Crowdfunded prebuilt SFF Gaming PC (custom case)

Freeman1

Chassis Packer
Original poster
Sep 12, 2018
16
4
Hi guys,
I have a cool project going on but I have some doubts about it succeeding.
Basically I want to crowdfund a prebuilt high-end SFF Gaming PC. All components are standard aside from the PSU which is not available to retail customers. The reason I want to resell it as a complete built is that most of the users will build it with the same specs for which the case is designed and I also want to serve costumers which are looking for prebuilt systems.
The case will inhabit a RTX 2080 FE or RTX 2080 Ti FE and the new i7/i9 CPUs or a RTX 2070 FE with the new 6 core i5 in a slightly different case. I guess it will be harder to get a PC crowdfunded with the 2 higher end cards even though the potential customers could choose between 2 GPUs and CPUs. The price would be too steep for a unknown brand for most of the people even if there would be reviews already out from well known youtubers.
Also I guess the minimum order quantity to even be considered by NVIDIA will be for one specific model and not the sum of different ones that get ordered at the same time. (I guess with Intel it will be the same.) So if that's true then I will obviously choose to get the RTX 2070 case model in production before I do anything else.
Anyways, I never saw a crowdfunded High End Gaming PC so I would be glad if I would get some opinions on it, or maybe someone already considered doing it and can tell me what the obstacles would be. Maybe there's some projects that failed or even succeeded that I am not aware of.
The PC will be competitively priced in comparison to normal PCs with the same spec. To make that happen it will help to order the stuff directly from the manufacturer. The PSU manufacturer told me already that their minimum order quantity is 100 pieces.
NVIDIA has its fill-up form to join the NVIDIA Partner Network, I guess Intel has something like that too. (About the other companies I don't worry too much, just about the big players.) That form is obviously not suitable for my inquiry. As I am based in Germany I called NVIDIA in Germany. They told me that I should directly call the NVIDIA Headquarters in the USA what I will do.
Also what I wonder about is how PayPal will handle a crowdfunding campaign in what this much money is involved. Is it even reasonable to run the Crowdfunding Campaign off a private website instead of using Kickstarter or Indiegogo etc? How are the funds of buyers handled by PayPal what will be needed to get all the components? I will get in contact with PayPal too I just want to be able think about every obstacle that could show up before starting a project of this kind.
 

Valantar

Shrink Ray Wielder
Jan 20, 2018
2,201
2,225
Right off the bat: warranty and support. That's one of the main reasons why people buy pre-built PCs - even unique, bespoke ones. If they can't have it serviced by someone, and if the company responsible doesn't provide high quality post-sale support, they're going to become some very unhappy customers once something goes wrong (which, this being a high-end PC, it will). For a pre-built high-end PC, I'd expect a minimum of a 3-year parts-shipping-and-labor warranty to be included. If it's premium, that becomes on-site service for at least the first year. And neither of these are cheap or easy to provide. You can't plan this as a one-off and go off and do new projects, you'll need to have a plan to provide support and service for the future, including on-hand replacement parts (you can't order them when they're needed unless the delivery time is near zero).

As I see it, unless you have both enough margins on the first batch and some way of maintaining sales over time so that you can afford to pay a professional service provider for the entire warranty period of all sold units, this will be dead in the water. I don't mean to come off as all negative, but as I see it this is an absolute necessity.

As for crowdfunding on your own site: doesn't that effectively remove all guarantees your backers have of you not running off with the money? Doesn't sound like a good idea. A trusted third party middle-man with clear and well known terms is a much needed safety net for things like this.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Saici

Freeman1

Chassis Packer
Original poster
Sep 12, 2018
16
4
Thank you for your answer. Well that topic was all the way back in one corner of my head, I am glad you brought it up. You made a lot of good points.
About the crowdfunding on a private site: Several blogs and sites mentioned it when talking about all of the different kinds of crowdfunding as it would be a real alternative. I was thinking the same thing, so I thought in that case PayPal would be the middle-man then.
 

