Something Missing from Reviews

[mizogucci]

I read lots of product reviews by this site and others and I'm always amazed how an important part of the test variables is never listed. Ambient room temp is a huge factor in all the hardware reviews and it is never mentioned. Not sure why it is over looked but I thought its time to mention it here in the hope people start adding it to their reviews.

Makes a big difference if you are doing a review in say florida and is it 88 percent hunmidity and 80 degress in the room or maybe you are doing it in Utah in the winter and the room is 40 percent humidity and 57 degrees.

Ambient environment should be listed in every review.

 

[Leaps-from-Shadows]

For most reviews, ambient conditions aren't important. For instance, doing a normal mainboard review the conditions don't matter at all. The board should behave the same whether it's the freezing cold of winter or the blazing heat of summer. If you're overclocking it does matter, but no two boards will overclock the same no matter what the ambient conditions are ... so again, it doesn't matter.

It's only in heatsink and other cooling system reviews where it's actually relevant. And those do list the ambient conditions.

 

[geekapproved]

True, but it's irrelevant because as long as you stay under the recommended temps for the given hardware, your ok, regardless of if you live in Alaska or S. Florida.

Now if your bragging that your cpu stays at 50c under load and your cousin in Florida has the same system and his is running 65c under load, then it's relevant.

 

[mizogucci]

Ok well I guess temp means less to you than to me. I'd like to know whether the items tested are on a test bench, inside a case and what the temp of the room is. All of this new equipment runs hotter now and if I have a radeon 6990 on a open test bench or inside a case and its 60 degress or 80degrees ambient temp that makes a difference of whether or not that card is going to over heat or not at stock settings! This also determines noise level as hot equipment triggers different fan speeds which is where the noise level comes from.

My equipment sits in the same place all year and the temp of it ranges up to +-15F depending if I have it 65F or 79F Summer/Winter in my house. All of it is stock with no over clocking.

If someone is doing a review say on a GTX590 and a HD 6990 the review could be totally different if the two cards are in a cool room on a open bench or in a hot room inside a case as for example the HD 6990 is quiet when cool and about 20db louder when hot.

I just think a real review cant be made unless at least the all of the large variables are not known and I consider Ambient temp a large variable.

 

[Leaps-from-Shadows]

Just so you know, most of the reviews you read by major sites are done in the same conditions every time. Some of them are even done in office buildings where the ambient conditions only change a degree or two here or there no matter what season it is.

I guess they (and I) figure that if you know your ambient temps are going to change that much, then you've already figured out what the effects are going to be and can plan accordingly.

 

[geekapproved]

Ok well I guess temp means less to you than to me. I'd like to know whether the items tested are on a test bench, inside a case and what the temp of the room is. All of this new equipment runs hotter now and if I have a radeon 6990 on a open test bench or inside a case and its 60 degress or 80degrees ambient temp that makes a difference of whether or not that card is going to over heat or not at stock settings! This also determines noise level as hot equipment triggers different fan speeds which is where the noise level comes from.

My equipment sits in the same place all year and the temp of it ranges up to +-15F depending if I have it 65F or 79F Summer/Winter in my house. All of it is stock with no over clocking.

If someone is doing a review say on a GTX590 and a HD 6990 the review could be totally different if the two cards are in a cool room on a open bench or in a hot room inside a case as for example the HD 6990 is quiet when cool and about 20db louder when hot.

I just think a real review cant be made unless at least the all of the large variables are not known and I consider Ambient temp a large variable.

But....your not understanding....it's irrelevent. As long as your temps are in the acceptable range, it doesn't matter what the ambient room temp is.

I live in Florida, and my 5850 runs under 60c under load. My Cousin lives in Minnesota, his runs 50c under load because his home is much cooler than mine. Both of those are acceptable temps, so who cares what the ambient temp is?

Also I would be willing to be that the test lab is kept at a constant temperature via thermostat.

If your reading a benchmark from Tom's Hardware that's comparing the temperature and power draw of 5 different cards, obviously they were all tested in the same room, on the same motherboard, so the ambient temp was the same.

 

[mizogucci]

Like I said temp means more to some people I guess. 10c means alot to me. It is the difference between overheating and noisey fans and cool and quiet. I'd just like to know the ambient temp on reviews so I can compare it to my own environment. Equipment will perform much differently in a 60F room than a 85F room which is well within human tolerance. I have no clue what the test environmental condition is so if I'm worried about heat and they review heat tolerances that info is almost completely useless. No one cares about stock temps with old low voltage equipment so obviously I'm talking about overclocking and higher hotter stuff and ambient temp does matter. Video cards start sounding like a blow dryer at 85-87c and ALL AIR cooled machines behave differently at different temps so people need to know what the temp of the AIR is in the review room. =)

 

[lowjack989]

Like Geek Approved stated....All HSF reviews you read are done in a controlled enviroment...most if not all HSF reviews and GPU reviews state the test rig and ambient temps that the test were done in...

 

[Leaps-from-Shadows]

What you should really do is E-Mail the sites in question directly. You're obviously not getting a favorable reaction here. You seem to be the only one concerned with ambient conditions for normal hardware reviews, but maybe you can sway review sites by appealing to them directly. Or maybe they'll just list their ambient conditions for you in a reply E-Mail, so you can rest easy.

 

[RJR]

Go over to OCC (overclockersclub) and check out the cooler or case (or whatever includes pertinent temps) reviews, ambient temperature is always included.

Just depends on the competence of the reviewer and site as to whether it's included.

 

[Leaps-from-Shadows]

OP is talking about having that info for ALL reviews, not just the ones where the temp actually makes a difference.