Newegg's Eggxpert Review Program

[rwpritchett]

My non-Eggxpert reviews do not have an Eggxpert tag so don't worry on account of that.

FWIW- new member since 2011

 

[balroger]

Time was when all reviews were stamped with eggXpert tag but they stopped doing that a while back. I'd relax, I just got my first review since February, so longer than your drought. They will only send out items if they get them from the manufacturers, when the program first started I think I had 3 items at one time on several occasions, obviously those days are over.

 

[balroger]

Interestingly Newegg seem to have switched from Fedex to UPS, got notification today that a package is on its way to my home address via UPS and also a separate order is going to my workplace again via UPS.

 

[slamscaper]

So I FINALLY received a response directly from the EggXpert team today. I just felt something was wrong because I've never had a drought so long and they've NEVER missed (or possibly ignored) my emails in the past, as whenever I had problems with any of the review samples they were very quick to reply, even if I just had questions or suggestions as well. Let's also not forget that the frequency of the assignments went from two or three a month to once every month or two as of late, most of which were muti-item lists that were nearly impossible to get back to them in time in order to receive the product you really wanted to review (I had my email synced every 15 minutes to my smartphone and Newegg's EggXpert mail address set as a VIP and yet STILL others always seemed beat me when I replied immediately with one word: "Accept"). I honestly believe some EggXperts simply received the emails earlier than others...

Their response, which I received late last night, made me incredibly sad to read. I was hoping for something much more reassuring than this. I am however incredibly grateful for the opportunity they gave me, not to mention all the products I've been sent to review since the inception in 2011. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't surprised that I was not one of the EggXperts kept on once they decided to remove some, considering I've been an EggXpert since 2011 (first regular review in 2006), my helpfulness rating is great, I've never missed an assignment or been very late with one, and lastly I also have the Top 1000 reviewer badge, which honestly I'm sure most (if not ALL) of you guys do as well. Perhaps they just did a random drawing to determine which EggXperts would remain after the cut. Who knows at this point? It's not like they'll ever tell any of us that. I just really hope that I am re-invited in the future. Being that they said "re-invite," I'm sure they do actually plan on getting back the same EggXperts they already had before sending out invitations to new prospects, which I guess is the only silver lining for me here.

But I'm very much let down as I always got excited when I saw "EggXpert Reviews" pop up in my email client, since I knew that was a new assignment. You should all feel very privileged if you're still getting assignments at this time, since that means you survived the cuts to the program. I'm sure you all deserve it.

Here was their response to me:


View attachment 206014

 

[Joe88]

Basically its winding down, i'm still in but it seems like nothing but corsair and seagate stuff.

 

[slamscaper]

Basically its winding down, i'm still in but it seems like nothing but corsair and seagate stuff.

Yes apparently even the people lucky enough to still be involved are getting very few products, thanks to the very small pool of products being added to the program. I don't get this seeing as sales in PC gaming have been spectacular and I'm sure that translates to Newegg as well, even though Amazon is so popular. Newegg has done a good job of staying relevant even as Amazon has lowered prices so much to compete in that area.

Perhaps Newegg just doesn't feel the program is as beneficial as they thought it would be, although I actually thought it could have been if they gave us more tools. I did request that they give EggXperts the ability to at least add pictures to our reviews (I have no idea why they never did this) as this would have helped the average end-users SO MUCH. Amazon does this and even allows videos, which I don't think are necessary but I still like the ambition.

I feel so invested in the program and the fact that I'm currently unable to spend the thousands and thousands I was in the past on parts for builds made it even more important for me to acquire some of the newer tech from review samples, just to keep me relevant in the industry.

I'm staying hopeful that it will ramp back up but I don't have a lot of faith that it will again. I can remember how excited the EggXpert staff used to be about the program and the reviews. Now there appears to be only a few employees even taking care of it and most of Newegg's employees don't even know the program exists. It had lasted so long and I really thought things would improve after PC gaming sales started soaring worldwide and in the US. I guess it's just a matter of playing a wait and see game now.

I keep thinking about how my very last assignment offer was not a mutli-item list but a REAL assignment meant only for me and a few others. It was for an Adobe entry-level editing suite, which I did accept but I was 3 days late accepting it since I had been sick and hadn't checked my email. I keep wondering if that was why they decided to remove me, figuring they should keep people in that actually respond in time. I do know they were really adamant about people declining if they didn't want something and not just ignoring the emails. I guess I'll never know...

 

[rwpritchett]

... and when I checked my email on returning home I'm offered a 14TB internal drive, yes please I say.

Balroger,

If you've received your 14TB drive and it's a Seagate drive like I received, could you go to Seagates website and enter your serial number into their warranty checker?

I entered mine and it came up as expired. I wrote Seagate support and got this response:

Thank you for contacting Seagate Support. My name is Jehosafat and my goal is to make you a very satisfied customer. today by finding a resolution for you.

I understand that you you have concerns regarding your Seagate Ironwolf drive's warranty. Don't worry, I'd be more than glad to work with you and help you find a quick resolution for this inconvenience.

