As someone who's had a subscription for over a decade now, and been reading the magazine for a good 10 years plus before that, I've seen a lot of changes over the years in the magazine. In fact, in the hi-fi press full stop.
Of the titles I've read (most over the years), the only ones I've stuck with are this one, more recently Hi Fi World which has a nice old school feel to it (unashamedly I might add, and I think publisher Noel Keywood and editor David Price would agree with that to some extent!) and on the odd occasion, high end hifi+.
WHFS&V these days applies its brush over a broad canvas; tellies, hifi, phones, all in one systems, cabling, hard disk, and so on. Not all of it appeals to me, TVs, projectors, MP3, etc., are all entertainment right enough, but they don't do much beyond the functional as opposed to the desirable for me. I've openly disagreed with the quantity of TV reviews and that at times I can read the magazine in 10 minutes.
Equally, since 1997, I've bought - on the strength of WHF reviews - my current loudspeakers (Mission 733i floorstanders - "superb with all kinds of music"), my former CD player (Kenwood DP7090 - no single quote sticks out with this one, but it struck me that it was almost on a par with the Cyrus 6SE of the day, the Marantz CD-63MkII KI Signature and they were bang on), my current speaker cable (Audioquest type IV - a four star review), my former cable - Van den Hul's The Name, my current amp, my old tape deck (Aiwa ADF850 from 1993), my former amps (Arcam Alpha 5 and NAD 3020A), my former speakers (Mission 751s) and last but not least, my current interconnect between my CD player and my amp (Nordost Blue Heaven).
Apart from listing most of the gear I've bought in recent years, that shouts out to me how much I've valued the magazine's reviews over the last 20-odd years. I can't moan much about the last few issues as there's been a big turn towards two channel gear again and this month carries a review of the latest Chord DAC (the QBD76, not the Chordette, although it features too elsewhere in the current issue) in the Tempations section which HFW covered a while back and both mags give it a great review.
I think the investment the title has put in to the test facilities is pretty impressive, I think the fact you can come on here and speak, not just to some web content floozy, but to the actual editorial team is mind bogglingly good - what more could you reasonably ask for?
Example: I stuck up a post on the HiFi Choice website forum a year or so back in response to an article from a very well known hifi journo who's been on the scene for years and which was dipped in the inkwell of bad science. Not a squeak. I like to think he'd re-read his piece and booked a long holiday...
Anyway, my point is, here we have a case where someone has posted critique of review standards (or policy) and has not only had his questions answered by the Editor In Chief (ma'am!), the tech ed and the online site editor, but had several responses.
I think you must give credit where it's due (I'm not suggesting the OP has done differently here); the magazine is still impartial IMO and required reading for anyone looking to buy or upgrade. I might not agree with all of what I read in WHFS&V, but it appeals to a wide body of people who get a lot from it and it's not difficult to see why.
(By the way, why didn't you review the Marantz SA7001 KI Signature player - just about everything else in their 2-channel product range was covered from the budget end to the top end of the scale; did they forget to send one out?! Hopefully, the new SA8003 will make an appearance this time round...!)