When Dell purchased Alienware, it was a high flier, one of the premier gaming PC OEMs. Gaming PCs are a niche market, but buyers of gaming PCs load up their systems and buy top-of-the-line equipment, with high profit margins.

Next month, according to the Wall Street Journal (paid subscription required), Dell will begin phasing out four gaming systems in its XPS line of PCs. This will leave the Alienware line as its sole "true" gaming systems.

According to the report, not only have XPS systems taken some sales away from Alienware, many potential buyers seem to feel that Alienware has lost its "mojo," perhaps feeling that ownership by the staid old Dell equates to boring.

As gaming PCs are usually high-profit margin, Dell is looking for its Alienware line to produce an influx of valuable revenue.

VoodooPC, which was purchased, in an even more surprising acquisition, by HP, has been placed into an even more subservient position than Alienware. Rather than maintaining the VoodooPC line, HP instead says its Blackbird gaming PC has "VoodooPC DNA." Whatever you call it, just as with Alienware, it makes one wish the two were still independent companies.

Source: By Tech Ex