The Alphacool Apex Stealth drama, so far

There has recently been a bit of a kerfuffle in the tech reviews scene. Igors Lab, a well-known and respected site appeared to make some errors while testing the new Alphacool Apex Stealth metal fans, something that was made clear when other reviewers tested the same set of fans. What followed is a pretty messy series of events…

While the original Apex Stealth fan review was published by Igor, he said he was not the one to conduct the fan testing. That task was apparently handled by a freelancer, Pascal, who also has his own YouTube channel for tech videos. The review praised Alphacool's new fan design, citing them as revolutionary and better than the competition. It was also an ‘exclusive', going live well ahead of other reviews.

After this, Alphacool asked Igor if they could use the review results for some marketing material and went live with pre-orders, showcasing the Igor's Lab results. In hindsight, this should not have happened but at the time, the errors in the original review were not clear.

Other independent reviewers tested the same fan to find that their results did not line up with those of Igor's Lab at all. Aris over at Hardware Busters, Sweclockers and Roman ‘Der8auer' all reported less impressive performance results, amongst a few other sites. This is particularly interesting to KitGuru as we are still due to get a set of Alphacool Apex Stealth fans for a custom build in the new year. Not a dedicated review, as such, more as part of a build project our modder James Dawson will be creating.

The logical assumption here would be that there was some kind of mistake with the Igor's Lab testing and the follow-up to that would be going back and re-analysing the fans and test conditions.

Instead of doing this, Igor's Lab updated their review, confirming that the testing was done by a freelancer. That same freelancer then uploaded a (now-removed) YouTube video, in which he stood by his testing, despite the evidence that an error had potentially been made. Re-uploads of the video were later copyright claimed and taken down as well – although parts of it are included in Der8auer's lengthy video on this subject.

In our industry, mistakes do happen from time to time but the best approach is to always inform the readers of the error and go back to re-do the testing. It is something that can be fixed and doesn't need to be a blemish on anyone's reputation. If anything, the tech enthusiast audience values integrity and transparency on that level.

In an updated statement on the matter today, Igor confirmed plans to go back to revalidate the test setup and re-test these fans to do right by the readers and correct the situation. Additionally, Alphacool no longer has the marketing material featuring Igor's results live.

This statement does raise a few more questions though. The freelancer who conducted the original testing for Igor was later hired by Alphacool and now has a role at the company but is currently within a probationary period. Additionally, Igor states that he has since learned that the manufacturer was aware of the fan's weaknesses back in October when the original results were published, so we have to wonder why questions weren't raised about the results in the first place, before publishing. We'd also have to question why Alphacool thought it would be okay to use those results for marketing pre-orders.

Igor also asserts that chat logs between Pascal and Alphacool were deleted, alongside documents containing more information about the fans and OEM test results.

There is blame to be placed on all sides in this situation, which appears to keep getting more and more questionable as new information continues to come to light. Alphacool has not yet issued a statement on the matter but it seems pretty clear that one needs to be made.

We aren't just jumping on the bandwagon, we've worked with Alphacool in the past ourselves and as we reported on the announcement of these fans, we think it is important to inform readers of recent developments. I have heard from a source close to a small PC parts store here in the UK that a bunch of pre-orders for these fans have been cancelled over the last couple of weeks, so it is clear that the original review did push a number of customers into pre-ordering. As a result, allowing the original review's results to be used in marketing for pre-orders was certainly a mistake.

KitGuru Says: What do you all make of the situation? We'll be following it closely to bring updates as they come to light. 

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