Retrevo

Retrevo.com is an easy to use online database of information about consumer electronic products. The site features price searches, reviews and online manuals for thousands of electronic devices. Users can search for the best price on a product, read reviews of the product from around the web, or obtain manual pages and other technical data about the product. The site also features a convenient side-by-side product comparison feature, which allows you to compare product specifications in an easy to read list form. Registered users have access to My Retrevo, which allows them to save products to a Wish List, save Manuals for products that they own, and save Comparisons. The site has a wealth of information, and has a very well designed user interface for accessing that information. Users can easily search for products by name or browse by category. Major categories include Cameras and Picture Frames, Home Entertainment, Computers and Home Networking, Mobile, and Auto and Navigation. There are many sub-categories within these major categories. When using the Review feature, a summary of each review is given, with a link which opens the actual review site in a new browser tab. Price comparisons are handled similarly, with a summary and a link which will take you directly to the product website. The manual feature does not require you to visit the product’s company website to read or download a manual. Retrevo was launched in July 2006 by Vipin Jain, Jiang Wu, and Manish Rathi. Vipin Jain currently serves as President and CEO. Jiang Wu serves as Chief Technology Officer, and Manish Rathi serves as Vice President of User Acquisition. Major investors in the site include Alloy Ventures and Norwest Venture Partners. Retrevo’s major competitors include Wize and Viewscore. Wize is similar to Retrevo, but is not limited to just electronics. Wize includes categories for Electronics, Home and Garden, and Health and Beauty. Viewscore features only electronics and has a unique ranking algorithm that is based on the results from thousands of reviews from around the web. Neither of the competing sites offers access to product manuals. The site has a relatively clean look and feel. Ads are displayed, but they are relatively unobtrusive. The home page is very simple, with a convenient search bar as the main feature. Navigation is relatively straightforward, although it is sometimes difficult to find the link to add a review, manual or comparison to the user’s My Retrevo lists. Response times are excellent, with pages loading very quickly. Response time when accessing manuals is also excellent – the site has a browser based reader that does not require downloading an entire manual to view a page in the manual. The registration process is very simple, asking only for email address and password. Validation of the email address is required. Membership is free, and there is no premium membership offered or available. Retrevo combines a wealth of information into an easy-to-use interface. The price comparison provides plenty of different locations for purchasing a product, and the review section for a product has links to most all of the reviews on the web for a given product. The side-by-side comparison feature is easy to use and provides comprehensive specifications for each device. The manual section is excellent – it is much more convenient than visiting the product’s support website and downloading the manual yourself.