Choidebu

"Banned"
Aug 16, 2017
1,196
1,204
About the case being priced not far from building it off-the-shelf: forget about it. Hardware margin is low; ask any of your local computer shop. If you're an OEM, maybe, but we're talking assembly here not manufacturing. You can forget there is any significant savings beyond PSUs, buttons, risers and front panels.
 

el01

King of Cable Management
Jun 4, 2018
770
588
Hi guys,
I have a cool project going on but I have some doubts about it succeeding.
Basically I want to crowdfund a prebuilt high-end SFF Gaming PC. All components are standard aside from the PSU which is not available to retail customers. The reason I want to resell it as a complete built is that most of the users will build it with the same specs for which the case is designed and I also want to serve costumers which are looking for prebuilt systems.
The case will inhabit a RTX 2080 FE or RTX 2080 Ti FE and the new i7/i9 CPUs or a RTX 2070 FE with the new 6 core i5 in a slightly different case. I guess it will be harder to get a PC crowdfunded with the 2 higher end cards even though the potential customers could choose between 2 GPUs and CPUs. The price would be too steep for a unknown brand for most of the people even if there would be reviews already out from well known youtubers.
Also I guess the minimum order quantity to even be considered by NVIDIA will be for one specific model and not the sum of different ones that get ordered at the same time. (I guess with Intel it will be the same.) So if that's true then I will obviously choose to get the RTX 2070 case model in production before I do anything else.
Anyways, I never saw a crowdfunded High End Gaming PC so I would be glad if I would get some opinions on it, or maybe someone already considered doing it and can tell me what the obstacles would be. Maybe there's some projects that failed or even succeeded that I am not aware of.
The PC will be competitively priced in comparison to normal PCs with the same spec. To make that happen it will help to order the stuff directly from the manufacturer. The PSU manufacturer told me already that their minimum order quantity is 100 pieces.
NVIDIA has its fill-up form to join the NVIDIA Partner Network, I guess Intel has something like that too. (About the other companies I don't worry too much, just about the big players.) That form is obviously not suitable for my inquiry. As I am based in Germany I called NVIDIA in Germany. They told me that I should directly call the NVIDIA Headquarters in the USA what I will do.
Also what I wonder about is how PayPal will handle a crowdfunding campaign in what this much money is involved. Is it even reasonable to run the Crowdfunding Campaign off a private website instead of using Kickstarter or Indiegogo etc? How are the funds of buyers handled by PayPal what will be needed to get all the components? I will get in contact with PayPal too I just want to be able think about every obstacle that could show up before starting a project of this kind.
I love the concept, but I have a bit of an issue with the "High-End part..." Not to disappoint you or anything, but I feel like that's fitting within a niche of a niche, with SFF already being (an admittedly growing) niche, and ultra-high-performance being a niche within that. More affordable options (sub $1500? idk...) would reduce profit margins, but would hypothetically attract more buyers.

RTX benchmarks still aren't out yet, so I wouldn't bank on their performance quite yet... I would stick to 1080 Tis if the RTX series doesn't offer better performance at around 1440P, which I would say is a good gaming resolution.

I think that making your own cases will be a bit tricky in the beginning due to the learning curve (I'm still getting over it), and the manufacturing costs. If you can pull it off, great! If you can't, I would try to contact an OEM or some case manufacturer to bulk buy and rebadge one of their cases (like how CyberPowerPC puts their logo on their cases); maybe Fractal Design or Silverstone?

It would be awesome to see Non-OEM -ish custom prebuilts that are SFF. There are only a few from existing custom prebuilders, and in the future, a custom case would be really cool to see.
 

Freeman1

Chassis Packer
Original poster
Sep 12, 2018
16
4
About the case being priced not far from building it off-the-shelf: forget about it. Hardware margin is low; ask any of your local computer shop. If you're an OEM, maybe, but we're talking assembly here not manufacturing. You can forget there is any significant savings beyond PSUs, buttons, risers and front panels.
it's all about the quantity am I right? If I will be able to get the stuff directly from NVIDIA and Intel in "high" quantity the margin should be significantly higher than buying it from a third party in bulk.
 

Freeman1

Chassis Packer
Original poster
Sep 12, 2018
16
4
I love the concept, but I have a bit of an issue with the "High-End part..." Not to disappoint you or anything, but I feel like that's fitting within a niche of a niche, with SFF already being (an admittedly growing) niche, and ultra-high-performance being a niche within that. More affordable options (sub $1500? idk...) would reduce profit margins, but would hypothetically attract more buyers.

