HWM+HardwareZone.com Tech Awards 2013: Readers' Choice Results

The 4th annual HWM+HardwareZone.com Tech Awards saw a total of 169 brands competing for 41 Readers' Choice awards. After tallying more than 249,000 votes, we finally have the list of winners. Did you vote for your favorite brands? Come on in to find out if they've won!

By Vijay Anand - 27 Feb 2013

Welcome to the 4th annual HWM+HardwareZone.com Tech Awards!

This year, 36 Editor’s Choice and 41 Readers' Choice awards were given out by HWM and HardwareZone.com to recognize the best brands, products, and services in the computer, consumer electronics, digital entertainment, and communications industries. This grand total of 77 awards is six more than the 71 awards last year.

For the Editor’s Choice awards, 159 products that were introduced between December 2011 and November 2012, and which fitted the stringent criteria set for the 36 categories were meticulously tested and benchmarked in the HWZ Labs by a 12-writer-strong editorial team throughout the course of last year. The nominees were selected in accordance to the benefits, value and significant technological advancements they've brought to consumers. To better reflect the ever-changing market trends, the Editor’s Choice categories have continued to evolve. For example, last year, we added new categories such as Best Tablet and Best Headphones; this year, we've Best Windows 8 Ultrabook and Best 4K TV categories just to name a few.

For the Readers' Choice awards, voting was opened to all the readers of HWM and HardwareZone.com. A total of 169 brands competed for the 41 Readers' Choice awards available, up from last year's 138 nominees and 37 awards. New categories this year include Best Fiber Broadband and Best In-Ear Headphones. A record-breaking 249,000 votes were cast during a 4-week voting window. This is 60% more than the 155,000 votes we've gotten for Tech Awards 2012. We are proud and humbled by the strong support shown to us by the community.

This year's awards ceremony took place on February 27 at the Joyden Hall at Bugis+. To capture all the details from our testing, reader's inputs and event highlights, we've prepped the following HWM and HardwareZone.com Tech Awards 2013 related content:-

Without further ado, we present you a detailed outcome of our Readers' Choice categories in this article.

Readers' Choice Awards - Computing (Part 1)

Back in November 2012, we asked you - our intelligent and tech-savvy readers and members of the online community - for your favorite brands and services in 41 categories spanning the tech industry trinity of computing, communications, and consumer electronics. Your response was nothing short of overwhelming, as we received more than 249,000 votes. Here's a big thank you to you all. So, here then are the results of this detailed survey; check out to see if your favorite brands won. For the more curious readers, you can also check out previous year's results.

Best Desktop CPU Brand - Intel

After a record-breaking 2011, chipzilla saw slight drops in both revenue and net income in 2012. Certainly, the decline of PC sales was one contributing factor. That said, when it comes to desktop CPU, Intel is still the name to beat. For one, the vast majority of desktop PC systems in the market today use Intel's 22nm-based 'Ivy Bridge' processors. And don't bet on Intel slowing down either: the successor to Ivy Bridge, codenamed 'Haswell', is expected to arrive in the middle of this year. 90% of the votes? That sounds about right.

Best Gaming Graphics Processor Brand - NVIDIA

Yes, NVIDIA is making a big push into mobile with its Tegra 4 and Tegra 4i mobile processors, but that doesn't mean it's neglecting its desktop GPU portfolio. Last year, we witnessed the arrival of its 28nm Kepler architecture, and were impressed with the single GK104 GPU-powered GeForce GTX 680 and dual GK104 GPU-powered GeForce GTX 690. And more recently, its GeForce GTX Titan is the fastest single-GPU graphics card we've tested to date. With 76% of the votes, NVIDIA is once again the runaway winner for the Best Gaming Graphics Processor Brand award.

Best Graphics Card Brand - ASUS

This is the fourth straight year ASUS has won the Readers' Choice award for Best Graphics Card Brand. Its percentage of votes has even increased from 37% to 43%. Surely, ASUS' wide range of offerings is a huge contributing factor; whether you prefer AMD or NVIDIA GPUs, you're bound to find a suitable graphics card from ASUS' lineup. And if you're a hardcore gamer, you owe yourself a look at its Republic of Gamers (ROG) series of graphics cards, which is now led by the super-fast ROG ARES II Radeon HD 7990.

