The HP and Voodoo co-branded Envy notebook in 2008.
(Credit: Hewlett-Packard)Hewlett-Packard is sending mixed signals on what exactly it plans to do with the Voodoo PC brand it acquired three years ago.
After purchasing the gaming and PC enthusiast brand in 2006, HP in 2008 began using the Voodoo name beyond powerful gaming PCs. It painted the name Voodoo and VoodooDNA on high-end HP notebooks and desktops, and talked up their premium engineering and design. They used the analogy that if the HP brand were a Smart Car and Compaq were a Chrysler, Voodoo would be their Maybach.
But a year later, HP's consumer PC lineup contains little trace of the Voodoo branding. HP had introduced the HP Blackbird with VoodooDNA and more recently HP Firebird with Voodoo DNA. Both are nowhere to be found on HP.com. In a more recent example, a new notebook, called the HP Envy was released last week. A year ago it was called the HP Voodoo Envy 133. Though the updated model takes some Voodoo ideas like the thin profile, quick booting, the power adapter, and packaging, you'd have to be a Voodoo fanboy to know Voodoo had any sort of influence at all on it.
So what gives? It seems the Voodoo team didn't have much to do with the Envy, despite its sharing the same name with older products.
"The reason there's no 'Voodoo DNA' on the (most recent) product has to do with the overall design language, the target market, and the fact that we weren't directly involved in the design," Rahul Sood, the founder of VoodooPC and the chief technology officer of gaming PCs for HP, wrote on his personal blog.
In the same post, Sood that Voodoo is "transitioning from 'desktop and notebook' manufacturing to something beyond." While it's unclear what "something beyond" means, he hints that besides HP taking some design and engineering cues from Voodoo that the company he founded didn't quite fit into HP the way Sood had initially expected.
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We admit we had doubts about HP/Voodoo's new Firebird gaming PC when we got an early look last December. We found the case attractive, and we liked the idea of an mainstream-oriented gaming PC with the polish of a boutique system. Our hesitation came from the fact that for its $2,000 or so price tag, the system lacks a robust upgrade path due to its fixed laptop-style graphics cards and custom motherboard. We also wondered whether gamers would be interested in efficiency and style at the expense of raw horsepower.
HP's Firebird 803 gaming PC
(Credit: Sarah Tew/CNET Networks)After getting our hands on a review unit last week, our hesitation turned to admiration because the Firebird does so many things right. It really is a pretty-looking desktop, first of all. Its power efficiency embarrasses traditional gaming PCs in its price range by consuming significantly less juice (155 watts compared to 255 watts on a Dell under load, for example). The value is also there because its performance and features are exactly where they should be for the price. The Firebird can't dial up Far Cry 2 all the way, but it will certainly play it at most resolutions, and with decent image quality. The Blu-ray drive, the HDMI output, and the 802.11n WiFi even accommodate living room usage, which you might legitimately consider given the Firebird's attractive design.
We found it easiest to think of the Firebird like a laptop or an all-in-one PC. No, you don't get the full range of tear-it-down, built-it-up-again possibilities inherent to most desktops. If that's what you demand in a gaming PC, the Firebird isn't for you. But you also get something in exchange for the upgrade limitations, in this case a full-featured PC that's pleasing to the eye, and forgiving to your power bill. Given the Firebird's more-or-less closed system, we have to wonder why HP and Voodoo didn't simply make this an all-in-one. Perhaps that's next on the product development list.
Read our review of the HP Firebird with VoodooDNA 803.
News of HP's new Firebird gaming PC leaked a few weeks ago, but with the official announcement this morning, we're free from our embargo and can finally comment on the product. As has been rumored, HP's new system is officially named the HP Firebird with VoodooDNA. This means it was developed in conjunction with Rahul Sood, founder of boutique PC vendor Voodoo PC, and chief technology office ...
Read the full post at CNET's CES 2009 blog.
Amid reports of layoffs at Hewlett-Packard's Voodoo PC subsidiary, the company has decided to be slightly more clear about what exactly is going on--emphasis on "slightly."