RTX benchmarks still aren't out yet, so I wouldn't bank on their performance quite yet... I would stick to 1080 Tis if the RTX series doesn't offer better performance at around 1440P, which I would say is a good gaming resolution.

I think that making your own cases will be a bit tricky in the beginning due to the learning curve (I'm still getting over it), and the manufacturing costs. If you can pull it off, great! If you can't, I would try to contact an OEM or some case manufacturer to bulk buy and rebadge one of their cases (like how CyberPowerPC puts their logo on their cases); maybe Fractal Design or Silverstone?

It would be awesome to see Non-OEM -ish custom prebuilts that are SFF. There are only a few from existing custom prebuilders, and in the future, a custom case would be really cool to see.
Well I feel like there's no drawback in going small. When I look at what the big players like msi and asus put out there with two laptop supplies it looks like they are forcing showing off a small pc. How many percent of people need two PCIe slots? So what is the drawback if I get it to be silent? The only drawback I see is not being able to use HDDs, and that's also just a drawback when you want to save all the bucks you can considering how cheap SSDs are becoming today.
The RTX 2070 Model will definitely be under 2000 USD. I really like the new series because of the new founders design. The case should showcase the card in all its glory. The old Founders Edition is too loud.
 
  • Like
Reactions: el01

Choidebu

"Banned"
Aug 16, 2017
1,196
1,204
it's all about the quantity am I right? If I will be able to get the stuff directly from NVIDIA and Intel in "high" quantity the margin should be significantly higher than buying it from a third party in bulk.
How much is *significant* to you? 10-15%? Cause that's how much a region's primary distributor gets, at least on motherboards, according to a friend who runs a computer shop. Granted they do get more in store credit and surpluses, promo items, but that's not applicable here.

Look, just trying to manage your expectation here - not pulling you down or anything.
 
  • Like
Reactions: el01

el01

King of Cable Management
Jun 4, 2018
770
588
Well I feel like there's no drawback in going small. When I look at what the big players like msi and asus put out there with two laptop supplies it looks like they are forcing showing off a small pc. How many percent of people need two PCIe slots? So what is the drawback if I get it to be silent? The only drawback I see is not being able to use HDDs, and that's also just a drawback when you want to save all the bucks you can considering how cheap SSDs are becoming today.
The RTX 2070 Model will definitely be under 2000 USD. I really like the new series because of the new founders design. The case should showcase the card in all its glory. The old Founders Edition is too loud.
I think you might have misinterpreted what I said... I only mentioned practicality issues with the "high-end" component of your idea, and I didn't say anything about power supplies, 2 PCIe slots, or HDDs. I was also suggesting use of smaller cases from the stated OEMs (e.g. SG13, Fractal Node 202.

Also, with an older card, you wouldn't have to use a FE design. CyberPower uses bulk buys of ASUS, GIGABYTE, and EVGA cards in their builds... And notice how all OEMs have increased cooler sizes for RTX. It may be because of the 2-fan NVIDIA card, but what if this card runs hot to begin with?

Finally, SSDs don't come across as "cheap" to me. Cheap 500GB HDDs (admittedly 5400 RPM) are $43 USD in 2.5" form factor. A decent 500GB SSD comes in at $90. That's a massive difference and this isn't even PCIe. Don't get me wrong, SSDs are great, but they aren't particularly cheap. Maybe it's my college-student penny-pinching coming into play.

If you don't agree with me here, that's ok :D you do you!
 

Freeman1

Chassis Packer
Original poster
Sep 12, 2018
16
4
I think you might have misinterpreted what I said... I only mentioned practicality issues with the "high-end" component of your idea, and I didn't say anything about power supplies, 2 PCIe slots, or HDDs. I was also suggesting use of smaller cases from the stated OEMs (e.g. SG13, Fractal Node 202.

Also, with an older card, you wouldn't have to use a FE design. CyberPower uses bulk buys of ASUS, GIGABYTE, and EVGA cards in their builds... And notice how all OEMs have increased cooler sizes for RTX. It may be because of the 2-fan NVIDIA card, but what if this card runs hot to begin with?

Finally, SSDs don't come across as "cheap" to me. Cheap 500GB HDDs (admittedly 5400 RPM) are $43 USD in 2.5" form factor. A decent 500GB SSD comes in at $90. That's a massive difference and this isn't even PCIe. Don't get me wrong, SSDs are great, but they aren't particularly cheap. Maybe it's my college-student penny-pinching coming into play.

