False Marketing Claims

Share your experiences about noisy computers and components, and vendors responses to your valid complaints.

Moderators: NeilBlanchard, Ralf Hutter, sthayashi, Lawrence Lee, Devonavar

Post Reply
Bluefront
*Lifetime Patron*
Posts: 5316
Joined: Sat Jan 18, 2003 2:19 pm
Location: St Louis (county) Missouri USA

False Marketing Claims

Post by Bluefront » Sat May 20, 2006 3:23 am

I know everybody does it, but on the front page of SVC this morning, I found a Thermaltake 120mm fan advertised at almost twice the airflow at a lower db than a 120mm Yate Loon.....on the same page. This is an obvious lie, but some people believe this stuff, witnessed by a recent post on SPCR.

Only consumer complaints and a lot of them, will stop this practice.

I complained in an E-Mail to SVC......you should also.

SVC

JazzJackRabbit
Posts: 1386
Joined: Fri Jun 18, 2004 6:53 pm

Post by JazzJackRabbit » Sat May 20, 2006 8:55 am

This belongs to Customer Advocacy / Feedback forum. Besides, SVC is doind nothing wrong, they are simply passing on information from the manufacturer. Even if they were to take the liberty and retest all of the fans (which no seller will ever do) there will be people who'll say their testing methodology is wrong. If you want to complain to someone, complain to ThermalTake.

Bluefront
*Lifetime Patron*
Posts: 5316
Joined: Sat Jan 18, 2003 2:19 pm
Location: St Louis (county) Missouri USA

Post by Bluefront » Sat May 20, 2006 9:43 am

Here's the text of the E-Mail to SVC.....

I really hate to see a good company such as SVC continue to sell products with obvious false claims. On the front page of your site this morning, you advertise a 120mm Yate Loon fan and a similar looking 120mm Thermaltake fan. The Thermaltake fan claims almost twice the airflow, at a lower sound rating. This claim is a blatant, obvious lie by the manufacturer of that fan. I know you do not make the specs......Thermaltake does. But to a new computer modder, that false claim may seem truthful...


SVC and others should at least publish a disclaimer about these sorts of claims.......if not discontinue completely, the false advertising.

Sincerely, Carl Bohne

SVC is doing something wrong by using lies to sell products....sorry if you feel differently. A disclaimer about such false claims would be helpful. Discontinuing such advertising would be better.

JazzJackRabbit
Posts: 1386
Joined: Fri Jun 18, 2004 6:53 pm

Post by JazzJackRabbit » Sat May 20, 2006 11:40 am

Bluefront wrote:SVC is doing something wrong by using lies to sell products....sorry if you feel differently. A disclaimer about such false claims would be helpful. Discontinuing such advertising would be better.
That's what I'm telling you. SVC does not know how quiet/loud those fans actually are and they obviously cannot test them. The only thing they can do is pass on specs from the manufacturer. Disclaimer might be a good idea, but honestly, if you put disclaimer on a fan, why don't you put disclaimer on everything? But then it will become like warning labels on microwave and any other product. You can't protect from stupidity. I say leave it. And it's not just SVC, it's every other retailer too, do you plan to send a similar letter to newegg?

IMO let it go, like I said, if you want to complain, complain to thermaltake.

Bluefront
*Lifetime Patron*
Posts: 5316
Joined: Sat Jan 18, 2003 2:19 pm
Location: St Louis (county) Missouri USA

Post by Bluefront » Sat May 20, 2006 11:53 am

It's a different matter when you say "X" product is better than "Y" product. That's a matter of opinion. But when you say your one pound product weighs three pounds, that's not an opinion, that's an outright lie.

No reason computer product advertising should play by a different set of rules. In the USA the Consumer Protection Agency has a say in such matters. It's only a matter of time......

And you have to start somewhere.

Raygers
Posts: 48
Joined: Sat Feb 11, 2006 7:17 pm
Location: Chatham, Ontario, Canada

Post by Raygers » Sat May 20, 2006 12:26 pm

I have a rather daft question, how do you know that the advertising is misleading, has anyone reviewed these fans?

