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Problems with some of that... sad to say.

I've read reviews ( in Stereophile and elsewhere ) where a product was reviewed and the reviewer still had it well over 12 months later. How do i know this? Simple. The reviewer makes mention of it when comparing it to the current product being reviewed. No mention of the reviewer ever buying the review sample either. As such, the logical conclusion is that either the reviewer never sent it back and kept it, was given the unit by the manufacturer or purchased the unit and never stated so in print. Given the fact that Stereophile is complaining about having a hard time coming up with gear to review, could it be that manufacturers are simply responding to how they've been treated by Stereophile employees in the past ?

Like i said before, if Stereophile adopted a review program similar to what i laid out here in AA a year or two ago, they might not be having these problems. For those not familiar with what i suggested, here it is again.

All products are shipped into Stereophile headquarters and bench tested. This gives JA the chance to verify proper operation before any sonic opinions of the unit could be formed. It also puts each unit through all the paces it would normally ever encounter, giving it a thorough work-out prior to ever being listened to. Not only would defective products be weeded out before the listening reviewer ever wasted time passing on info about products that were defective to begin with, proper operation would be a verified fact. Once the review listening session was over, the reviewer would then ship the unit back to JA for another trip to the test bench. This info would allow JA to compile new / broken in specs, which would be food for a technical article with specs and technical support to back up the article. This would also verify that the manufacturer was getting back exactly what he shipped as JA could forward back a set of the specs when the unit is returned. On top of this, the reviewer would be subject to dealing with the manufacturer / customer support just like any other customer would. Every product would be in / out & accounted for at all times, making the manufacturers happy. This drastically reduces potential for the "rumour mills", speeds up and organizes the whole process and should provide more reliable info for the paying subscribers.

As a side note, take a look at this info posted from a manufacturer on their website. I have nothing to do with this manufacturer, so don't think i'm trying to give them "free press". What i am trying to do is to demonstrate that there are BIG problems in the review process. It was information like this ( and quite a bit more ) that prompted me to ask some very specific questions to a specific writer. After reading this article, as posted by the manufacturer that went through this ordeal themselves, tell me whether those questions were justified or not. Some may feel that i was on a "witch hunt" back then, but others, many of them knowing & speaking from first hand experience, know that i was only trying to help others see what really goes on behind the scenes. Sean
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