The Illusion of Overclocking Support

Since the onset of overclocking there has been competition, competition to see who has the fastest rig, who has the most video cards and who may have the lowest temps.  The list goes on and the reward for winning is often fame, sometimes fortune and in rare occasions, a job.  Hardware makers like watching these little battles because they are the ultimate realization of their hard work and something they can use to further promote their products and brand.

That is assuming the competition meets with their approval and is somehow in their best interest. 

For a company to better control the variables they may turn to hosting a competition.  HWBOT is currently the defacto source for world record scores and will often host sponsored competitions for a particular manufacturer.  The scale of these competitions can vary from a short 30 day score collection to something bigger that may contain multiple stages and last up to six months or more.  While HWBOT will handle the score collection and ranking it is up to the creator of the competition to set the rules and provide the prizes.

The way I see it, an overclocking competition is pure marketing and should be used to influence brand recognition.  Of course any marketing decision should also end with, “How is this going to make us money?” and I believe this is where hardware makers are selling themselves short.

First of all let’s talk about prizes.  I have witnessed, and even competed in, a few competitions where the prize pool contaminated hardware from the hosted manufacturer that was identical to the hardware required to participate.  How does this actually get people excited to participate?

On a related note let’s talk about promotion of an event.  Say you are a hardware maker and hosting a worldwide overclocking competition.  An online qualifier is used to select the contestants and their prize is a free trip to (select an exotic destination) to compete in the finals and basically become agents of that company overclocking on their hardware.  This seems like a really exciting prospect and a great way to promote the brand and the eSports style overclockers in attendance.