednesday, April 3, 2013 - link
I'm not sure if this is the correct place to provide feedback on the website redesign. First off, it looks great. Secondly, when using my phone to access the site I have some issues navigating around. I use a SGS2 4.0.3 with Chrome. When I try to select a category from the drop down, such as Smartphones, that works great. However if I try to select a subcategory like HTC, I just zoom in. I don't know if this is user failure, a issue with mobile chrome, and a minor issue on the site, but I thought I would bring it up.noblemo - Wednesday, April 3, 2013 - link
Your dedication to quality content is highly appreciated.The site layout looks good. My only feedback concerns the grey-on-grey color scheme for the Pipeline: higher contrast between text and background would be better. Thanks for mentioning the issues with Chrome on Windows; I just tried the site with IE and it looks much better.
butch84 - Wednesday, April 3, 2013 - link
Is there a formal way to submit questions for the podcast other than adding a comment? I'm not aware of another avenue so here goes...Can you guys discuss iPhone 5 cold weather performance on the next podcast? I live in Minnesota and my iPhone 5 is unusable outside after 30 seconds. If the temperature is below freezing, the phone displays a low battery warning and shuts off immediately, even if the battery has 50 or 60% charge. To be fair, Apple states that the operating temperature is 32° to 95° F, but I never experienced this with my iPhone 3GS. Are other modern smartphones susceptible to this issue? If I had known about this problem I would have thought twice about buying this phone.
There are many threads on the apple forums about these symptoms, so I'll provide a link to one example:
https://discussions.apple.com/thread/4742928?start...
Thanks and keep up the excellent work! Love the site redesign by the way.
watersb - Thursday, April 4, 2013 - link
I'm not a gamer, more of a science programmer. For me, GPU-CPU "hybrid" computing plus mobile computing is the whole game. Well, data center and big storage is in there, as well.So THANKS for a great podcast on the NVIDIA GTC and recent GPU news. Looking forward to my eyes glazing over with Brian's techno-Glossolalia next time.
pdjblum - Friday, April 5, 2013 - link
Your readers got you the advertisers in the first place. Placing the needs of your readers ahead of your advertisers will be a win win for both. It is about the best product for the people who use the product, and that should not be influenced by advertisers. Congratulations on your huge success, but remember it was your readers, not your advertisers that brought it about.risa2000 - Sunday, April 7, 2013 - link
I was surprised too, when listening to Anand's explanation of the redesign. It seemed to me he had the priorities backwards. Anyway, I have settled myself on RSS feed as primary source of the information (about the site) as a consequence to the redesign, which, technically speaking, might not be what the advertisers wanted.THizzle7XU - Sunday, April 7, 2013 - link
I thought the redesign has always looks great. I didn't even notice the modified contrast. I don't think you need to apologize for updating your site, Anand. Great work as always! Best tech site anywhere. Never dumbed down for the lowest common denominator.aliveon2legs - Saturday, April 13, 2013 - link
I was with OmniPoint/Voicestream/T-Mobile for 10+ years, and I'll tell you why, with my first Sprint contract about to expire, I won't go back; their coverage map. They do not differentiate between 3G and 4G on their map. To me, that is extremely shady and borderline dishonest. The idea that 3G and 4G can be lumped together is absolutely laughable. I simply have no idea what kind of coverage I would get if I went with them, so it's not even a decision.Montago - Thursday, April 18, 2013 - link
THANK GOODNESS that Stylish exists...http://userstyles.org/styles/84286/anandtech-com-2...
This new design is still too bright - with stylish its acceptible :D