HP Firebird 802 gaming rig gets $500 price drop
By Donald Melanson 
posted April 19th 2009 10:46AM
posted April 19th 2009 10:46AM
Well, it's only been available for a few short months but HP has already seen fit to give its flagship Firebird 802 gaming desktop a fairly sizable price drop -- $500, to be specific. That includes a $150 cut to the $1,799 base price and a $350 instant rebate that brings the price down to a pretty darn reasonable $1,299, questionable keyboards aside. For those that haven't been pricing gaming rigs lately, that'll get you a Core 2 Quad 9400 processor, 4GB of RAM, a 500GB hard drive, and dual NVIDIA GeForce 9800S graphics cards (with 512MB of DDR3 memory on each card). Of course, any price drop of this size also invariably bring of the question "why?" and, in the case, the reasons are still a bit hazy. While HP discontinuing the line outright seems to almost certainly be out of the question, a slight revision does seem at least possible, if not necessarily imminent -- although, any way you shake it, $500 off is $500 off, so we're not complaining.
[Thanks, Ali]
[Thanks, Ali]
For a minute i thought they dropped it to $500, no such luck :(
I can't decide whether I love or hate this design. At least it doesn't seem to have any built-in xmas tree lightning that gamers are so fond of.
Hi, Im looking for a computer case.
Yeah..? what do you want?
Something.... Perspex and glowing... maybe a dragon decal or a chrome skull
Sigh... right this way sir.
I completely agree with you. When current case is simple/industrial in design. NZXT Tempest. I got it because it has a ton of airflow and wasn't the Antec 900 that everyone and his brother has. Yes my case has a side-window and a few led fans that came with it but its certainly not as gaudy as some of the crap out there. Also, I am an engineer, I like to see my hardware. :-)
HORRIBLE specs for the price, but I LOVE that case..
well, the thing is, they can fit all those stuff inside a small case rather than a huge box. NOT to mention, its energy efficient :P
Actually, for a brand-name pre-built gaming PC the specs aren't that bad for the price (the new price). Of course you could save a couple hundred If you have experience in building PC and know where to get the right stuff for the right price, but this is a pretty good deal for the lazy.
Woohoo
Ok, I still don't care.
i would buy this just for that fucking case...
It looks to me like a cracked LCD on the side. Meh, opinions will differ...
They have some really nice designs (Envy 133 case is one of the best designed). They just need to work on keeping their hardware updated.
You could put a giant fucking sticker on the side to cover up that stupid ass design. The rest of the case doesn't look bad, I don't think....
[joke]I can build a machine with them specs for £1[/joke]
That case looks pretty ugly methinks.
Nice...
But just bought a Dell Studio Core i7 for $899 with better specs including Blu-Ray burner.
Wish it looked as good as the HP though
Link to this? I'm looking for a new comp and don't feel like building one because I don't know anything about processors, RAM, or anything anymore... And that price seems to fit for something that would be neat.
wait, the studios come with an i7 now? All I saw recently was Core 2 Quads...
"...dual NVIDIA GeForce 9800S graphics cards (with 512MB of DDR3 memory on each card)"
Dual video cards and a full 1GB of DDR3 memory for $900 ? Indeed, link please...
I don't think the Studio does, but the Studio XPS does (starts at $799).
If you buy this, pray that you never need to send it for service. Rahul/Voodoo had the worse service I have ever seen and it continues under the HP/Blackbird banner. For my money, Dell is a better choice. If your computer needs a fancy decal, you need a more interesting life !
I hate to actually promote them but wal-mart has this for sale on their website for $1298 plus you get a $100 gift card and free shipping...just sayin
I recently bought this system and it's great. I had to reinstall the OS twice due to some Nvidia driver issues and some 64 bit incompatiblities. But now it works like a dream. Case is great!, System is fast, especially with Windows 7. Been playing Crysis and its been fun. Although I'm only a casual gamer, I needed a system to replace my 8 year old desktop and I wanted it be future proof. This system fits perfect with a 22 inch monitor. I know there's better systems out there, I tried getting a Dell XPS, but its been delayed for 6-7 weeks and couldn't wait any longer.