Ray

qviri
Posts: 2465
Joined: Tue May 24, 2005 8:22 pm
Location: Berlin
Contact:

Re: False Marketing Claims

Post by qviri » Sat May 20, 2006 1:15 pm

Bluefront wrote:a Thermaltake 120mm fan advertised at almost twice the airflow at a lower db than a 120mm Yate Loon
Flowing air creates noise. It's physically impossible to double the airflow and reduce noise at the same time.

justblair
Posts: 545
Joined: Fri Jul 15, 2005 12:33 pm
Location: GLASGOW, SCOTLAND, UK
Contact:

Re: False Marketing Claims

Post by justblair » Sat May 20, 2006 4:19 pm

qviri wrote:
Bluefront wrote:a Thermaltake 120mm fan advertised at almost twice the airflow at a lower db than a 120mm Yate Loon
Flowing air creates noise. It's physically impossible to double the airflow and reduce noise at the same time.
That depends on how good the origional fan is in the first place. It is possible to produce a quieter fan profile with higher flow.

However as the TT fan is clearly based on the same mould as the loon (if not from the same factory) and from my experiance is in fact near identical noise wise, clearly the claim is suspect.

A lot of this comes down to the fact that their is not one standard for measuring Db in fans.

JazzJackRabbit
Posts: 1386
Joined: Fri Jun 18, 2004 6:53 pm

Re: False Marketing Claims

Post by JazzJackRabbit » Sat May 20, 2006 5:08 pm

justblair wrote:
qviri wrote:
Bluefront wrote:a Thermaltake 120mm fan advertised at almost twice the airflow at a lower db than a 120mm Yate Loon
Flowing air creates noise. It's physically impossible to double the airflow and reduce noise at the same time.
That depends on how good the origional fan is in the first place. It is possible to produce a quieter fan profile with higher flow.

However as the TT fan is clearly based on the same mould as the loon (if not from the same factory) and from my experiance is in fact near identical noise wise, clearly the claim is suspect.

A lot of this comes down to the fact that their is not one standard for measuring Db in fans.
I thought TT fans are generally made by everflow. Except for one heatsink where they used L1A.

justblair
Posts: 545
Joined: Fri Jul 15, 2005 12:33 pm
Location: GLASGOW, SCOTLAND, UK
Contact:

Post by justblair » Sat May 20, 2006 8:18 pm

The 120mm TT fan that comes with the Typhoon is badged Hong Sheng. However I had one out against a nexus and the two are identical in terms of the casing and fan profile. You can tell when you examine the injection points that they have come from the same mould.

The TT fan from the typhoon runs natively at the same speed as the Yate Loon. Slow it down to match the Nexus and noise wise they are identical.

Just noticed though on the specs for the SVC sold fan that it claims 2000rpm. Clearly it has a different number of windings in the motor (or different motor)

My guess is then that the design has been sold to several manufacturers, or that one manufacturer is making all of these fans.

Felger Carbon
Posts: 2049
Joined: Thu Dec 15, 2005 11:06 am
Location: Klamath Falls, OR

Re: False Marketing Claims

Post by Felger Carbon » Thu Jun 15, 2006 7:46 am

justblair wrote:A lot of this comes down to the fact that their is not one standard for measuring Db in fans.
Nor one standard for creativity in writing advertising copy. :D

Rusty075
SPCR Reviewer
Posts: 4000
Joined: Sun Aug 11, 2002 3:26 pm
Location: Phoenix, AZ
Contact:

Re: False Marketing Claims

Post by Rusty075 » Thu Jun 15, 2006 10:46 am

justblair wrote:A lot of this comes down to the fact that their is not one standard for measuring Db in fans.
There is, ANSI S12.11. OEM's and manu's use it, and people like TT undoubtably have the testing report in their posession for the fans they relabel...they just choose not to use the numbers on it.

Post Reply