Phil McKinney, an HP vice president and CTO of the Personal Systems Group, under which the Voodoo brand falls, weighed in on the official Voodoo blog Wednesday. The Voodoo brand is currently being integrated with the company's larger consumer PC line, which means that things at the little niche PC outfit from Calgary, Alberta, are also changing.
Voodoo co-founder Rahul Sood with Voodoo Envy notebook and minor injury.
(Credit: Hewlett-Packard)"Voodoo's limited size and focus on North America had limited its scale. We can now extend Voodoo's reach and influence globally through HP's extensive go-to-market resources," he writes.
"Are there layoffs? At times, there are downsizing moves in HP's business units just as there are hiring moves. We're always adjusting the work force to meet business needs and market dynamics. Is Voodoo immune from this practice? No, it is not."
Last week, HP announced that it would cut nearly 25,000 jobs over the next three years--and simultaneously replace half of those positions--as it sorts out its acquisition of IT services giant EDS.
McKinney also notes that the Voodoo Envy 133 just started shipping, and the Omen desktop is soon to follow. That was part of the reason, as we noted on Monday, that the idea of Voodoo being "shut down" seemed bizarre.
Though McKinney doesn't shed any light on the mysterious new product Voodoo is developing, which Voodoo co-founder Rahul Sood teased last month, he does explain why Sood won't be blogging for a while (see picture above).
This blog has been updated with comments from HP.
A rumor is circulating that Hewlett-Packard is closing the gaming PC outfit it bought just two years ago.
The report comes from a blog called Techgage, which cites an "insider close to the situation," who reports an e-mail announcing layoffs is circulating at the company, though the report doesn't include a specific number of jobs being cut. It also reports that Voodoo is returning parts to its supplier.
Voodoo Envy 133 notebook
(Credit: Hewlett-Packard)HP spokeswoman Marlene Somsak said it would be "incorrect" to say HP is shutting down Voodoo, but didn't offer a denial that jobs will be or have been cut.
"We continually assess and rebalance the size of our work force relative to the business environment and market conditions," she said. Beyond that, she said HP had no comment.
"Shutting down" Voodoo seems more than a bit odd for several reasons. First, it's a brand that HP has had high hopes for. The company just recently announced its most ambitious Voodoo-branded products--the Envy 133 notebook and the Omen desktop--which are just beginning to ship.
Second, on the blog entry used to announce that the Envy 133 started shipping to customers, Voodoo co-founder and HP gaming exec Rahul Sood said the company had "a good thing" they were working on, which he would announce at a later date. If this rumor was true, no matter how hard Sood tried, it would be tough to spin Voodoo's closing as a happy development.
Here's what could be happening (again, we don't know for sure): HP could be phasing out Voodoo's manufacturing operations in Canada. In July, HP announced it was rolling the Voodoo brand into its Personal Systems Group, which is the business unit in charge of making all consumer PCs. That transition could mean that Voodoo PCs start to come off the same production line as its Pavilion or new HDX laptops. According to HP, though Omen and Blackbird are made in Canada, Envy has been built in Asian factories from the beginning.
We'll update the story if we find out more.
(Credit:
Hewlett-Packard)
It's HP's version of the Lenovo X300 or the MacBook Air: incredibly thin and pretty to look at. It was introduced as part of an elaborate product rollout at a high-profile event in Germany.
The Envy is a good example of the kind of design chops and credibility Voodoo brings to HP. When HP bought Voodoo a few years back, the enthusiast PC maker became HP's gaming PC unit, which made sense, especially after Dell bought Alienware.
But soon after the Envy was announced, HP said it was folding Voodoo into its consumer PC line. It doesn't seem like HP wants to draw a distinction between gaming PCs and regular PCs anymore, and we wondered what the future of the Voodoo brand was at HP.
But it's still hanging around, and Voodoo is also trying to stir up some buzz, if a post by Voodoo co-founder Rahul Sood to the company blog is any indication.
In a blog titled, "Good things happen in threes," Sood talks about the Envy shipping, and a new contributor to the blog, but gets all mysterious about the third "good thing."
