Vic Smith wrote
Ralph Mowery wrote

Another bad rating is if you get something
that is damaged or defective on arriavle.

Pretty sure online reviews really hurt Consumer Reports subscriptions.
I know I dropped my CR subscription when online reviews became
widely available. The main issue with using online reviews is you have
to have enough of them, and use your judgement in reading them.
Obviously, you don't pay any attention to reviewers who haven't
even used the product, rave about feature that don't interest you,
or down-rated it because of random shipping issues. If shipping
is a chronic complaint, it's a real issue.

When I built this computer, in 2015, I ordered my computer parts
exclusively from Newegg. The reviews for the MB I bought - Asus
Hero VII - were mediocre at best. But so were ALL the other reviews
of new generation MB's, no matter the manufacturer.

Yeah, found the same problem deciding which external 8TB
hard drive to buy, both the candidates had similar reviews.

But the main problem was DOA's that reduced the scores.

I ignore the scores and just use the review texts.

I surmised that the bulk of the DOA complaints was simply
user incompetence, so I ordered anyway. The MB has been
flawless. The quality probably increased as number of reviews
increased, but I never checked.

Yeah, I don't bother to check after I have decided which to buy.

Maybe at that time Amazon had more reviews
on that MB than Newegg, but I didn't look.

I do generally look at the main review sites.

I think Amazon has the most accurate reviews because it
somehow has developed a "culture" for reviewing products.

Particularly with books because they do encourage you
to do a review when you finish reading a kindle book.

I know I have reviewed by far more
Amazon products that anywhere else.

Me too, particularly kindle books.

On some sites it seems the bulk of the reviews are "complainers."

Havent seen much of that.

Just some of my thoughts on it.

The other problem I find with sites like Consumer Reports
is that they hardly ever have a recent review of what I am
buying and hardly any of the products are buyable when
they do have one product that stands out when I am buying.