Monday, September 29, 2008

        
                              Screenshot of the Exabytes latest website design.

A couple of weeks back I seen something that have attracted my attention. Exabytes is finally going to revamp their website. Now I have known Exabytes since my early years working in Aseansources.com and I do believe that this is their 3rd or probably 4th website’s facelift and the best part is this time they are giving away a free Mac Air to any lucky reviewer.

Browsers Compatibility
Anyway, let’s get down to business and review the new Exabytes website design and interface. Overall I view the new website with five different individual browsers including Google Chrome ( you just can’t exclude Google these days). Those other four browsers are Internet Explorer 7, Mozilla Firefox version 2, Safari version 3 and as well as Maxthon version 2 and the good news were that it looks good on all browsers. No unaligned table or oversize text was present on any browser. However, there is a slight glitch to it, I’m not sure it is because of the Beta testing stage but I was having difficulties trying to key-in the domain name on the “Find your domain name” text box while running on IE 7 and Maxthon browsers and added on to it, there are slight sizing inconsistency on the text box with the drop down menu box as displayed below. Once again these problems only occur if you are viewing it through IE 7 and Maxthon browser. I guess its back to the CSS twitching for the Exabytes team members.

    
                       Screenshot of the Exabytes latest website design.

Colour Scheme
Yay~! Exabytes has finally gotten rid of the bright orange colour which you can see on the current website which I think it contradict with the bright ocean blue. Yeah, I know the orange and blue are part of the Exabytes branding and logo colour but if we manipulate the colour properly, we can actually achieve a “Zen” colour combinations. Branding efficiency VS colour deficiency, what would be your pick? But remember, colours and designs are based on individual perception and there is no right or wrong to it.

However I do like the new colour theme as the new primary sky blue goes well with the white and background together with the metallic grey strips as the side dish. The new design has a more free and open space with eliminates the box or table feeling in the design and one of the great improvement compared to the current website is the background. All hail to the white back ground~!! The current fine lines background can give anybody a seizure if we look at it for a continuous 10 minutes.

Design Elements
Overall the design concept and elements didn’t change much from the current website. Rather then a total website revamp, I would classify this project more towards a facelift to the current website. Layman term, its more like an upgrade from a standard Proton Satria to a Proton Satria GTi with its cool body kits and improve engine performance. The index page is still one big major billboard of banners with product summaries and Search Engine Optimization (SEO) keywords. 

I was rather disappointed in this as I was hoping to see something very new on Exabytes but basically after comparing the new with the current, there’s isn’t much new on the contents. 

However there is one feature which I think it’s rather interesting to have it there this is the “Express” drop down menu and user friendly as well. I believe that it will serve quite a good purpose there in fact I too was attracted to it for like 5 minutes trying to see what are the results are for every options that I have selected.  Besides, I was blown away with the red flames or a gradient which is hosting the drop down box. It gives the impression of rebel without a cause it’s hot.

Banners, Banners and more Banners
Having four banners in a row can be cool. Each banner can contribute a ray of lights and colours if it is design tastefully. However, do take note that each banner will have to be design as seamless as possible. Do not get me wrong, it’s okay to have various of colours in each individual banner but it standards and feel of each banner have to be consistent. Otherwise the website will look like it is made out of mix and patch of various banners around the world.

       

You may ask how do I keep my banners standard without making look like each banner is done by different individual designer? Well for a starter, keep the font standards type. If the font for the description is Arial, go Arial all the way. 2ndly, make sure all images used in each individual banner is properly crafted. For instance, the forth banner which happens to be the “Our Award” banner looks rather cheesy compared to the banner besides it (Dedicated Server banner). The “Dedicated Server” looks majestic along with the “Ebiz Gold” and “Unlimited Domain” banners and maybe due to the cut-N-paste award trophies, it somehow derailed the mood of the entire banners. Each banners symbolize the website image and branding and there fore designers must take notice to make sure it fits in with the packs.

Discover Us Pages
Finally I’m now reviewing the sub pages and to be specific, the About Us page. I love the 3D rendering image of Exabytes new office. It really boost up the corporate feel of the website as well as the confidence level of us as a consumer towards Exabytes as a vendor. A second element which I like about this page is the right side sub menu boxes. It can be minimized~!! I seen hundreds of boxes like these and I don’t mind seeing a hundred more of these. A nice way to integrate AJAX and JavaScript along with web pages.

The next thing I found out was that there’s no shortcut links to the other pages of “Discover Us” on the content section of the website. Well if you do want to navigate to the other pages, you would have to use the drop-down menu. For my personal preference, I do like it better when all the sub pages or links are place where I can see or easy to navigate around. An AJAX tab feature will be great to have it in this page so that the sub pages can be display and loaded without any problem.

The next factor which most websites encounter is the over-scrolling web pages. I notice on some pages of the such as the “Why Exabytes?” page has immense amount of scrolling to get the bottom of the pages and somewhere at the middle of the pages, I wasn’t too keen to scroll down anymore. Maybe for the first few pages, I could scroll all the way down but after a while, things started to get bored and thus defects the usability of the website. Luckily the new Exabytes website do come equip with a “back to top” link which does help a lot to get back to the main navigation or the header of the website.

Product Page
Most of the product page isn’t ready or complete yet but I was able to take a glimpse of the Xtudent Web hosting plan.I do think the new product page is far more attractive then the current web design. The spacing and colours are wonderful. Yet there are a few areas which somehow made my mind goes puzzle and it once again, it’s the banner. Don’t get me wrong, the banner is cool however it’s taking too much space in terms of height. 

      
      I couldnt see more below that limits. Thank God man invented mouse with scrollers.

When I view this particular page via my laptop, all I could see at the very first glace as the banner and hence, I had to scroll all away down to get to the require content. For the first timer coming to this page, it would really be great but if I were a regular visitors and I have been coming over to this page to check on some information, it would rather be a slight delay or distraction for me to get to my objective. By the way, love the footer. Finally I get to see some of the Exabytes’ technical staffs which we only see their name via emails.

Lastly there was repeating information. The right hand side information panels. Once again it is a repetitive information from the “Discover Us” segment. Was rather bored reading or going through it all over again. Maybe Exabytes can come out with more new interesting information to publish over there??

Conclusion
Overall, the new Exabytes website is great. A much more improve version of its predecessor. However to relaunch itself as a new website, it would be better to get new content. Rather then giving the website a cosmetic make over, please do give the website a new personality where it will also give interest to old visitors such as myself to venture more into the new website. Anyway, to find out more about Exabytes new website design, you may visit them at http://www.exabytes.com.my

P/S: Congratulation for successfully scrolling all away to the bottom of the page. Your finger must be aching by now:P
       

Posted by Web Mojo @20:37 | (0) Comments