"There's also this other thing we're working on right now. Actually, on second thought--forget it. I'll save it for another day. This week's good enough as it is," he writes.
Sooooo, dear readers, what could it be? Chime in with your guesses in the comments.
The world's largest PC maker has decided it doesn't need a separate gaming PC unit anymore. From now on, Voodoo will be just one of Hewlett-Packard's consumer PC brands.
The recently introduced Voodoo Envy gaming laptop.
(Credit: Hewlett-Packard)Voodoo founder Rahul Sood said on his personal blog that this was "always" the intention when HP bought Voodoo PC in 2006, and "the plan is now being accelerated, ultimately making it a reality sooner than any of us ever imagined."
Sood repeats that this is a "good thing" for the Voodoo brand, and he's probably right. HP knows how to move PCs, and has a giant marketing machine that could help push Voodoo into the mainstream, making the new Envy and Omen notebooks and desktops available at retail.
What's not clear is what happens to Sood. He was named CTO of HP's Global Gaming Business Unit, which was responsible for the Voodoo business, when his company was acquired.
The future of the Blackbird gaming brand also seems up in the air. It was introduced last year as a hybrid of HP's consumer PC line with Voodoo-influenced technology inside. It appears unnecessary to have both.
HP couldn't immediately be reached for comment.
Notice any similarities between the Hewlett-Packard Voodoo Envy and its thin rivals, the Apple MacBook Air or ThinkPad X300? Yes, they're all very thin. But look inside and you'll see more common features.
To deliver reasonable processing power at low power the Voodoo Envy opted for the same special low-power processors used in the Air: the Intel SP7700 and SP7500.
You won't find these processors listed on Intel's processor pricing page. They were designed originally for the MacBook Air and use a special 22mm x 22mm package and have a thermal envelope of only 20 watts at 1.8GHz and 1.6GHz. Typically, Intel processors running at those speeds have a TDP (Thermal Design Power) of 35 watts.
Correction: The ThinkPad X300 uses an Intel SL7100 not an SP processor. It comes in the same small package as the SP processors but runs at a lower clock speed--1.2GHz--and uses less power: 12 watts versus the SP's 20 watts.
HP Voodoo Envy
(Credit: Voodoo)Interestingly, these processors are older 65-nanometer "Merom" processors--not the newest 45-nanometer Penryn generation. But there are updates on the way, according to Intel. "You can expect to see later this year a 45nm small form factor Montevina," an Intel representative said.
"Montevina" Centrino 2 processors coming out later this year will include low-power models such as the SL9400 and SU9400, running at 1.86GHz and 1.4GHz with a TDP of 17W and 10W respectively. One processor, the SU3300, will have a TDP of 5.5W.
New versions of the SP "small form factor" processors are also expected later this year. Future versions of the Envy and Air will likely use these Montevina processors.
This isn't where the silicon similarities end. The Envy, like the Air and X300, uses Intel X3100 integrated graphics and offers either a 64GB solid state drive or 80GB hard disk drive (4200RPM), just like the Air.
Finally, though not related to silicon, all three notebooks have a similar form factor: 13.3 inches. All in all, making for strikingly similar designs in many ways.
The new Voodoo Omen
(Credit: HP)Along with the other laptops and desktops HP announced this morning comes the Voodoo Omen. An update of Voodoo's flagship high-end gaming desktop, the new Omen introduces some unique design elements along with the standard performance components. With prices starting at $7,000 and likely approaching over $15,000, the Omen brings HP and Voodoo into the extremely expensive luxury PC market.
At this price range, the specs are almost beside the point. The configuration is not available yet, but a downloadable PDF on the newly designed Voodoo site reveals that the Omen will offer an NForce 790i SLI motherboard, an overclockable, liquid-cooled Intel Core 2 Extreme quad-core processor, solid-state hard drives, and support for both Nvidia's SLI and AMD's CrossFire multigraphics card technologies. All of that is to be expected, and neither the specs nor the sky-high price are different than what you can find from Alienware, Falcon Northwest, and other high-end PC vendors. But while Voodoo is not the only desktop vendor to let you configure a system in the $10,000-plus price range, it may be the only one with a model aimed specifically at that upper tier.
