Q6600 "Guaranteed overclock" editions!

[Durzel]

OCUK nuked the thread in time-honoured "zero tolerance on negative feedback" policy.

I actually agree with Richdog 100% - it's a scandalous state of affairs. As odd as it sounds I was more shocked by the fact that these "guaranteed to work at xGhz" CPUs were being sold without any kind of testing whatsoever. Selling cherry-picked CPUs is one thing (and open to debate as well - do people who buy the regular get the failures?) but selling CPUs with "guaranteed overclocks" purely based on conjecture that "everyone knows these processors overclock well" is outrageous.

Intel wouldn't warranty the chips run any higher than rated speed so there is every possibility that a given CPU might not clock 1Mhz higher than rated. It's unlikely based on widespread experience, but it's certainly possible and Intel wouldn't be liable to accept a return or whatever on it.

Gibbos evangelising on the forum is pretty transparent, but on this occasion OCUK have really dropped the ball.

[Saracen]

.....

Seriously i'm not meaning to start an argument and as always my posts have a firm element of tounge-in-cheek, but you must surely understand by now why people make threads on this sort of thing here, no matter how indignant it makes you feel. People love to talk about OCUK in the same way people love to talk about anything controversial in a subject close to their heart,it's been happening for countless years and will likely be for countless more, unless of course the Hexus admins issue a blanket ban on any thread of this nature, which is probably a bit unlikely.

I'd consider a blanket ban to be unlikely, too.

But your opening post asked for "thoughts?". You got mine.

When I posted my response, three of the first 10 threads in this forum either mentioned OcUK in the title or, like this one, were explicitly about OcUK. And two more contained repeated moans about OcUK, be it pricing, or service, or their forums, or attitudes, or whatever.

Would I ban mention of OcUK. No.

But there's a world of difference between banning OcUK from being mentioned at all, and liking the fact that people drone on about them so much. Five out of the first 10 threads! This forum is supposed to be about shopping and retail therapy, but it isn't a "Bitch about OcUK" forum.

Your suggestion of the "back" button didn't, ahem .... exactly come as a shock to me. But it's hardly practical, is it? I won't ban OcUK being mentioned, but there ARE lines which I (and HEXUS) will not permit to be crossed, and if they are, posts will be edited or threads deleted. So ignoring and not reading isn't really an option.

[Saracen]

OCUK nuked the thread in time-honoured "zero tolerance on negative feedback" policy.

I actually agree with Richdog 100% - it's a scandalous state of affairs. As odd as it sounds I was more shocked by the fact that these "guaranteed to work at xGhz" CPUs were being sold without any kind of testing whatsoever. Selling cherry-picked CPUs is one thing (and open to debate as well - do people who buy the regular get the failures?) but selling CPUs with "guaranteed overclocks" purely based on conjecture that "everyone knows these processors overclock well" is outrageous.

Intel wouldn't warranty the chips run any higher than rated speed so there is every possibility that a given CPU might not clock 1Mhz higher than rated. It's unlikely based on widespread experience, but it's certainly possible and Intel wouldn't be liable to accept a return or whatever on it.

Gibbos evangelising on the forum is pretty transparent, but on this occasion OCUK have really dropped the ball.

There's nothing outrageous about their guarantee. They aren't claiming that they're tested as clocking. They're guaranteeing that they'll refund if they don't overclock to the specified extent, which is not something you could do if a standard one doesn't overclock, or by that much. If that guarantee is worth it to the buyer, then it's worth it. If it isn't, don't buy it.

Suppose I want to achieve a specific level of performance, and am considering two alternative chips. It may be that a 6600 is acceptable to me IF it overclocks, but if it doesn't, I'd rather buy a more expensive alternative. This offer takes that uncertainty away, because I can try it. If it does, great. If it doesn't, then I've got the guarantee so can return it. That guarantee may be worth paying for. Just because it isn't worth it to a lot of people doesn't mean it isn't to some, or that OcUK shouldn't be able to offer it. It's the buyer's choice.

So ... a product is offered that gives that peace of mind, but you can be assured that some percentage of these chips either won't hit that overclock, or that OcUK are running the risk that they won't. If chips come back, they then can't be resold as brand new, so will end up being sold on as used, or B-stock or whatever, and at a discount price. So OcUK will lose money, or at least, risk losing money on those, not to mention the overhead and cost of admin.

It's up to each buyer to determine if he or she wants to pay that price premium for the guarantee. If not, don't buy a guaranteed chip, buy a standard one. If it is, then it's their choice to do it and not for others to say it's outrageous.

Personally, I wouldn't pay it, but then, I'm not interested in overclocking. To my mind, the really stupid thing about this offer is not the price or the fact that they offered it, but that it handed competitors a diamond-encrusted solid-gold opportunity. Nice, one, Scan, for picking up on it.