If you don't agree with me here, that's ok :D you do you!
well the reason of the whole project will be the custom case
I know they use all cheap fan designs but I do find that the FE still has a good value when you consider cooling power/ size. I still could get a KFA2 a little cheaper which comes in plastic and instead of saying Geforce RTX it says: "What's your game?" Just hilarious, wonder that those companies are still on the market. The design of the FE will compliment my case. It's a premium product.

well the cheapest m.2 PCIe ssds cost about 15% more than m.2 Sata SSDs which cost the same as 2.5 SSDs. You get 1500MB/s read/ write within a formfactor that is many times smaller without any moving parts. Paying a bit more than double that price sounds just awesome to me.
 
  • Like
Reactions: el01

Valantar

Shrink Ray Wielder
Jan 20, 2018
2,201
2,225
How much is *significant* to you? 10-15%? Cause that's how much a region's primary distributor gets, at least on motherboards, according to a friend who runs a computer shop. Granted they do get more in store credit and surpluses, promo items, but that's not applicable here.

Look, just trying to manage your expectation here - not pulling you down or anything.
Yep, that's in line with what I've heard from similarly positioned acquaintances back when I worked in PC component retail. Granted, that was a few years back, but I sincerely doubt margins for AIB partners, distributors and retailers have improved since then - in fact, I'm quite willing to bet that the opposite has happened. Back in my day, retailer margins for CPUs, GPUs and other expensive hardware were often in the 3-5% range.



OP: If I were you, one of the first things I would do would be to contact a major PC/consumer electronics service provider in your target market (North America? The EU? Both? More? You'll need coverage for all markets, or clear terms outlining shipping requirements for those outside) and get a quote for providing basic warranty service for a given number of units for a given number of years. This will in all likelihood be cheaper and easier than attempting to do this yourself or hiring a technician to do it - at least unless you're aiming for a very low volume. Then, figure out the design, prototyping and manufacturing cost of making a custom case (I suppose some people on these forums might be able to help there?). That'll help you figure out the kind of margins you'll need on each sold unit to stay afloat at any given number of sales. Then you can start figuring out if this is feasible at the number of sales you had envisioned, or if you have to increase or decrease your goals. The lower the number, the higher your margins will need to be to make this work, and the higher the number, the more of an undertaking this is (not to mention the higher the difficulty of actually reaching your sales goal).


Of course, there is an "easier" way of going about this: design the case you want on your own, and crowdfund it as a DIY case. Cases generally don't need much warranty coverage (unless you use really bad materials or have glaring design flaws), and you'll be addressing a larger potential market. If the case is successful (or at least you end up with a very good prototype to show off), you can pitch it to one or more bespoke PC building companies (the likes of CyberPowerPC, Maingear and so on) and try to convince them to adopt your design for a product line (or make use of their supply chain for a whole-PC crowdfunding campaign). A step-by-step approach like this is far more likely to succeed. Of course, as shown by the Cerberus, crowdfunding custom-designed SFF cases isn't easy.
 
  • Like
Reactions: el01

el01

King of Cable Management
Jun 4, 2018
770
588
well the reason of the whole project will be the custom case
I know they use all cheap fan designs but I do find that the FE still has a good value when you consider cooling power/ size. I still could get a KFA2 a little cheaper which comes in plastic and instead of saying Geforce RTX it says: "What's your game?" Just hilarious, wonder that those companies are still on the market. The design of the FE will compliment my case. It's a premium product.

well the cheapest m.2 PCIe ssds cost about 15% more than m.2 Sata SSDs which cost the same as 2.5 SSDs. You get 1500MB/s read/ write within a formfactor that is many times smaller without any moving parts. Paying a bit more than double that price sounds just awesome to me.
I understand the storage part (I get that moar money means moar performance but HDDs are fine for me), but how is the EVGA iCX cooler or the Strix cooler "cheap"? Also, by now I could say that the Vega AMD blower cooler is the most "premium" because it arguably looks subjectively the best. Finally, why do you feel the need to use an RTX card? Benchmarks aren't out yet, and it needs testing and optimization in games. Some people just don't want to spend the money on RTX.


Does this cooler look good enough?