The 7-inch LCD and the removable top panel
(Credit: HP)As you can see in part from the photo, it's the design of the Omen that helps it stand out. The all-aluminum chassis features a 7-inch LCD at the front, which works as a secondary display. You can also have the system custom painted, or you can order separate panels made of leather, wood, or glass to swap into the sides and the top of the system. That feature in particular is unique. We saw a wood-paneled mock-up at a preview about a month ago, and it definitely projected the "luxury" affect that Voodoo is marketing.
What we haven't seen is the inner workings. The pictures and Voodoo's descriptions indicate that the Omen's lofted case echoes the design HP used on the Voodoo-assisted Blackbird 002 desktop, wherein the main body of the chassis is elevated to allow air to enter the case through the bottom. Voodoo says it has rotated the motherboard 90 degrees as well to allow for better vertically oriented air-flow. This also puts the major outputs on the top of the system, although the cables are routed through a hole cut into the top of the rear panel. Voodoo also touts copper cooling pipes built into the case itself.
Voodoo provided no specific details on when the Omen will be available for purchase. Its Web site has a couple of teaser images set to go live over the next few weeks, and a press release says "current Voodoo customer will receive a private invitation to be among the first to order a customized Omen."
The Voodoo Envy 133
(Credit: HP/Voodoo)We've previously taken notice of Voodoo founder (and current chief technology officer of HP's Global Gaming Business) Rahul Sood's playful birthday video, where he cut a cake with a MacBook Air and said, "Well, I wouldn't be needing this notebook for long anyways." Now we know exactly what he was talking about, with the new announcement of the Voodoo Envy 133.
We actually got to take a peek at one of these in person a few weeks ago, and we were impressed with the slim, attractive design. At around 3.4 pounds, it falls somewhere between the traditional MacBook and the lighter MacBook Air (it's nearly as thin, at 0.7 inch)--it might be best compared with Lenovo's 13-inch X300.
Voodoo is not into soft, rounded corners.
(Credit: HP/Voodoo)One particularly smart innovation we hope other laptop makers will adopt is what the company calls "Voodoo Aura PowerConnect." That simply means the Ethernet jack is located on the power brick, so you don't have to fit the jack into the system itself. Plus, the power brick will act as a point-to-point Wi-Fi connection, so you can unplug and move around without being tethered to your Ethernet cable in those rare situations where you have wired Internet access, but no Wi-Fi router (which actually happened to us in a hotel recently). There's also an Instant-On menu that gives you access to a Web browser and even Skype, without booting into Windows.
Unlike the Air, the system has HDMI and multiple USB ports, but it does have a few Mac-like touchpad gesture controls (such as pinching to zoom in on photos). We saw it in white, but the Envy 133 will be available in a variety of colors and custom graphic finishes.
The Envy 133 will start at $2,099, and be available "starting this summer," according to HP. Other highlights include:
- Starts at 3.4 pounds, 0.70 inch thin, 9.04 inches deep, and 12.65 inches wide.
- A carbon fibre casing with custom microweave design. The 13.3-inch backlit LED screen is covered with a durable fused composite glass.
- Voodoo IOS - gives road warriors instant access to Skype and an Internet browser.
- Voodoo Aura PowerConnect - users can plug an Ethernet cable into the jack located on the power brick. A point-to-point Wi-Fi connection is automatically established, between the RJ45 and the notebook.
- Multiple gesture touchpad - features scroll and pinch options.
- Standard integrated Webcam
- Wireless connectivity - includes integrated wireless 802.11 ABGN + Bluetooth.
- Ports - headphone/microphone, HDMI, USB 2.0 (1x) and a shared e-SATA/USB (1x).
- Backlit keyboard
- Proximity sensor - This system recognizes when fingers are on the keyboard and turns off the touchpad to avoid any accidental movement of the cursor.
- LED display - 13.3-inch LED WXGA (1,280x800) screen covered in high-quality fused composite glass that runs from edge to edge.
- Ambient sensors - adjusts the display brightness according to its surrounding environment.
