[randac]

I have a feeling that OP has used this feature and that it's part of their complaint.

I've been using it for many years by now, and have essentially given up on it recently.

I'd often set for past year/month and get articles, reviews, etc that were clearly dated many years previous. I don't know if the site are responsible for the gaming of search, or Google themselves, but the result is the same. I have some doubt that PC hardware review sites are gaming dates on their old articles, although I accept it could be in their interest to do so too.