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HP Shows Off Crazy Omen X Gaming Desktop and VR Backpack
HP has dabbled in PC gaming hardware over the years, but lately, the company hasn’t really been known for its enthusiast builds. HP aims to change that with its Omen X gaming desktop, which starts at $1,799.99.
In case you couldn’t tell from the picture above, the PC is cube-shaped and has front-facing LEDs, but what arguably makes it more unique is that it’s tilted on its side.
You can purchase the chassis itself, but it will cost you a staggering $600. While HP admits that it does cost a pretty penny, the company asserts that a lot of the cost is due to R&D.
The front-facing LEDs also support RGB lighting, which can be customized via software. Here we see it transitioning from red to purple. While the Omen X will use a MicroATX motherboard, it’s chassis is quite large. Here is a normal-sized bottle of water for comparison.
Taking off the top-left side panel of the case reveals the motherboard. HP asserts that the unique angle of the chassis allows you to more easily service the PC.
This particular configuration uses a quad-core Skylake processor coupled with 8GB of RAM and two AMD Fury X GPUs. Nvidia configurations will also be available. This build also uses a 12cm intake fan at the bottom right-hand corner and supports three 12cm fans at the top. The PC will also support X99 configurations and has enough room for full-sized graphics cards.
The right side of the case has pullouts for four storage drives. You can mount either SSDs or HDDs in them.
You can remove the faceplate for the bottom bay, which allows you to access the PSU.
This is the back of the Omen X, which show off the I/O panel.
Using HP’s software, you can customize the Omen X's LEDs to change color depending on how hot the PC gets. For instance, you can set it to light blue when the PC is cold and red when it gets hot.
In addition to the Omen X, HP also showed off its VR backpack. HP is marketing this for both consumer and professional use, asserting that we could see it in VR arcades. It’s surprisingly lightweight, and has extra hot-swappable battery packs. Unfortunately, HP isn’t specifying what specs you’ll find in the pack, other than the fact that it will use a quad-core Intel CPU.
Here’s what it looks like viewed from the front. It features both chest and waist straps (The chest strap on this particularly unit broke after some wear and tear). It's also worth noting that this is a prototype pack, so build quality could improve with the retail release. Unfortunately, HP hasn't yet announced a release date for the device.
When you don’t want to use it as a VR backpack, you can simply remove the straps and use it as a standalone desktop PC.
The bottom of the PC reveals its power plugs.
The top of the PC reveals the power button, HDMI, and two USB ports.
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