New Homepage Feedback Round 2

[SmileyTPB1]

I still don't like it. I don't understand the big emphasis on the forum. I prefer more links to news and articles. That is why I come here.

 

[dormantreign]

The forum is a major part of the community, your really missing out of you don't check out what other members say from time to time.

 

[kkiddu]

Hey Toms. Appreciate you spending time and effort to give the homepage a fresh look.

But for me as a regular user who is so used to the old layout, it's just confusing.

Can't you guys make a iGoogle like homepage where all the sections can be moved and resized?

 

[ravenlord]

way to go, Toms... we are slowly getting there....IMHO, this and any other tech site should be about relevance and current uptodate content, alongside features and expert articles and advice. If you manage to present this in an interactive, modern format, that is attractive to your core audience and easy to follow, then you have a great website on your hands... the forum replies give some great suggestions...I know you wont please everyone but you sure can make everyone have an opinion!
For my part, if you revamp the color scheme to include more gray and less white, I will be very happy!. Other than that, keep it going!

 

[luccha]

I still think the old version is better... articles could have their first paragraph shown in the first page (just like old times) and the hot news look better in red than in bold... IMHO

 

[Upendra09]

how about making the tabs and headings a cool blue and making the text black ? it provides good contrast and cuts down the clutter feeling

Edit: i like beta 1 better and these changes ^^ should be made to beta 1

 

[iamauser]

I've been trying to come up with some constructive comments that aren't overly harsh.

I still don't know what design goals you're trying to accomplish here -- you'd actually get some useful feedback from people if you told us what those were. More front page ad space? Surfacing user-generated content? Increasing click-throughs to individual pages to increase page impressions? Clearer content hierarchy? Better useability? Better surfacing of new content? Cleaner overall design? Lighter page weight? All of the above? Any of the above?

I honestly don't know, and therefore can't offer useful constructive criticism, and neither can anyone else. You do a redesign by first establishing the goals of the redesign, then iterating to reach them. It is impossible to offer a critique -- other than an opinion (my opinion is that it's awful, just eye-searingly awful, and only the tiniest improvement over the misaligned bucket-of-divs that was the previous 'beta') -- without knowing what you're trying to achieve.

If you're doing this in-house, hire a professional.

If you're using an external designer, fire them and hire somebody better.

And if you offer another revision, tell us what you're trying to achieve, and those of us who do this for a living will give you some feedback on how well you're doing it.

 

[eddieroolz]

The news must be on the centre. That is the one and only thing I ask for.

 

[heerobya]

The latest version of our Tom's Hardware homepage is set to be visible in preview later this week and includes some of the feedback our users have given us after the previous iteration. We encourage everyone to review the latest design (once available) and post your feedback, comments and critiques of the new page to this thread. Bear in mind that not all feedback from the last feedback thread has been integrated yet into the design, and we will be releasing another version within 2 weeks. Please remember to keep your feedback comments clear, constructive and detailed.

Thanks!

Put the charts way towards the top! On the right side above all the silly advertisements!

Keep those charts udpated! Graphics card charts especially!

 

[rajeshsundaram]

Being a UX guy I can say, the beta2 should have a carousel style display system to promote latest articles and news highlights. The frequency of publishing articles are slow.. like one or three per week on a average. So for daily visitors like me.. that section looks soo "static". So a mix of articles and news displayed in a carousel style will help a lot.

- Rajesh

 

[nozzlezator]

I love the old style of site, first thing i see are news and that is very important to me and second thing i see is featured articles.
Then i like to check all others categories and articles (Graphics section, CPU section...) and i can do that with just scrolling down - no need to click there,click there.... just scrolling and seeing latest articles in each section is making browsing site really fast.

Beta2 site is different - first thing i see are featured articles and my first impression was - where are the news here?And then i found the news just below but categories are gone and i must access them (just for check) via Articles option on top (i usually don't use it)....Also I'm used to old site and beta2 is confusing to me when i open it.

Greetings from Serbia.

 

[gerchokas]

Much better organized - and good looking! I definately go for Beta 2!

 

[HappyBB]

I like the old one better as I can access different articles / topics / features in different categories easily. In the new one, it's not so easy; I have to navigate the page longer than before and not guaranteed that I will find what I want. I'll choose the old one.

 

[BlueFireAngel]

I like this over Beat 1 but, like MarkHeath said above, there are things about the old page that I like much better.
"Like the others have stated, a definite improvement in the new page's structure. One thing that I personally liked about the "old" home page that I miss in "beta 2" is the lists of articles based on categories. I understand that many would find it just too cluttered with all those articles there as they are on the "old" page so perhaps some form of modularity could be introduced? Just a thought"
That's a pretty good summation of my thoughts. I also like some of the proposed mockups in this forum. I'm glad to see that beta 2 improved based on comments in the beta 1 forum. Thanks!

 

[amerikanight]

beta 2 is a little better, but why not just make these small changes to beta 2 to make it even better

did a mockup of a slightly different look

http://i.imgur.com/kgq1E.jpg

I AGREE!!! Nice job!!

 

[amerikanight]

The news must be on the centre. That is the one and only thing I ask for.

YEP!!! me too!!

 

[Hilarion]

Toms, Really?
You ARE joking about this aren't you?
I hope you are.
Horrible changes.

 

[adbat]

I can't see any point in changes but I do not mind it eather.

BUT. still some links do not change colour if I visit them and that is a big issue and I hope it will be fixed.

 

[jpishgar]

Great feedback, friends! We're nearing the end of the 2nd round of development on the front page redesign and your comments have made this process very informed for us. We greatly appreciate it!

 

[ojas]

i kind of liked it when all the latest articles were grouped by topic on the home page...basically, i like the old one better!

 

[Pyree]

I like the old version. May be because I am used to it. Also if tom's hardware is really really keen on giving us a new look on its front page, I suggest a layout format similar to abc.net.au with latest news and latest article in two small clickable flash. The look of the beta front page is also too narrow and I think they don't look very good on wide screen. Also I would like a realtime message box on the right hand side, not twitter.

 

[CyberAngel]

The users should be able to select the layout and columns and data to be display plus saving several of these preferences, please?

 

[skaz]

My honest opinion is that I like the original site layout over the two new ones. I think moving the main news away from the center just feels "off". Makes everything else feel "scattered".

I would keep the layout and only change the size, shape, design of some of the key buttons.

 

[razor512]

it would be cool to have the ability for a custom home page so that users can move items around, if needed you can keep the ad positions fixed then let users move everything else around. or if possible create a style menu where users can select from a list of all of the old UI's


PS are there any plans to bring back the old tomshardware charts where users could filter out cards and still get a visual comparison (dynamically generated bar graph)?


Also is there a way to customize the offers section. for example, I am currently interested in getting a GTX 560 ti. it would be great if the best offers section can be customized in a way that will allow me to be updates on lower prices for the GTX 560 ti.

 

[ben110]

If I am to make one suggestion, can we please have the latest news section in the middle of the page? As in switch it with the column on the left.

I agree. Latest news should be in the middle and Discover Tom's Guide Articles should be on the left.