Reviewing www.online-tech-tips.com

It is time for our first episode of the Genuine Help for Windows 7 series in 2010. In this review I will take a look at Online Tech Tips, a site with plenty of content, mostly for Windows users. The site has articles about Windows XP, Windows Vista but covers Windows 7 too. Let's see if it is worthy of our blue badge.

Ease of use - Good

When you enter the site, you are welcomed by a very clean design. There are no special effects, nothing distracting. The content is put first, with big titles and small intros for each of the articles. On the right you have menus which share the most popular articles and most recent ones. And then you have the menu which helps you navigate the site, the search box and buttons to translate the content to other languages. The navigation is simple and finding your way is very easy.

While the clean design is refreshing, it is also a weak point. When browsing through the site, I got a very strong impression that it is lacking in personality. The logo is very generic, there's no mention of the author of the article you are reading, no icons which suggest the topic being covered. I know this is a very subjective judgment but I do feel that adding a bit of visual personality to the site can help a lot.

Going back to positives: one thing I enjoyed is the fact that the site doesn't have too many ads. You have two blocks of ads on the homepage and each of the content pages. However, when you open an article you will see also some in-text advertising. Personally I don't really like this kind of ads. I find them to be misleading and pretty annoying.

Even so, the site doesn't put the ads first. You don't have to scroll between many blocks of ads to get to the content. Aseem Kishore - the owner of the site - managed to strike a pretty good balance and you will rarely be annoyed by ads.

Ease of understanding - Good

Understanding the tutorials published on online-tech-tips.com doesn't require any special technical knowledge. The articles are written in a friendly manner with simple words, most technical jargon is used only when necessary and it is generally well explained.

One thing that can be improved is to add (when necessary) links to third-party documentation which explains very thoroughly more complex technical concepts. However, that's not needed very often so it isn't much of an issue.

Completeness of tutorials - Good

On the completeness side, online-tech-tips.com does a pretty good job. As an example, their article on How to Change Computer Name in Windows 7 it is what I consider to be a very good tutorial. The author explains why you would want to change your computer name, how to do it and also covers a few caveats you need to be aware of, if you choose to do this. This is very helpful and I would love to see this approach being used by more sites with tutorials.

While browsing through other articles, I noticed that the authors do a pretty good job at being complete. While they might not be perfect each time, you do get the feeling that the author has put some effort before publishing his/her tutorial.

Original articles - Good

When it comes to publishing original articles, the site does a pretty decent job. While online-tech-tips.com publishes stuff which you can find on other sites as the “God Mode” Control Panel to Windows 7, it also features a few guides which are not encountered that often like Windows 7 Color Calibrate – How to Calibrate your Monitor or Install and Delete Fonts in Windows 7 the Easy Way.

Personally, I would like to see online-tech-tips.com publishing even more original articles, so that they can be easily rated from good to great.

online-tech-tips.com - Genuine Help for Windows 7

Online Tech Tips definitely deserves the the blue badge of Genuine Help for Windows 7. It is a very clean site with plenty of useful content, all delivered in a friendly manner.

There are a few things that can be improved (like giving the site a bit more personality or removing the in-text advertising) but overall it is a very good destination. We definitely recommend you to visit Online Tech Tips. You can find there tutorials which complement our offering.

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