Best Motherboard Brand - ASUS

For many years now, ASUS' motherboards are known for its strong balance of features, performance, and reliability. This has resulted in a strong brand following that's hard to erode, despite the competitive landscape. Also for the fourth year running, ASUS has strolled home with the Readers' Choice award for Best Motherboard Brand, garnering a whopping 56% of the votes along the way.

Best PC Memory Brand - Kingston

Kingston has completed a three-peat by taking home the Readers' Choice award for Best PC Memory Brand for the third year running. And again, it has done so with a very huge margin. Just recently, the company celebrated the 10th anniversary of HyperX, its line of products for gamers and PC enthusiasts. And to mark the occasion, it has announced a 10th Anniversary Edition of its HyperX memory, and is backing it up with lifetime warranty. If your needs aren't as extreme, Kingston's competitively priced ValueRAM memory offerings are worth a look.

Best Desktop PC Brand - HP

Maybe it's the cannibalization from the iPad, or maybe it's the shortage of the new super-slim iMac, but the fact remains that the Mac's long-standing run of outpacing the PC industry has come to an end. A similar story seems to be unfolding here too: for the Readers' Choice award for Best Desktop PC Brand, HP, the world's largest PC vendor in 2012, has regained the trophy that it has lost to Apple last year. However, the margin isn't very wide, just 2% of the votes separate them. Both ASUS and Dell are tied for third place.

Best Inkjet Printer Brand - Canon

While there's a slight drop in the share of votes, Canon remains our readers' favorite inkjet printer brand. Just early this month, the company added three new wireless Pixma printers (MG6370, MG5470, iP7270) to its lineup, and they came fairly soon after the company's last Pixma lineup refresh in October, which saw the introduction of the Pixma Pro-10 and Pro-100 A3+ pro-level photo printers. And for those paying attention, Canon has unveiled a few new Pixma office AIOs at CES 2013; hopefully, these will arrive on our shores soon.

Best Laser Printer Brand - Canon

HP was the winner for the Best Laser Printer Brand for the past two years; and on both occasions, it faced strong competition from Canon. This year, with 26% of the votes, Canon has finally edged HP for the award. The constant stream of new Imageclass products (three of them just a month ago; five in October last year - just to name a few) looks to be paying dividends.

Best LED Printer Brand - Fuji Xerox

Fuji Xerox has long been a strong proponent of LED printing, and for many years now, the company has been aggressively bringing its award-winning S-LED print head technology into products targeted at home/SOHO and SMB users. Case in point: In August last year, the company introduced several S-LED-based monochrome single function and multifunction printers. And more recently, the company has developed a suite of mobile solutions to help companies get ready for the cloud.

Best Wireless Networking Brand - Linksys

For those unaware, enterprise network gear giant Cisco is selling its Linksys division to Belkin (the deal is expected to close in March this year), a consumer electronics manufacturer who, other than making routers, also makes iOS, notebook, and data center accessories. While Linksys has managed to hold on to the trophy for the third year running, we can't help but notice that its share of votes has dipped to 30%, compared to 32% last year, and 40% in 2011. Second placed D-Link also sees a drop in its share of votes, and it looks like ASUS is the one that has profited, as the latter's share shot up from 7% to 17%. If you're hoping to get an 802.11ac router this coming IT Show, we've reviewed the offerings from all the three top brands (Linksys, D-Link, ASUS).

Best Antivirus/Internet Security Software Brand - Symantec

If you're running Windows 8, you can use the bundled Windows Defender to protect your PC from spyware and viruses. Alternatively, if you want more features, you can use third-party tools like Norton 360, AVG Internet Security, and Trend Micro Titanium Premium Security. With this latest win in the Best Antivirus/Internet Security Software Brand category, Symantec (which markets its consumer security software products under the Norton name) has joined an illustrious list of brands to have won their respective award for three consecutive years.

Best SSD Brand - SanDisk

There are many factors going for solid-state drives moving forward: Apple's increasing use of SSDs in the Mac; Intel's push to unify specs for SSDs for Ultrabooks; and more importantly, SSD manufacturers' aggressive moves to bring down the prices of their offerings. Yes, the conventional spinning hard disk drives still hold the price advantage if you wish to store tons of data cheaply, but the point is, you no longer need to break the bank to get a decent SSD to enjoy fast bootup and speedy app launches. For this year, the Readers' Choice award for Best SSD Brand goes to SanDisk. In fact, the American data storage solutions company narrowly beats Intel to the trophy. By the way, if you're looking to get a top-end SSD, remember to check out our recent high-end SSD shootout.