TL;DR: I feel as if you are tunneling into more and more of a niche, going for a very very specific user who wants RTX, X299, ITX, a custom case, all SSD storage (HDDs are still widely used), AND a reference cooler. If this can make money, great! I fully encourage you to go along, I'm just adding a few suggestions.

P.S. The KFA2 is designed for LN2. Most buyers will just throw the cooler into a bucket and slap a LN2 pot onto the thing.
 

Freeman1

Chassis Packer
Original poster
Sep 12, 2018
16
4
I understand the storage part (I get that moar money means moar performance but HDDs are fine for me), but how is the EVGA iCX cooler or the Strix cooler "cheap"? Also, by now I could say that the Vega AMD blower cooler is the most "premium" because it arguably looks subjectively the best. Finally, why do you feel the need to use an RTX card? Benchmarks aren't out yet, and it needs testing and optimization in games. Some people just don't want to spend the money on RTX.


Does this cooler look good enough?


TL;DR: I feel as if you are tunneling into more and more of a niche, going for a very very specific user who wants RTX, X299, ITX, a custom case, all SSD storage (HDDs are still widely used), AND a reference cooler. If this can make money, great! I fully encourage you to go along, I'm just adding a few suggestions.

P.S. The KFA2 is designed for LN2. Most buyers will just throw the cooler into a bucket and slap a LN2 pot onto the thing.

about that graphics card thing. My case will only allow for max 27cm long graphic cards. I doubt that I will get a cheap GTX 1080Ti. They would have to be extremely cheap that I would consider them. They are much more inefficient which means more power draw which means the psu would be more expensive. People love that RTX thing. I don't care I want to play in 4K. I looked through all the cards RTX 2080 and the Tis. Within this length there're only a handful of cards, 3 with a extremely ugly design and then the one from EVGA which is ok but I don't think they will be a lot cheaper. Ti maybe 2080 not a lot.
 
  • Like
Reactions: el01

Freeman1

Chassis Packer
Original poster
Sep 12, 2018
16
4
Yep, that's in line with what I've heard from similarly positioned acquaintances back when I worked in PC component retail. Granted, that was a few years back, but I sincerely doubt margins for AIB partners, distributors and retailers have improved since then - in fact, I'm quite willing to bet that the opposite has happened. Back in my day, retailer margins for CPUs, GPUs and other expensive hardware were often in the 3-5% range.



OP: If I were you, one of the first things I would do would be to contact a major PC/consumer electronics service provider in your target market (North America? The EU? Both? More? You'll need coverage for all markets, or clear terms outlining shipping requirements for those outside) and get a quote for providing basic warranty service for a given number of units for a given number of years. This will in all likelihood be cheaper and easier than attempting to do this yourself or hiring a technician to do it - at least unless you're aiming for a very low volume. Then, figure out the design, prototyping and manufacturing cost of making a custom case (I suppose some people on these forums might be able to help there?). That'll help you figure out the kind of margins you'll need on each sold unit to stay afloat at any given number of sales. Then you can start figuring out if this is feasible at the number of sales you had envisioned, or if you have to increase or decrease your goals. The lower the number, the higher your margins will need to be to make this work, and the higher the number, the more of an undertaking this is (not to mention the higher the difficulty of actually reaching your sales goal).


Of course, there is an "easier" way of going about this: design the case you want on your own, and crowdfund it as a DIY case. Cases generally don't need much warranty coverage (unless you use really bad materials or have glaring design flaws), and you'll be addressing a larger potential market. If the case is successful (or at least you end up with a very good prototype to show off), you can pitch it to one or more bespoke PC building companies (the likes of CyberPowerPC, Maingear and so on) and try to convince them to adopt your design for a product line (or make use of their supply chain for a whole-PC crowdfunding campaign). A step-by-step approach like this is far more likely to succeed. Of course, as shown by the Cerberus, crowdfunding custom-designed SFF cases isn't easy.

Good points. Yeah having it serviced by other companies sounds good except that the best service they do is the bare minimum you would expect as a service.
 

el01

King of Cable Management
Jun 4, 2018
770
588
about that graphics card thing. My case will only allow for max 27cm long graphic cards. I doubt that I will get a cheap GTX 1080Ti. They would have to be extremely cheap that I would consider them. They are much more inefficient which means more power draw which means the psu would be more expensive. People love that RTX thing. I don't care I want to play in 4K. I looked through all the cards RTX 2080 and the Tis. Within this length there're only a handful of cards, 3 with a extremely ugly design and then the one from EVGA which is ok but I don't think they will be a lot cheaper. Ti maybe 2080 not a lot.
OK, Cool! :D

Not sure about the RTX "love" though... most people are VERY suspicious...
 

