Customer Reviews, or, Stupidity as an Art Form.

So, we've all been there. Looking for whatever electronics or PC components online, at newegg or tigerdirect, and we see something that might fit our needs. Go to whatever search engine floats your boat, and start looking for reviews or benchmarks. Fast forward 30 minutes, for whatever reason, you couldn't find a good review or an unbiased benchmark. Why not just use customer reviews? It's rated 4 or even 5 stars, it should be good enough, right?

Of course, the correct answer to this question is hell no. Absolutely never, under any circumstances should you trust an E-tailers customer reviews on anything. Why? Well, first and foremost, statistical sampling is garbage. People are much more likely to complain than to say something positive, especially when their expectation was "function". Also, when someone does give a positive review, it's almost always going to be a very generous one, usually because they expected it to turn on, and OH MY GOD THE SHINY LIGHTS WORK!

But, you think, doesn't that mean that if it's rated high, it should be even better than the rating implies? Not really, no. Remember, most people only buy new electronics when it's an upgrade. As such, of course it feels faster, that would be the whole point of an upgrade, yes? Hell, odds are good they don't know what component actually matters anyway.

That means your best bet is to search for the people who say they're a high tech level, right? Wrong. Most technically inclined folks think a little too literally, and know that on a scale of idiot to Einstein, they're at best a 3-4/5, and won't put themselves as a 5. Anyone saying they're an expert thinks they are, and those people are much more dangerous to listen to. They're the ones with a metric asston of anecdotal evidence supporting all kinds of ridiculous stories and theories about how things work.

So, what good are the reviews? Well, they're great for figuring out how the unit is most likely to die in the event it does. That can be handy for a lot of things. They aren't any good for determining how well something works, because if someone who knew what they were doing had benched the components properly, you wouldn't be this desperate for reviews, now would you? They're also fairly good entertainment, if you're decent with the stuff, you can sit down with a beer and laugh until you cry.

In summation, e-tailer customer reviews suck.