Actions
Forum Thread Details
  • Replies 33 replies
  • Subscribers 2664 subscribers
  • Views 1227 views
  • Users 0 members are here
Related

Are there any products you own - that you'd like to write a RoadTest Review for?

cstanton

Predominantly we setup RoadTests based upon discussions we have in the element14 Community team, or when we're approached by suppliers or manufacturers that would like their hardware 'tested'.

It occurs to me though, that many of our members may already have hardware, equipment or kit that they could or would like to write a RoadTest for, maybe we could even supplement these with accessories to help the RoadTest along.

We would need some way of deciding which product to setup the page for to RoadTest, but we've had a number of times now where people have stepped forward and said they'd like to RoadTest an item that they already have. It may have to be something that Farnell stocks, fundamentally.

Let me know your thoughts.

  • in reply to battlecoder

    We have  Review Blogs which is suitable for that sort of thing :)

  • in reply to ralphjy
    ralphjy said:
    Seeed Studio, Waveshare, M5Stack, and DFRobot

    The stores do have products from these brands. I think we should do more with DFRobot kit, though they tend to lean more towards being heavily like a personal computer, and I often want to steer away from "how do I use this to build a network attached storage / media centre?"

    ralphjy said:
    RoadTests do take a fair amount of effort.  I generally apply for development boards or tools that I haven't tried before.  

    Certainly, and they're often on a scale, too. There's some talk of having "approachable" RoadTests, help people increase their skill set.

    ralphjy said:
    I also considered using the Uno Q with the ADI Voyager 4 which was offered earlier to Top Members, but that would have required doing the roadtests sequentially.

    Which is interesting, some supplier/manufacturers want reviews by a set deadline, others simply want them 'done in a reasonable time and done well'. It's a spectrum for sure.

  • in reply to cstanton

    Well here I was thinking I was onto something :p

  • I love this idea.  I have no idea what I would choose to review at this moment, but the idea has great merit.  I really like the idea because I think that a "Review" is assessed as a deeper dive into the equipment than a blog post - even though that assessment could be inaccurate.   posts some incredible reviews as blogs that are very helpful and inciteful.
    Right now, I think the litmus test is "Is it a Farnell/Newark/Element14 item?"  (Farnell + detailed) = Roadtest.  Else = Review Blog.

  • in reply to cstanton

    Let's take this roadtest as an example Enroll to Review the Infineon AIROCTm Cloud Connectivity Manager Eval Kit - element14 Community

    Multiple people acquired the same product around the same time to test it. We can see there 5 entries and the ratings range from 2.5 to 5 out of 5. These ratings tell me that this product has a steep learning curve that may not suit all, but it will give good result on we get used to its development flow.


    Let's say a community member decides to make a roadtest of a product they own and give it a poor rating. If the product is costly, chances of multiple people owning the same product and posting the review here is very low. The product page will show only one review with poor rating. If I were specifically looking for it online, it will immediately impact my opinion of the product.

    If we are going to include roadtest of a product a community member owns, I would suggest dropping or hiding the ratings section until a certain number of reviews for the same product has been received.

  • in reply to balajivan1995
    balajivan1995 said:
    I would suggest dropping or hiding the ratings section until a certain number of reviews for the same product has been received.

    Ah, no. We'll never do that. The intention is always to have truthful and transparent reviews by people's genuine opinions of the product.

    balajivan1995 said:
    The product page will show only one review with poor rating. If I were specifically looking for it online, it will immediately impact my opinion of the product.

    Then maybe it was deserving of that review, people will also take it on the merit of the review, and opinions on it elsewhere rather than only one location.

  • What if I only own accessories for something, but I'm kinda missing the main instrument (or I have an outdated one)?  Would that still be a valuable RT?

    For example, I have an Analog Discovery 2, for which I bought several of the accessories (Transistor Tester, Impedance Analyzer, BNC Adapter board). I could do a RT of the accessories (which are all still available as they are all compatible with the AD3) but I could only RoadTest them with an AD2.


    The problem there would be that the AD2 is no longer available for purchase  (since it has been superseded by the AD3) so there could be a difference in the results that I report (performance, resolution, etc) versus what someone would get if they used it on a current AD3 unit. For the purposes of a RoadTest would be ideal to test them with an AD3, but an AD3 is a lot more costly "part" to send just to enable me to test the accessories, and maybe compare it against its older revision (the AD2).

    In all similar scenarios (i.e: Owning the accessories but having an outdated unit) the value of a RT done with an older unit that can no longer be purchased) will be somewhat debatable, but sending an updated device to a Roadtester would probably cost more than sending the accessories to someone that already had a newer version of the main device but it's lacking the accessories, right?

  • in reply to cstanton

    It's mostly for roadtesting the products which we have, I've seen some really interesting products in that lineup. 

  • in reply to cstanton

    When resources and roadtester requirements allow, including Multicomp Pro Accessories in general Roadtests might allow for a more complete review of both the accessory and sponsor's products.