This morning has got to be one of the better days of this year. Some aspects of my ego. Team Sugoi got invited to the MSI-ECS Product Demo day at their Libis office and by jeebus, it was fun! The demo day was organized by a friend and I got invited as a blogger (for Sugoi Stuff and Bloggy Network). It’s basically a day of freely testing new products from brands that they manage. Sure, they might not let you take them home, but who passes on a chance to toy with new tech?
[Shamless plug: For the detailed reviews of the products, just wait for them over at Sugoi Stuff. We’re just sorting out a few things with our web host so that might take around five days or so for us to get to post our takes on several of the products.]
Quite exciting to get a hands-on preview of what’s hitting the market. I’m particularly eying the new Lenovo Y430 as my new laptop. Unfortunately, it might take me six months to be able to scrounge enough cash to even consider buying one. Seeing the new Genius and Ozaki speakers had me GASing as well. I particularly like the Ozaki WoW 2.2 channel speaker. And the new Samsung LCD monitors! Oooh… GAS!!!
As a part-time techie, I never believed in buying “branded” stuff before since there are quite a lot of no-name alternatives but I guess my business-sense has given me the maturity to consider investing in quality behind the brand. Not that I am easily convinced by “If it’s *blank* then it must be kick-ass.” That’s what testing and peer-reviews come in.
Sure, product demo days might not give you the full sense of owning a particular gadget but they can give you a much better look at products without having the pressure to actually buy them. Compare that to a typical store visit where they rarely give you a (good) demo of the product.
It’s nice to see that even large companies are opening up to blogging and new media as a means of drum-banging for them. So kudos to MSI-ECS for having us over.