It’s the high time for gadget geeks to rejoice. When HP acquired Voodoo PC, the boutique gaming maker, I was just sitting back and waiting for some unique product to come up and it’s here now.
Designed by a core group of gaming enthusiasts at HP and performance computing experts from VoodooPC, the Blackbird 002 is said to be a machine born from the minds of gamers, created with gamers in mind. Base specs begin at $2,500 while you will need to pay $6,500 for the fully-loaded beast.
Let’s see how HP and Voodoo PC have done justice with the hefty price tag.
The brawny gaming machine has been named after the Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird reconnaissance plane, which gives HP an edge over rival PC manufacturers such as Alienware, Falcon Northwest, Overdrive PC, and Dell in ruling the gaming rig.
Blackbird looks stunning while it sits atop its sexy silver stand that can hold up to 600 pounds. The lines and the slanting curves add to the looks of the beast. The top of the case houses a pop-up media card reader and USB/FireWire ports.
It looks like that the Blackbird has been carved out of a single piece of black aluminum, with a grooved exterior. You will find a little LCD screen on the rear that lets you know beforehand if the Blackbird ever happens to crash. The front is lit with colored LEDs. The LEDs light up the back panel also that proves to be useful when you are joining a gaming peripheral or an external USB drive. Wiring runs gracefully though the back of the aluminum case to avoid kinks.
The HP Blackbird 002 does full justice with its namesake, the Lockheed as it looks like it goes fast even if it is turned off. It’s the type that asks for attention from each and every angle.
Full System Liquid Cooling: The Blackbird 002 enjoys a maintenance-free liquid cooling that jeeps heat away from the CPU, motherboard and GPUs. Although as sealed liquid system is employed to cool the overclocked Core 2 Extreme quad-core processor but, it does depend on a mishmash of air cooling and sealed liquid cooling for the graphics cards. It isolates each heat source in its own thermal chamber. In nutshell, the system is quite quiet for a gaming rig.
No toolkit: The Blackbird doesn’t have any toolkit as all the components, from the CPU to optical drives, can be removed and installed without tools. The Five slide-out trays are completely toolless and they firmly hold the drives even while you are transporting the machine to some other place. Anyhow, there is a built-in Allen Wrench toolkit for the back panel (only exception).
Fully customizable: The Blackbird 002 is customizable and built to order because games like it that way. The swinging chassis door of the case can be easily opened with a finger. There is no pre-installed software. There are many options for the customers to select from. They can either opt for Intel or AMD motherboards and processors, ATI or Nvidia, and Vista or XP.
Specs for the base configuration: An AMD A64X2 6000+ 3GHz processor, 256MB ATI RX630XT video card, 2GB DDR2-666 RAM, and a 500GB 7,200 RPM SATA drive. Priced at $2,500.
Specs for the fully-loaded beast: A liquid-cooled, factory-overclocked Intel QX6850 3GHz chip, dual Nvidia GeForce 8800 cards, and many more features. Priced at $6,500 for all the extras.
Other specs: Intel Core 2 Extreme QX6850 Factory overclocked to 3.67GHz, 2 X 768MB NVIDIA GeForce 8800 Ultra, Asetek Custom Self-Contained Cooling System (GPU cooling optional), SoundBlaster X-Fi, dual gigabit Ethernet ports, USB and FireWire ports.
HP Blackbird 002 is on the edge to excel in the gaming rig with its combination of innovative design and true, powerful gaming specs. Anyhow, the design might not appeal to a few but, when we talk about the features; the Blackbird 002 is definitely going to put many gaming machines to shame.
The only downside with the Blackbird is its heavy weight of 80 pounds. In addition, the slot-loading drives require use of DVD burners instead of HD DVD or Blu-ray. Except for these two shortcomings, the Blackbird 002 will fly high for sure in the gaming rig. I must give it 9.5 out of 10.
PCmag: Sleek like its reconnaissance-plane namesake, the HP Blackbird 002 is poised to excel on a specialized mission: ruling the game grid.
GadgetLab: Aesthetics aside, the Blackbird 002 is one of the most powerful computers we’ve ever tested. Gaming PC manufacturers take note: The bar just got raised into outer space.
NewLaunches: It’s a pure gaming machine that rejects conventional PC design in favor of an aggressive, dynamic appearance that seems to defy the laws of physics.
HP Blackbird 002 gaming PC Picture Gallery
