X-bit labs

Information

X-bit Labs for mobile users! Do not forget that we are running a special version of X-bit Labs web-site for users of mobile and handheld devices: http://pda.xbitlabs.com. Check out our news and articles from smartphones and PDAs to be always updated on the latest computer and technology news.

About Us

X-bit labs is an English-language Internet-site focusing on PC hardware. We offer a constantly updated news wire alongside with detailed reviews of the newest products. We aim to keep our readers not only constantly aware of the most recent events and news of the computer hardware world, but also to provide in-depth info on many acute topics dealing with PC hardware trends and technologies.

Please bear in mind that we do not restrict ourselves to quoting facts, but try to use all our knowledge and experience to provide some analysis and make some forecasts. However, you shouldn't be concerned about us sometimes expressing our personal opinion, because all the members of our team are highly experienced hardware engineers and analysts.

How did it all started? The idea of this project came into the world on 29 March, 1999. Hardware stuff has always been of interest to me and my friend Ilya. Years of program-making, constant upgrades of home computers and quite a bit of experience in the Russian internet (RuNet) pushed us to asking ourselves: why not give it a try? Especially, since a few first reviews received so much positive feedback from the people in the industry.

So, we made a few attempts to develop this idea and put it into life, but the success was pretty vague. However, we didn’t give up and in summer 2000 we pulled ourselves together, changed almost the entire team and launched X-bit labs as you know it today. Here I would like to sincerely thank all our readers who supported us, helped us to make X-bit an interesting read for everyone. Your advice, guys, really meant a lot to us and proved very helpful.

Despite the recognition we received and the positive feedback we got, there was still one very serious difficulty, which prevented us from growing further. X-bit labs team was physically based in Russia, namely in Moscow, but we targeted our contents specifically at North America and all English-speaking people worldwide.. However, the confusion about us being from Russia but having no business in the Russian market was really frustrating.

So, we decided to solve the matter once and for all. From July 2002 the headquarters of X-bit labs has been officially moved to the United States. At this time X-bit labs has three test facilities physically located in three different parts of the world. One of our biggest testlabs is still in Russia, Moscow, another one is certainly in the US (California) and the third test facility, which is our primary Video lab, is based out of Tallinn (Estonia).

Right now X-bit labs is one of the top three hardware review sites out there with close to 1.8 million unique readers every month and continues to grow thanks to the great talented engineers working on the project full time.

Please meet our team:

	Anna S. Filatova: Editor in Chief. Well, it’s hard to speak about myself, but I will try :) I am 29 years old now and I am a co-founder and responsible for the overall Editoral direction and administration of the site as well as for making the male part of the team work :) I live in Los Angles California but I spend a lot of time traveling around the world. I graduated from the Moscow State Linguistic University, Applied Linguistics department (not very computer related, eh?) Although it may sound not very clear, it is still very simple: I was doing foreign languages and language theory. Thanks to this university I can now fluently speak English, German and French, and look forward to learning some Chinese one-day :) And what about computers, you ask? This is the most interesting part, as it has always been my hobby. I was very much in programming on Turbo Pascal, Basic, Delphi and a bit of Assembler. As for other hobbies, well, there is something interesting I suppose. I am a big fan of paintball, got my motorcycle license a few years ago, and since last winter I fell in love with snow-mobiling.
pic coming soon	Ilya Gavrichenkov: Hardware Editor – Platforms. A co-founder of X-bit labs site. Ilya is the No. 1 person in our test laboratory. Being responsible for the coordination of the entire test lab activity, he is also a true expert in the CPU and Mainboard field. He is a degreed engineer, graduated with honours from the Moscow State Aviation Institute (University of Aerospace Technology), Applied Mathematics department. He has always been very serious and at the same time very enthusiastic. With his almost 30 years, Ilya is fond of sleeping until 5p.m.: night is the right time for him, as he says. And even though he is a 100% Russian he simply hates winter time: you can never get him to go for a walk in winter. I think he would really love to live in the Caribbean, for instance :)
pic coming soon	Anton Shilov: News Editor, Entertainment Hardware Testing Lab Manager. I am proud to say that he is one of the most experienced news-editors and market analysts among the technology Internet media. Following all the world’s events and being not afraid to carry out some in-depth investigations on his own, Anton is always right in time with his findings and analysis. He is also in charge of our entertainment hardware lab in Tallinn, Estonia, and is always full of new ideas and testing approaches that result into unique indepth materials you can find in X-bit's Video section. Anton lives in Tallinn and studies at the Audentes university, Information and Technology department. As for hobbies, he is so much into IT, media, electronic music and art that even his hobbies are all here: he rarely leaves his home without his camera, smartphone and a book or news-paper.
	Alexey Stepin: Hardware Editor - Entertainment Hardware. Alexey - one of the first and the greatest hardware geeks in Estonia - has been known as a die-hard hardware specialist since 1992, who managed to tweak nearly every single piece of hardware available in his hands just in order to get some more speed out of microprocessors or graphics chips. After spending some years with successful retailers in the Baltic States, now he is with X-bit labs to provide you hardware reviews worth attention of both: ordinary end-users as well as PC enthusiasts!
	Yaroslav Lyssenko: News Editor, Hardware Editor - Entertainment Hardware. Being a news and hardware editor, Yaroslav is responsible for hardware testing and digging out exciting stuff from around the Web. Having spent nearly four years with X-bit labs’ entertainment hardware testlab, he is now among the world’s most experienced media hardware testers. Besides working with X-bit labs, Yaroslav studies finances and economy, and plays percussion and drums in the jazz department of Georg Ots Tallinn Music College. He is also fond of martial arts and street racing. What an explosive combination of hobbies! :)
	Nikita Nikolaichev: Hardware Editor - Storage Products and Peripherals. He deserves being called the best storage specialist in Russia. Very experienced, which you can see yourself if you take a look at any review in our Storage section. He is a degreed engineer. He graduated from Moscow State Aviation Institute (University of Aerospace Technology), Robotics and Intelligent Systems department. They were developing specific parts for military defense systems. But then Nikita aka niknik decided to get a more peaceful job and sat down to computer hardware testing. This is how we got him :) Besides hardware, Nikita is a dedicated traveler. He is a big fan of boating down the rivers of Siberia and northern Russia. Risky but very thrilling hobby :)
	Alexander Britvin: Hardware Editor - Mobile Solutions. After finishing physical-mathematical school of the Moscow State Aviation Institute (University of Aerospace Technology), Alexander started studying radio technology at the Bauman’s Moscow State Technical University. He continued his education at the Moscow State Technical University of Communications and Informatics and today he is full-time member of the X-bit Labs editorial team. He is in charge of mobile platform reviews and gets his hands on dozens of notebooks on a regular basis. Like almost everyone on our team, he's got to have some crazy hobby. And he does: he is fond of sky-diving!

If you want to link to us, you should use the full web-site name and URL http://www.xbitlabs.com. You may also use our button, banner or logo:

Note for reporters, editors and writers: X-bit labs is spelled in two words, with the first capital letter followed by a dash.

If you want to ask us some questions, to discuss possible cooperation or to share interesting news, if you wish to send us some samples for testing or have found a mistake on our site, don't hesitate to contact us. All your comments and suggestions are most welcome!