Best External HDD Brand - Western Digital

Western Digital and Seagate are the two largest hard disk drive makers in the world, so it's no surprise that they are vying for the Best External HDD Brand award. For the third year running, the award goes to Western Digital. And again unsurprisingly, the combination of Western Digital and Seagate accounted for a giant chunk of the votes - 63% to be exact. For creative professionals, check out the Thunderbolt-equipped My Book Thunderbolt Duo that offers up to 8TB of storage. The My Book Studio that offers up to 4TB is also recently updated with SuperSpeed USB 3.0 connectivity.

Best Removable Flash Storage Brand - SanDisk

Flash memory storage leader SanDisk has comfortably walked home again with the Best Removable Flash Storage Brand award. Its share of votes is consistent with last year's: 58% vs. 57%. While the company's latest moves revolved more around EFDs (embedded flash drives) and SSDs, based on its track record, it's safe to expect news of faster memory cards and new USB flash drives before the year is up.

Best NAS Brand - Seagate

The network-attached storage (NAS) category has always been hotly contested, and it's no different this year. After winning the award for the past two years, D-Link is looking for a three-peat this year. Alas, this is not to be, as its share of votes dropped from 25% to 18%. The new winner is Seagate, which amassed 19% of the votes. Buffalo and Western Digital aren't that far behind with 17% and 16% respectively. Can D-Link regain the title next year? Stay tuned to 2014 for the answer!

Best LCD Monitor Brand - Samsung

The LCD monitor category is another category that involves a lot of players. Despite the number, the winner has managed to garner almost half of the votes. Yes, Samsung is once again the winner of this category. But to be frank, we aren't that surprised. Besides making monitors with increasingly thin designs, Samsung's monitor lineup is also one of the most comprehensive in the industry - from energy efficient monitors and 3D monitors, to professionally-calibrated monitors and monitors with a wireless hub.

Best PC Components Retailer (Singapore) - Fuwell

Sim Lim Square has always been the go-to place for DIY enthusiasts building their own systems, as this is the mall that gathers numerous PC components retailers under the same roof. For the fourth straight year, our readers had voted Fuwell as their favorite PC components retailer. PC Themes comes in second (14%), and Best Buy (not to be confused with the one in the U.S.) is third (13%). However, Fuwell's share of the pie has reduced from 28% from the previous year to just 20% this year.

Best Ultra Portable Notebook Brand - Apple

You couldn't be more wrong if you think that the award for the Best Ultra Portable Notebook Brand will go to one that sells Ultrabooks. Instead, the winner is Apple, maker of the MacBook Air (which is unofficially the 'first Ultrabook') and MacBook Pro notebooks. In fact, the SuperDrive-less 13-inch MacBook Pro with 'Retina' display seems to strike the perfect balance between performance and portability, and we've no doubt that many have opted for it over a slimmer and less expensive Ultrabook. In any case, if you're going to pick up an Apple portable soon, know that the company has just updated the processors and lowered the prices in some of the models.

Best Business Notebook Brand - Lenovo

In the business notebook category, the award remains in the hands of last year's winner, Lenovo, maker of fine products such as the IdeaPad Yoga 13 and the soon-to-arrive ThinkPad Helix. Apple remains at second place with 18% of the votes. As we've posited last year, the strong showing of Apple's notebooks in the business context can be partly attributed to the 'halo' effect created by other Apple products such as the iPhone and iPad (both of which are increasingly being used by companies). HP, currently the world's largest PC vendor, comes in third with 16% of the votes.

Best Gaming Notebook Brand - Dell/Alienware

Alienware is a wholly owned subsidiary of Dell, Inc., and it specializes in putting together high-performance desktops (e.g. Alienware X51, Aurora) and notebooks (e.g.Alienware M14x, M17x, M18x) for professional and gaming purposes using third-party components and custom enclosures. Despite not having much updates (the current M14x, M17x, and M18x are last revised in mid 2012 with Intel 'Ivy Bridge' processors), our readers still view Alienware as their favorite gaming notebook brand. (Or maybe many are using souped-up Dell XPS notebooks for gaming.) ASUS is second (23%) and Razer third (13%). Singapore-based Aftershock garnered 4%.