Was it a smart move by OcUK? Probably not. It strikes me as naive. But hey, I don't have access to their sales figures, Perhaps it worked for them.

[davidcrofter]

It doesn't strike me as naive at all just a desperate attempt to cash in ... retailers should strike a fine balance between greed and being seen to be doing the right thing for their customers - this fails miserably on both those scores.
So OCUK have removed the thread and taken the 3.3ghz chip down altogether plus lowered the asking price in response to being caught "red handed".

[Blitzen]

Welcome to the nature of forums, in my years as member and moderator myself i've also seen threads repeated ad infinitum

I have seen how the 'forums' work where you moderate and the job is done far better here. Threads like ths wouldnt last 5 minutes on EO's

I do however agree with you that this is, by nature is a forum, and as long as subjects arent abusive or personal , they should stand.

@Saracen.
You may be tired of these 'OCUK' threads but they do drum up alot of interest and comment. That alone is a good thing isnt it?

[drunkenmaster]

Well, bitching about OCUK seemed to work. Deal came out, £200 for the 3Ghz and £235 for the 3.3Ghz. a little bitching and spreading the bad word here, there and everywhere and the 3Ghz is down £30, in a day and the 3.3Ghz is down about the same. Not bad, almost like we "made" a good deal by posting here

But as it goes, yes, almost unanimously it was bad, not least when you listened to their staff.

They claimed they were trying to get back to their routes and offer their loyal customers something good. NO loyal customer would buy them, every loyal customer and people on their forums know every chip they sell can do 3.3Ghz, if it can't its likely a DOA chip anyway so you can still get a return. The ONLY people that would buy this would be naive people who didn't know what they are paying for. The very word "guarentee" also immediately gives the impression that they have pretested them, they only admitted they didn't much further into that thread when asked repeatedly. I could check but i assume they haven't said they aren't tested on the actual shop site and description(though they might have by now you'd hope).

But again they claim this is to get back to their routes which is offering good overclocking products. these are VERY tame overclock guarentee's for a pretty hefty mark up, something none of their customers would buy. THe very reason behind overclocking is to get something cheaper and get more value from it. So the lowest price in the UK on the standard Q6600 would be nice, thats what their customers wanted.

This is so incredibly clear that they just wanted to cash in on people that weren't aware how good the normal Q6600 is rather than really offer good deals.

AS i've said before, theres 3-4 items in the whole store at any given time you can't find cheaper elsewhere. often they are massively higher. motherboards routinely 10-20% higher cost, i got an overclocked 3870x2 on release at £260, while they charged £300 for the standard models.

Slightly higher cost for better service is one thing. They are far far away from being regarded as having the best service around, and also have incredibly poor pricing, frequent orders not being sent out when they should(half of my orders in the past 3 years got sent out 2-3 days late for no apparent reason). Theres little reason to buy from them and their attempt to win back business is to screw naive people over.

Their staff have confirmed that the "overclocked" versions will be better batch numbers than non overclocked versions. So buy buying a non overclocked version you do have a significantly higher chance of a worse clocker, we're talking in the hitting 3.8-4.2Ghz range, they'll still all do 3.3Ghz.

buying elsewhere, for less i might add, you have a change of getting a good batch number, at ocuk you are guarenteed to NOT get a good batch number if you buy the standard chip.

[Saracen]

It doesn't strike me as naive at all just a desperate attempt to cash in ... retailers should strike a fine balance between greed and being seen to be doing the right thing for their customers - this fails miserably on both those scores.
So OCUK have removed the thread and taken the 3.3ghz chip down altogether plus lowered the asking price in response to being caught "red handed".

You don't know why they've taken the chip down or lowered prices. It may be in response to competitor's responses, rather than being "caught", red-handed or otherwise. Which is precisely why I said I thought it was naive. It's an own goal, in my opinion. But they're still entitled to offer it, and if people choose to buy, that's their right too. And as i pointed out above, just because you don't see any value in the guarantee doesn't mean other customers won't ..... right up until competitors start doing it for free. Which is why it's an own goal.

Nor do I agree that it was necessarily greed. We don't know what return rate they expected, so we can't know what costs would be associated with this offer. If a chip comes back, do they just refund and take a hit (which is part of the costs I mentioned) or do they then set up and test the chip themselves before refunding? In that latter case, there is also a cost attached to offering the guarantee.

[Saracen]

....

@Saracen.
You may be tired of these 'OCUK' threads but they do drum up alot of interest and comment. That alone is a good thing isnt it?

Not necessarily. But even if it did, the OP asked for thoughts, and got mine. It's a fuss about nothing.

[Richdog]

I have seen how the 'forums' work where you moderate and the job is done far better here. Threads like ths wouldnt last 5 minutes on EO's

Blitzen, discussions like this go on EOCF all the time, you just don't participate in them for obvious reasons. No hard feelings on my part, it was a fair judgement. You seem to act a lot more civilised and calm on Hexus, so maybe you've chilled out somewhat since then..

