Intel Core 2 Duo and Girl Power

Intel enlisted the help of two professional female gamers from Frag Dolls at its launch of 10 Core 2 Duo processors at its HQ in Silicon Valley yesterday. Which is a good thing considering that most of the speakers and special guests at those events are men. The gaming PC business is tiny (makes up less than 5 percent of AMD's desktop chip revenue), but both Intel and AMD work hard to cultivate a following among the tech-savvy gamers. I checked out a $6,000 VooDooPC Omen that comes with a clear side panel and a pink liquid-cooling system. Chatted with VooDooPC president Rahul Sood, who seemed a bit overwhelmed by all the attention to his blog about Intel dis-inviting ATI (which is being sold to AMD) to the event. Anyway, there was a funny skit at the Core 2 Duo launch, involving two Intel employees taking their laptops with them on a flight from SF to New York City. The guy with the Intel-based notebook finished all his work during the flight while the other guy with the AMD-based notebook didn't because the battery died in mid-air.