Best Tablet Brand - Apple

It's incredible how time flies. Including the iPad Mini, we've now seen five generations of the iPad. With more than 100 million units sold in less than three years, it's no hyperbole to say that the iPad is the world's favorite tablet. But despite the growth, Apple is losing market share to the avalanche of Android tablets, most notably, those from Samsung. This perhaps explains Apple's drop in share of votes to 53% this year (last year, it was 64%; two years ago, it was 75%). Mind you, Apple's 53% is still double of Samsung's 25% - the question is, how much further would it drop? Well, we guess Apple won't be pushing the panic button as long as it's still raking in the bulk of the industry's profits.

Best Point & Shoot Digital Camera Brand - Canon

With compact digital cameras sales on the downward trend (no thanks to smartphones), nearly all major camera makers are focusing their efforts on DSLR cameras, mirrorless cameras, and newfangled cameras to make up for the shortfall. Still, when it comes to compact digicams, Canon (at times, Sony) remains the one to beat. For the fourth year running, Canon is the winner of our Readers' Choice award for Best Point & Shoot Digital Camera Brand. With a lion's share of the votes in each of these four years, its stranglehold on this award would perhaps only be broken the day the compact digital camera segment becomes irrelevant (that is to say: not any time soon).

Best Mirrorless Camera Brand - Olympus

The 'mirrorless' interchangeable lens digital camera category is a new category that we set up two years ago to reflect a new type of camera system that was taking the market by storm. The inaugural award went to Sony; and last year's recipient was Nikon. This year, we've yet another new winner, and it's Olympus. We can only posit that the market takes very well to the PENE-PL5 and the OM-D E-M5. With no apparent strong brand loyalty thus far, would we see yet another new winner come 2014?

Best DSLR Camera Brand - Canon

In 2012, Canon released the EOS 6D, EOS 650D, EOS 5D Mark III, and EOS-1D X DSLRs. And for filmmakers, the 4K-capable EOS-1D C is finally available since December. With so many choices, it's no wonder Canon is able to remain the worldwide DSLR market share leader. And for the third straight year, it has been voted the best DSLR Camera Brand by our readers. Nikon remains at second place, but it too has a good 2012, as we saw the D5200, D600, D800, D800E, and D4. And just two months into 2013, we've already seen the D7100. Here's wishing for more affordable full-frame DSLRs in 2013.

Best HD Camcorder Brand - Canon

In the last few years, Canon has adopted a slightly different approach for its Legria series of camcorders. Instead of cramming a high-megapixel sensor, it has chosen to put a mere 2MP sensor in many of its mid-range and high-end offerings. Thanks to the bigger per pixel size, this has resulted in some of the best low light performances we've seen in a long while for consumer-level camcorders. Also, to keep up with the trend, a handful of Legria camcorders now also come with Wi-Fi support. Our readers clearly like the direction Legria is going, for Canon has for the third year running pipped the likes of Sony, Panasonic, and JVC to take home the Readers' Choice award for Best HDCamcorder Brand.

Best Consumer Electronics Megastore (Singapore) - Challenger

With 33% of the votes, IT and CE chain store Challenger is our new winner in the Best CE Megastore category. The new outlets, new collaborations, and the frequent member promotions certainly played their part. Surprisingly, last year's winner, Courts, has fallen to fourth place (13%), behind Harvey Norman (16%) and Best Denki (14%).

Best Mainstream LED TV Brand - Samsung

There's a similarity between Samsung's global TV market share position and its vote shares in our various TV-related Readers' Choice polls, and that is it dominates the other players. For the mainstream LED TV category, it has gobbled up 61% of the votes, leaving the remaining 39% to be split among at least eight other TV makers.

Best Premium Smart LED TV Brand - Samsung

For the Readers' Choice award for Best Premium Smart LED TV Brand, the winner is once again Samsung, with 65% of the votes. With its position in the LCDTV market now cemented, it's no wonder the Korean CE giant is currently investing heavily in Ultra HD 4K and OLED TVs.

Best Plasma TV Brand - Samsung

Trust us, reports of the death of the plasma TV are greatly exaggerated. Just ask Panasonic, which recently announced 16 plasma TV models at CES 2013. However, if Panasonic wishes to regain the trophy it has lost to Samsung last year, it perhaps has to wait for another year. In our latest polls, Samsung has once again grabbed 50% of the votes to stay ahead of Panasonic, which has 33%. LG remains in third with 16%.