When I began my search for a new rig last week, I stumbled across the HP Firebird which for a short while was #1 on my shortlist. Further research found that the unit was just recently introduced, which landed a gigantic question mark on it. Now I'm looking at the Dell Studio XPS or even an Alienware to replace my frankenstien custom PC (it's totally ugly).
Even at $1,299 this system is pretty expensive for its specs. But it's the design that demands such a premium. I personally like the design very much. But, due to the custom made cooling system and few other things, service would be a nightmare and we won't be able to fix certain issues on our own. But still, HP should be able push a lot of these machines with the $500 price cut.
$500 price drop after a short time = nobody's buying?
For $1,299 you can get a high end Core i7, GTX 260 with a 120 Hz screen and 3D vision from ibuypower.
Eeew. It's ibuypower, though. I bought a decently equipped gaming rig from them last year. The video card was messed up out of the box (weird lines and display artifacts, constant crashing while idle) and just 6 months into having it, the power supply gave up the ghost in spectacular fashion. After replacing video and PSU, I'd spent $1300, thus negating any savings by buying the ibuypower system in the first place.
Ibuypower was basically impossible to contact. Both failures happened within the year warranty period, but their tech support staff (such that it was - kind of like calling a rusty toy wagon a sports car) basically could care less.
I've heard similar reports from friends who bought from them and Cyberpower (owned by the same people).
Just sayin, if it's too good to be true, it probably is. For people who can't or won't build their own, this looks like a cute little machine.
read the reviews of ibuypower on www.resellerratings.com and you will run, not walk, away from ibuypower
well as horrifying as what you both are saying, I'm reading the reviews now and they're not too chabby...
sort by lowest ranked to read the horror stories
This is still too expensive for what you get... I am quite happy with the computer I already have and my 360 for games.
all i want is the case i wish they sold it
It wouldn't do you any good. Unlike the Blackbird, the Firebird is not ATX-compliant and uses mostly proprietary hardware.
This price drop happened almost 2 months ago. Also i love how you guys do reviews of Apple laptops that are the same exact thing probably twice a year but you didn't do a review on this. All you guys said was "Yep its small and the keyboard bends" Kinda makes me sad on how Apple geared this site is. I don't mind the Apple stuff but when you guys do unboxings of the same things then do reviews for the same thing with a faster processor. Sad Panda.
That price drop actually happen over a month ago. The 803 sold out and according to one of the admins on the voodoo boards there was "overwhelming" demand for the 803. He also says that waiting for the 803 to come back would be a "bad idea".
This thing is a rip off.
Using 3-year old DDR2 technology to cut corners and cost instead of DDR3.
It's missing out on the twice as fast peak rates and it's crippling the bus speed down to 800Mhz. No Wi-Fi either?
Let's talk about all the practical performance gains found in DDR3 which could be applied to a substandard machine like this.
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Yeah, thought so.
err, I clicked the HP link, and it has a 5400 rpm harddrive??
monster cables are shit
What this thing needs is some crazy green/yellow LED fans, UV lighting and a disco ball.
disco ball, now we're talkin.
dual 512MB 9800 GPUS?? Why would you want that.. They are just clearing out old parts. They should use a GTX285 or 4870...
then we are not talking about $1299 for this...
I own this sytem and it is very nice. It does the games and details I want it to do just fine. I will say though that the 500 price drop is because it is a slow seller. Buyers are not dumb as a whole and know what it is. Lets call it for what it actually is. It is a laptop system put in a nice looking case. It even takes laptop sized hard drives. The video cards are good but not upgradeable to speak of. No tv tuner card. With the 500 price drop though it is just about right for what you get. I love it and will continue enjoying it for some time. It is also nice and quiet. That is the first thing I noticed about it.
Lmao.
It's shit for the specs, but what you dont realise is that it comes with windows, which is extra cost to someone who has to build their own, & then there is the tiny-ness of it.
& every one knows hte smaller it is the moar expensive it is, for what it is... in computing.