Voodoo Magic: Cash In On Gaming

One thing's for sure: This is no ordinary PC. The company proudly calls the F-550, which costs as much as $5,000, the "personal dream machine," and declares its brand the Ferrari of the PC market. Arrogant? Perhaps. But Calgary, Alberta-based Voodoo PC has lived up to its own hype, winning countless gaming and PC awards in recent years and earning a die-hard following among computer and gaming lovers that would rival even Apple. That has helped the systems builder evade the PC market's ills, according to Voodoo PC president Rahul Sood.

"Voodoo PC has been somewhat immune to the slump--knock on wood--because we keep pushing our systems to the limit by using new, compelling technologies," Sood says, "and we're targeting a certain segment of the market that appreciates high-quality luxury goods."

Gaming is no longer a fringe market that big manufacturers and vendors dismiss, according to Sood. Microsoft has proved as much with its entry into the gaming market with its Xbox system, as has the mega-popularity of Sony's PlayStation 2. But gaming has also been working its way into the upper echelon of the PC market, and that has been a major plus for systems builders such as Voodoo PC.

"From our standpoint, the minute Dell walked into the gaming market, they truly validated the space to mass-market consumers. Dell is also influencing other majors to get into the space," Sood says. "It's good for us because there is still room for the Ferrari in the car market, as there is room for Voodoo in the high-end PC market."

Mobile Gaming
Gaming is so attractive for both vendors and solution providers because customers typically expect cutting-edge technology and spare little to get it, Sood says.

"The allure to companies like Gateway and Dell is they make more margins on the higher-end SKUs," he says. "For AMD, Intel, ATI and nVidia, it's a no-brainer; gamers buy the best, most expensive products they have to offer."

As the gaming market demands, Voodoo PC tries to bring the latest technology to market as quickly as possible. One aspect that is helping Voodoo PC extend its reach is the company's embrace of mobile technology. Voodoo PC's latest invention is the Envy line of gaming notebooks, which are powered by Intel's Centrino wireless processors to help deliver the speed and power of a desktop. Sood says his company's optimization of Centrino technology will let a 1.7-GHz Pentium M beat a 3.06-GHz Pentium 4 Desktop Processor in a notebook.

"We are still steady with our desktop line, but notebooks are accelerating to a point where we think they'll be almost 40 to 50 percent of our business," Sood says. "I suppose it can only be expected since Intel is pumping so much money into building wireless. They're really standing up and pushing this infrastructure."

Other technologies are in high demand for the notebook model. Sood says Voodoo gets the most requests for the ATI Mobility 9600 (M10) graphics processing unit (GPU). He says Voodoo did its homework on ATI's new technology and was the first to launch the GPU in North America. In addition, the Voodoo team jumped on Hitachi's new 7200 RPM 60-GB Travelstar hard drive.

"Hitachi really won our hearts with this drive," Sood says. "It's not all hype. It's truly the fastest notebook drive we've ever seen, and the battery usage is surprisingly similar to other drives."

Like other Voodoo models, the Envy machines are designed to offer an easy upgrade path. Sood says that Voodoo PC is the only systems builders in North America that constructs notebooks entirely from the ground up. Now the company is also beginning to see demand in the Middle East and Europe.

Cool Technology
Voodoo PC refers to its models as the ultimate gaming machines, and they are indeed impressive to gaming aficionados. But if the systems are as fast and powerful as the F-550, why can't they be used for other nongaming functions? The answer is, they can.

Many of the Voodoo models also double as a typical home computer--with a Windows XP operating system, an Intel Pentium 4 or AMD Athlon processor, Seagate or Western Digital disk drives, and monitors from NEC/Mitsubishi, Samsung or Sony. And, indeed, users can leverage a Voodoo model for a variety of different functions outside of gaming (think Apple--like tasks such as video and audio editing). Looking deeper, however, Voodoo machines offer much more than your basic PCs.

Besides being faster than a big-brand model, Voodoo machines are also cooler. Voodoo PC's sister company, Cool-IT Technologies, developed a liquid-cooling system that is virtually silent. The Voodoo F1 Liquid Chiller system uses translucent tubes that contain a green liquid to keep the powerful F-Class machines running cool at blazing speeds. Sood says his company is breaking into new markets beyond gaming, and that the high-end nature of Voodoo machines, along with the unique custom technologies like Cool-IT's liquid-cooling system, are helping to drive the growth.

"Technologies such as our F1 Liquid Chiller have really helped us expand our market into other verticals," Sood says. "We have also focused on growing our notebook line and reaching new consumers with these products."

It may be too early to tell whether the opportunities for the channel in gaming and home networking are real or if they're specific to boutique systems builders like Voodoo PC. But a number of forces are moving the market in the former direction. Consider that Sony's forthcoming PlayStation 3 will reportedly leverage grid computing to offer processing power 1,000 times higher than that of PlayStation 2, acting more like a home server than a gaming system. In addition, distributors such as D&H Distributing, which launched its gaming division last fall, are beginning to make a play for the market.

Sood says systems builders need to familiarize themselves with the unique gaming culture before jumping in.

"Every systems builder and his dog believes that cutting a window on a PC and painting it green automatically gives them a passport to the gaming market, but there's far more to it than that," Sood says.

The Voodoo PC team is currently working on the next wave, which includes a new desktop the company says will be the world's fastest machine yet. Sood says he sees speed as the biggest obstacle--not processing speeds, but rather the quickness with which they can adopt new technologies and bring them to market.

"I think we're just fortunate to be in the position we are in," Sood says. "If you fall asleep in this business, you can lose everything overnight."