Slow Summer Season: Not Even Enough To Rant About?

Introduction

It's a bit quiet these days and - believe me - I personally can only welcome that, as it allows me to have something like a life for a change. However, our highly appreciated readers, such as you, still expect to find interesting, exciting, amusing or controversial (my personal favorite) stuff here at Tom's Hardware Guide. Now I would have quite a few topics I could write about, or things I could review for you right now, alas none of them really excites me that much. As a long time reader you might be well aware that lame reviews are not exactly my cup of tea. I rather write something that amazes 50% of you and deeply upsets the other half. As long as I can make your blood boil I am doing a good job, or don't I? Well, that's at least my own definition and the only way to ensure that I enjoy my job.

This time I am going to try something new. I've just come back up into my lab after fiddling around with the rear disc brake of my Raven and I "had myself an idea". Why don't I ask you guys what you would like me to write about? I mean, we still have the continuous flow of review articles from the editorial team of Tom's Hardware that cover the most important stuff. However, nowadays you guys expect me to write ground-shaking material only, and that ain't so easy to come by. It's not even that. I could write a lot of stuff, but it's got to be politically correct unless I want to face lawsuits or other unpleasant responses from upset manufacturers as well as "fellow reviewers", the many ones that come here, read everything (thanks!), misunderstand about half of it (I'm sorry!) and then go and write either a piece that's (of course unwillingly) inspired by articles from here, or a piece that bases its whole significant existence on rants about my person, such as "Tom's paid off by AMD", "Tom's paid off by Intel", "Tom's paid off by NVIDIA", "Tom's a software pirate" (That was my personal favorite!), or "Tom's got no idea what he's talking about". Ah well, haven't I outlived you all?

You see, I am in pretty good shape and ready to go. Now I'd like you to send in what you want me to write about. You want my view on a certain area, product, technology? Do you want me to justify myself for the ridiculous crap I am discharging over and over again? Maybe it should be my opinion about a certain company and their philosophy? Come on, get it off your chest! The best emails will be published and I will add my own stuff to them. I promise. Can't set up something like a giveaway for it, now that I just had the idea some 20 minutes ago. It's gotta be for the honor and not for a price, I am afraid.

I will give you some suggestions. One thing I'd personally like to comment on is this hilarious reaction from NVIDIA to articles about ATi's SmartShader technology and DirectX 8.1. It seriously reminded me of Shakespeare's "Much Ado About Nothing', although I doubt that the person responsible at NVIDIA is in any way interested in literature. Rumor has it that employees of Silicon Valley technology companies know slightly less about literature than English professors know about DirectX 8.1. I am a doctor. I don't know about either of the two (and even less about US history). That's why I write about all of them.

We could also talk about other upcoming products, like nForce (and the questionable pleasure of testing it), Xbox, i845, the next Intel or AMD processor, VIA's upcoming Apollo P4X266 and their consequences. I recently received the complaint that I am not talking about my car(s) anymore. Hey, no problem! I can do that too! I could also recommend the best or warn you from the worst Autobahns (really "Autobahnen") in Southern German for people who want to drive faster than 140 mph for more than only 10 seconds (first of all: AVOID MUNICH!!). I'd love to go on about my high-tech lightweight and tuned-to-the-hilt mountain bike, Moser Guide tours and break-neck trails in the Black Forest. Wonna talk about Cuban cigars? Send your mail right here! Every suggestion is appreciated. However, please spare me with "I've got a Pentium III 667 and I can't get it to 1100 MHz"-stuff!

So has Tom finally run out of ideas, or what? Not really! However, I'd like to spice up this site as well as my job a little. Let's try it out and see if you enjoy it. I promise that I will never do it again if you (or I) think it sucks.

Send your suggestion to tom@tomshardware.com and the article will be up within the next 24 hours. Ehrenwort!