Having double checked in the system, it shows that the warranty of your drive's Serial Number ZHZ2F2FA has expired back on 22-Mar-2019. If you believe that this information is incorrect. Could you please provide us with your proof purchase to determine if we can extend you warranty?

 

[Joe88]

My 14TB drive

View attachment 206100

 

[rwpritchett]

My 14TB has a manufacture date of 16-Mar-2019, so a 6 day warranty. Looks like your warranty expired 4 months before these drives were even released. Small sample size, but 0 for 2.

I wonder if this is prevalent for this series or if it's the review samples only.

 

[Joe88]

The exp date is same as mfg date thats on this drive. It does seem these review units were black listed from warranty.

 

[balroger]

Yep mine is 22 March 2019, there's also a small ding on the case which is slightly concerning

View attachment 206111

 

[rwpritchett]

Here's the response from Seagate:

Thank you for contacting Seagate Support. My name is Gabriel and my goal is to make you a very satisfied customer today by finding a resolution for you

I understand your situation regard the warranty of the Drive. I will help you with this explain you the reason:

The reason that this Drive doesn't has a warranty because is a review sample, and the review samples Drive can't have a warranty, if you have any problem in the future you should contact with Newegg.

We will be happy to help you from 8:00 AM to 6:00 PM Central time, Monday – Friday. We’ve also provided our support link down below in case you would like to contact us by phone at your convenience.

So there you have it. We've been blacklisted.

 

[slamscaper]

That really sucks. Back when Newegg sent me a $400 HP Officejet Pro printer, it arrived COMPLETELY DEAD. Newegg told me to contact HP and just explain the situation. I told them I didn't have the proof of purchase because I received it through the review program from Newegg. I thought they do the same thing, but they were really nice to me and sent me a brand new one. So Seagate loses some points here. Post your EggXpert review and let EVERYONE know!

 

[Aldakoopa]

I contacted Newegg about the Corsair H100i Platinum SE that is being recalled. The customer service rep didn't know anything about the program and had to ask around. She said she sent a message to someone involved with the program at Newegg and they would get back to me, but that was like a month ago by now maybe. I dunno, whenever I last posted here I said I wasn't going to pursue it but then the next day I did. So it's been since my last post basically.

 

[balroger]

While checking out some laptops for a prospective purchase I notice that some lucky eggXperts have had the opportunity to review some gaming laptops, must be nice!

 

[Joe88]

Yeah, someone posted in here they got to review one
My laptop (which is 10 years old and was low budget to begin with) could really use a replacement

 

[Aldakoopa]

I got to review an LG Gram. Not a gaming laptop, but it's pretty nice.

 

[Goathead]

Been lurking for a long time, so here I am folks....I've been in the program for about 6 years or so.

Looks like more 4/14TB iron drives being sent out, I noticed that there have been a number of reviews in the last few weeks on that item.

I got the "pick one" today, but being a few hours late, I assume I'll get nuthin. Couple of wolf drives, some case fans and a power supply on the list

So the program isn't quite as dead as people were led to believe

Its safe to assume there is no warranty on review samples BTW, that's standard industry practice for product reviewers. Of course if you get the right person and not a "cowboy" you can typically get a courtesy replacement, which would be a refurb unit.

The company I worked for typically would ask for them back after a few months, run them thru the shop then sell them as refurbished with a 90 day warranty. These were high end digital cameras

 

[Aldakoopa]

I got an email a few weeks ago, one of those "pick your part" ones. It was mostly Corsair stuff, including a case, a PSU, and an M55 mouse. Then there was some printer from a brand I had never heard of before.

Anyway, my Corsair Sabre RBG mouse had started acting up a couple of weeks before that and was getting worse as time went on. Sometimes the thing wouldn't turn on with my computer and I would have to unplug it and plug it back in, and it had been doing that ever since I got it, but now it had started scrolling when I never touched the scroll wheel, sometimes it would scroll in the opposite direction, or not at all, when I did. It was really annoying in games where scroll wheel would change items or something.

So, since my mouse had been doing that, I replied to the email as soon as I saw it asking for the mouse since I was about to buy a replacement/backup one while I RMA'd the Sabre. I went ahead and contacted Corsair about the issue, and went through the process of reinstalling the firmware which completely bricked the thing. I thought "Oh well, maybe I'll get that review mouse in a couple of days." It took Corsair over a week to finally respond and accept the RMA, and I still had no review mouse. I had been using a wireless Logitech keyboard with a laptop-like touchpad on the side of it in the meantime, and was avoiding playing games because of it. It took a week for my mouse to get from NC to CA, and another week for the replacement to get back. So today, here I was, week 3 without a mouse and using that dreadful touchpad thing and suffering from carpel tunnel, and I get two small packages. One is the review mouse I figured somebody else had gotten, and the other is my replacement Sabre.

That's the slowest I've ever gotten a review item from them. I usually get them within a week after accepting, and definitely not after 3 weeks.

So, now I am trying out the review mouse, but I still like the Sabre better. This will make a decent backup in the future if that ever happens again, though.

 

[S_I_N]

Just got an email asking if I wanted to stay in the program.