Best Pay TV Service (Singapore) - StarHub TV

For the fourth year running, StarHub TV is our readers' favorite local pay TV service, receiving a staggering 77% of the votes. Just recently, StarHub has announced a new pay-as-you-watch cable TVplan called Anytime TV. This new plan allow you to access StarHub TV’s on-demand library of more than 6,500 TV shows and movies, as well as 12 complimentary cable TV channels.

Best Headphones Brand - Sennheiser

The headphones category is perhaps the most contested Readers' Choice category, thanks to the sheer number of players involved (we counted at least 18). With 19% of the votes, German audio company Sennheiser has retained the award it picked up last year. Bose (16%) and Beats (13%) are placed second and third respectively.

Best In-Ear Earphones Brand - Sennheiser

The in-ears category also shares a similar story. With 14% of the votes, Sennheiser just barely pipped Bose (13%) to the award. Lurking close behind is Klipsch, which has 12%.

Best Wireless Speakers Brand - Bose

Audiophiles may lament the quality of wireless speakers, but that doesn't stop the market from growing. The reason is simple enough: running wires, be it on a table top or across the room, is a universal dislike. And with the increasing number of wireless speakers built to rival the audio quality of their wired counterparts, this space is one to watch. Our first winner of this new category is Bose, which receives 29% of the votes.

Best Business Projector Brand - NEC

Our voters preferred quite a variety of brands when it comes to business projectors as the votes were fairly well spread. With 16% of the votes, NEC is once again the winner of this category. Canon comes in second with 14%, and both Epson and InFocus are tied for third with 13% each.

Best Home Theater Projector Brand - Sony

For home theater projectors, our readers have once again voted for Sony (33%). Panasonic (17%) remains in second spot. For those interested, here are four high performance home theater projectors that made it to our list of top 100 products of 2012.

Best Home Theater System Brand - Bose

For the third year running, Bose is our readers' favorite home theater system brand. While Pioneer comes in second, its number of votes is only a third of Bose's. In fact, the percentage breakdown of votes this year isn't all too different from last year's.

Best Mainstream Smartphone Brand - Samsung

According to Gartner, Samsung sold close to 385 million mobile phones worldwide in 2012, and about 206 million of them were smartphones. Indeed, with the Korean company commanding about 43% of the Android market, the Galaxy brand is becoming synonymous with Android. So it came as no surprise that when we asked our readers to vote for their favorite mainstream smartphone brand, a lot of them would vote for Samsung. With 68% of the votes, it's an easy win for Samsung. Much to our surprise though, Apple only manages about 1%. Perhaps all the iPhone users have voted for the Cupertino-based company in the premium smartphone brand category?

Best Premium Smartphone Brand - Samsung

The competition between Apple and Samsung is more evident when we come to the premium smartphone brand category. At the end of the day, Samsung emerges victorious with the slightest of margins, 44% versus Apple's 43%. Hopefully, with new devices from the likes of ASUS, BlackBerry, HTC, Huawei, LG, Nokia, and Sony, it won't be a two-horse race again next year. In the meanwhile, it's now confirmed that the Galaxy S IV will be unveiled in March.

Best Mobile Operator (Singapore) - SingTel

SingTel remains the market leader for mobile services in Singapore, and the votes reflected this with 44% choosing the red of SingTel over the other two telcos. However, it's worth pointing out that its 44% share is the lowest SingTel has achieved in the past four years. The telco that has benefited from it is M1, which sees its share of votes jumped to 32% (compared to 22% in 2012).

Best Fiber Broadband Service Provider (Singapore) - SingTel

With 32% of the votes, our readers have chosen SingTel Fiber Broadband as their favorite fiber broadband service. Together with StarHub (an RSP) and M1 (a fellow OpCo), they make up of about 80% of the votes. The largest share of votes beyond the top three ISPs goes to MyRepublic (15%), which just opened its first physical store earlier this month.

Best Mobile Broadband Service Provider (Singapore) - SingTel

For broadband on the go, the winner is again SingTel, which garnered 41% of the votes. The telco has both SIM-only plans and plans with USB modems, so you can enjoy Internet access on tablets as well as laptops. Of course, SingTel's Broadband on Mobile plans support 4G connectivity; for example, the Prestige 75 plan offers a maximum theoretical download speed of 75Mbps (though typical download speeds range anywhere between 3.4Mbps and 12Mbps). SingTel also offers Broadband on Mobile plans for mobile phones and BlackBerry devices.

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