REVIEW REQUEST: pcInfoByte

Welcome Boomer2120 to TWF, please help us out and review a few sites in this section. It help everyone as a new set of eyes and a different view point can be very helpful.

I'll post a review later

Sure, I will review a couple of the sites.

Overall I think this looks very nice. I like the style that you've used for the content area and navigation although I do feel like I've seen this sort of thing used a lot before.

What I would like to see here is some colour! The grey looks nice but I feel that the design could be improved a lot with the addition of a strong colour. What you could do is crate a nice logo/header area - what you have there now is very bland looking and doesn't stand out at all. Most colours look good with grey, so you have a lot to choose from. I think a dark maroon would look really good here, or you could go in the other direction and use a bright orange or blue. A dark colour would probably be easier to work with though. Also try to use the colour elsewhere in the design.

If you're linking articles from other sites you should definitely give the host site credit - just a little piece of text in the header area saying "Source: C|Net" or "From C|net.com" would work fine. Also open the links in a new window so users aren't taken away from your site.

I can't get the site up. Is there a problem??

All I see is Site under construction. Please post when you do big changes that differs from the ongoing thread here. That way we know if we should come back later or what.

Yeah, I am aware of the under construction page.

The problem that I'm facing is that I switched web hosts, and the nameservers need to propigate. Right now, I don't see the under construction page.

Also, I can't just upload the site because my previous web host is down at the moment, and I can't seem to retrieve the database file from them at this time.

Thanks for understanding, and it should be up shortly.

The site seems to be working now.

I think your layout is really clean looking and I do like the gray but you need some color, color, color! A good place to start would be your logo. I think an orange color (maybe do a gradient) would do wonders and maybe bring some small bits of orange somehow into the body part. Perhaps in the headers or even the links.

Very nice job:)

Got it now! I have to agree that it's a nice clean looking layout but too bland. Definietly needs some colour to it.

I won't dwell on the color as thats been done!

What I will say is that I can see the main purpose of the site, tech news, but is there going to be anymore to it? Is the site simplay a news portal or will you be offering services in the future such as tech info on PC's, programming articles, etc.

The reason I ask is that in my view, the news is a fairly limited arena, you could only run it so far. Plus keeping up has got to be a problem unless the news is fed into the site "live"

Where are you planning to take the site in short?

We will be offering articles in the near future as well as more user interactivity.

I can't really find anything bad to say about your site. I'd like to know how long you've been designing though. The only thing that I can say to give constructive critisism is that the site lacks a color scheme (unless your color scheme is grey and white). I like that it's neat and orderly. Good job.

Thanks for the great reviews.

I've been doing web design for about four years now.

I like the design but at first view couldn't figure out what your site was all about. Is it a PC news site maybe?

Maybe adding a slogan under your logo will help visitors figure out what your site's about.

Also maybe add another color to spice the design up.

Gavin

I could swear I've seen this design before.. sorta looks like one of those php nuke thingys. Oh well. Its neat sorted and professional but my main problem with it is that it does not draw me in! When i firsh saw it I did not feel like going on because all i saw was black text on a white/grey background. It reminds me too much of a school book! I dunno what to say on this site because it doesn't do anything for me. Its sorta stuck in the middle, the design does not annoy me nor inspire me. Try coming up with some ways to spice it up or else you might be boring your users to death
-dk

P.s. No offense meant by my harsh comments, just trying to help you improve. that's why you posted here right?

Agreed, badly needs colour, and it doesn't really say wha tthe sote is about. The logo is a bit bland too. That would be a good place for colour. Layout is good. Articles are intresting too.

Blue

Reminds me alot of a PHP-nuke site. The middle content and two side bars with the top being the logo. It's definitely a safe design and I have used it. Great for content sites in my eyes.

I seen the same problems that others have mentioned. The gray color scheme seems a little blah. Maybe you could make the logo orange and keep the gray outlining on it and make some of your main body headings the same color as the logo. Don't have to be orange, just a suggestion.

The other thing was "ummm. whats this for?" I think you need a slogan after your logo. Like "Pcinfobyte - technology information" or something.