Tech

Not all computers are made the same, and there’s a pretty penny to be made kitting out systems for people who need performance—film and video editors, animators, gamers—and those who just want the aesthetic of a slick computer to rub off on them.

The Hewlett-Packard Blackbird 002 PC, released last fall, is the slickest computer available right now. The first gaming computer to be released by HP since its acquisition of Calgary computer manufacturer VoodooPC, the Blackbird is being promoted as containing Voodoo DNA, which is how the megacompany is maintaining the prestigious Voodoo brand.

The computer itself weighs in the neighbourhood of 33 kilograms. It’s a big, sleek, heavy machine with a chassis that perches on a foot, both made of cast aluminum. It has a military-industrial look to it. Cool-blue LEDs installed inside the casing leak light out through the gaps, and lighting on the back panel makes it easy to swap out cables. The slot-loading optical drives are nearly invisible, hidden away within the grooves on the front. A hidden panel at the top of the machine pops open to reveal headphone and microphone jacks, USB and FireWire ports, and a media-card reader.

Slick presentation aside, this Blackbird is a performance-tuned machine. The hard-drive bay makes changing drives a simple affair. Slide the drive into the rack, and it automatically connects with the motherboard. And with five available slots, you can load in a total of five terabytes of storage, more than enough space to store thousands of songs, photos, and movies.

While you won’t need tools to switch out your drives, if you do need an Allen key, there’s one embedded in a foam compartment just inside the door. There are also a few screws and bolts, in case you want to mod your bird even more.

The processors in the Blackbird are overclocked at the factory, so a chip that’s rated 3.0 gigahertz might actually perform at 3.67 gigahertz. It’s a technique that hardware nerds have been using for years to get their computers working better and faster. The cost of the technique, though, is that the processors generate massive amounts of heat, which need to be controlled. Standard computers have fans that blow air through the case to cool things down, but the Blackbird is fully liquid-cooled, which makes it whisper-quiet. The foot upon which the Blackbird sits not only gives the illusion that the box is hovering, but also exposes a sixth surface from which heat can dissipate.

As fine-tuned as the Blackbird is, it’s also built using industry-standard components, so if you want to switch out the motherboard, you can use one off the shelf and not be reliant on a proprietary board manufactured by HP. This might not seem like such a big deal—who’s going to want to mess with the guts of such a sweet machine?—but a year or two down the road everything will be different, and the Voodoo builders of the Blackbird, gamers all, know how important it is to be able to make the machine your own.

The Blackbird is fully customizable, so when ordering you can choose from a number of configuration options, including a selection of processors, memory, video cards, and hard drives. The system I test-drove was tricked out with an Intel Core2 Extreme Quad-Core 3.0GHz QX6850 processing chip, two gigabytes of RAM, NVIDIA’s GeForce 8800 ULTRA video card, and two hard disks—a 160-gigabyte drive that spins at 10,000 revolutions per minute, and a 750-gigabyte drive with the more standard 7,200-revolutions-per-minute rating.

The price tag on this black beauty? While you can spend between $2,500 and $6,500, the system I tried out went for $4,679.75. In January, another version of the system, the Blackbird 002 alpha, was released. Sporting Intel’s 45-nanometre QX9650 chip—which has more transistors in a smaller space—this machine improves gaming performance and reduces power consumption. The fancy chip jumps the price by nearly $1,000.

It’s a premium price for a premium computer, but hardware and PC gaming geeks have been trumpeting the Blackbird as the best gaming computer on the market since its release.

The computer I test-drove certainly didn’t have a problem running Crysis at top speed. This first-person shooter from EA is considered to be among the most demanding of video games. But the Blackbird rendered the realistic jungle and water effects in real time without skipping a wing beat. Despite the problems some have been having with Vista, the Blackbird I tested clicked along just fine using the operating system. Power has its privileges.

Looking for unparalleled performance in a computer? Have an extra two or three grand to spend on a system? Want a desktop that will make you the envy of everyone, geeks included? The Blackbird is for you.

It’s for me, too. I just have to come up with a funding plan.