You don't know why they've taken the chip down or lowered prices. It may be in response to competitor's responses, rather than being "caught", red-handed or otherwise. Which is precisely why I said I thought it was naive. It's an own goal, in my opinion. But they're still entitled to offer it, and if people choose to buy, that's their right too. And as i pointed out above, just because you don't see any value in the guarantee doesn't mean other customers won't ..... right up until competitors start doing it for free. Which is why it's an own goal.

Nor do I agree that it was necessarily greed. We don't know what return rate they expected, so we can't know what costs would be associated with this offer. If a chip comes back, do they just refund and take a hit (which is part of the costs I mentioned) or do they then set up and test the chip themselves before refunding? In that latter case, there is also a cost attached to offering the guarantee.

They obviously reduced it due to the thread on OCUk forums... if you'd read it you'd know that... there was an uproar of negative feedback and they chandeg it sharpish, even the MD came and posted. No idea why you're being so defensive of them... honourable I suppose, albeit misguided.

a fuss about nothing.

You got that right.

[Blitzen]

Blitzen, discussions like this go on EOCF all the time, you just don't participate in them for obvious reasons. No hard feelings on my part, it was a fair judgement. You seem to act a lot more civilised and calm on Hexus, so maybe you've chilled out somewhat since then..

Im have my moments here aswell... The mods take a more informed approach to threads here though.
The difference being, on here you are allowed to express an opinion without some 12 year old American saying 'whatever' all the time. That gets so boring.
I actually tried a few enthusiast forums before settling here and it was the best choice. I also use 1 other that is run by a member here aswell.
This place is far more knowledge based rather than opinion based so thats better for me and most anyway.

BTW........Who says i dont participate? I post infrequently but i do post there

[TooNice]

There is is a difference between 'defending an e-tailer' and 'disagreeing with the outrage' it generates. If someone were to buy one of those chip, fail to overclock to the advertised speed (however unlikely), tried to return it to OcUK on the basis that it did not work as advertised, only to be asked to take a hikethen I would agree to foul play and see a perfectly understandable reason for an outrage. But I can't be outraged over a perfectly avoidable business practice. I'd be here all day long creating one thread after another if I was outraged for simply disagreeing with a given business practice.

Are people seeing it for the first time? Because it's not new (rather obsolete actually, I am not sure why OcUK would want to bring it back given the ease of overclocking today) - only the outrage is new.

[Richdog]

Im have my moments here aswell... The mods take a more informed approach to threads here though.
The difference being, on here you are allowed to express an opinion without some 12 year old American saying 'whatever' all the time. That gets so boring.
I actually tried a few enthusiast forums before settling here and it was the best choice. I also use 1 other that is run by a member here aswell.
This place is far more knowledge based rather than opinion based so thats better for me and most anyway.

BTW........Who says i dont participate? I post infrequently but i do post there

I think that's the main difference you listed there... the userbase. As much as I love EOCF it does get tiring when the place is populated by 99% American teens all posting "zomg u suck"... I really wish it was a bit more like Hexus or OCUK in that respect but hey... you can't have everything and I still love the place.

[999tigger]

In many ways I can't see what all the fuss is about?I think it's creative,pay us £50 more and we will give you your moneyback if it fails to overclock. Geeks who know wouldn't buy it, but then can they be blamed if people want to buy on this basis? The extra is not for the chip, but the gurantee it will perform. We all know that its stated ocing potentialis almost a given.Caveat emptor.

I don't hate OCUK I just trust and prefer to shop with Scan.

[TooNice]

Indeed. I don't see people complaining about extended warranty, yet the two are conceptually similar: yes the odds are very slim that those chip won't go as high as the conservative overclock they are guaranteed up to, but so is the odd of any electronic equipment breaking down if it survives the first month or so in my experience. I do not see the value of either, but is no one is forced to take it (the many alternative e-tailers aside, people can still buy the vanilla Q6600 from OcUK should they want to - and it's priced competitively this week). Incidentally, it was seeing this type of pricing model 1998 in some US E-tailers (selling say, a PII 350 @ 400Mhz for unless than a PII 400) that lead me read up on 'overclocking' (and find OcUK as I wanted to see if this practice could be found in the UK, who lead me to Hexus as the two sites were crosslinked back then).

[obiwinnie]

i would rather spend a bit more and buy one of the extreme range (QX) and have the mulitper unlock

[Hicks12]

Rofl, maybe it will get up to them speeds but if you get a bad one then whats the odds of getting a replacement or money back? 100 to 1 perhaps?.


Nice scan just rubbed it in their faces with their FREE guide. Any bet OCUK just compiled loads of info from free guides on the web(probably even some here xD) and claimed as their own >