Freeman1

Chassis Packer
Original poster
Sep 12, 2018
16
4
OK, Cool! :D

Not sure about the RTX "love" though... most people are VERY suspicious...

True. But ask a average person who wants to buy a new PC this year what they do think about RTX. They're all brainwashed by the BS marketing. The biggest improvement for me is the cooler. The first time in history that there's an "metal cooler design" what is actual usable and looks nice.
 
  • Like
Reactions: el01

Josh | NFC

Not From Concentrate
NFC Systems
Jun 12, 2015
1,869
4,466
www.nfc-systems.com
Been here (except with private and personal funding) and done that.

After 5 years of pain I asked myself this question:

Why would I go through the massive effort and cost designing, building, storing, shipping, and supporting systems for FREE when I could just sell the ONLY thing people were buying our system for in the first place.

Isolate what makes your idea valuable, sell it for the same amount you would take home with a complete system and save yourself the huge cost and monopoly of your life. The total expenses of what you are proposing are very high--it isn't just about the sticker price on power supplies and GPUs. Crowdfunding is not the answer.

If you go through with this all you are doing is alot of free work for NextComputing, Pudget Systems, Logic Supply, or some other S.I. that you will end up paying to do all this for you professionally.

My 2c :)

Peace and good luck in your adventure!
 

Valantar

Shrink Ray Wielder
Jan 20, 2018
2,201
2,225
Good points. Yeah having it serviced by other companies sounds good except that the best service they do is the bare minimum you would expect as a service.
That might be, though I suppose that varies wildly between providers (and what you pay them for). Then again, are you proposing to do this yourself? Can you afford for this to be your full-time job for the next few years? Or can you afford to hire a full-time technician? You likely won't need one for low production volumes, but getting one part time will likely be a challenge - not to mention getting them a place to work and all necessary equipment. Then there's the need for someone to answer the phone and emails and so on. The point being: this alone is a lot of work.

about that graphics card thing. My case will only allow for max 27cm long graphic cards. I doubt that I will get a cheap GTX 1080Ti. They would have to be extremely cheap that I would consider them. They are much more inefficient which means more power draw which means the psu would be more expensive. People love that RTX thing. I don't care I want to play in 4K. I looked through all the cards RTX 2080 and the Tis. Within this length there're only a handful of cards, 3 with a extremely ugly design and then the one from EVGA which is ok but I don't think they will be a lot cheaper. Ti maybe 2080 not a lot.
Much more efficient? Nvidia's projections are a ~35% rasterization performance increase, though that's still to be seen. Also, that's likely with the Founders Edition, which has a (marginally) higher TDP than the 1080Ti. Not to mention that both base and boost clocks are lower than the previous generation. In short: there's no indication of a large improvement in efficiency here. A small one? Sure, that's likely. But nothing earth-shattering. The x80 and x70 cards have quite dramatic TDP increases. Also, alongside this: worse efficiency doesn't mean higher power draw, just less performance. Given the TDPs, Pascal cards will run cooler and draw less power than Turing ones.
 

Freeman1

Chassis Packer
Original poster
Sep 12, 2018
16
4
That might be, though I suppose that varies wildly between providers (and what you pay them for). Then again, are you proposing to do this yourself? Can you afford for this to be your full-time job for the next few years? Or can you afford to hire a full-time technician? You likely won't need one for low production volumes, but getting one part time will likely be a challenge - not to mention getting them a place to work and all necessary equipment. Then there's the need for someone to answer the phone and emails and so on. The point being: this alone is a lot of work.


Much more efficient? Nvidia's projections are a ~35% rasterization performance increase, though that's still to be seen. Also, that's likely with the Founders Edition, which has a (marginally) higher TDP than the 1080Ti. Not to mention that both base and boost clocks are lower than the previous generation. In short: there's no indication of a large improvement in efficiency here. A small one? Sure, that's likely. But nothing earth-shattering. The x80 and x70 cards have quite dramatic TDP increases. Also, alongside this: worse efficiency doesn't mean higher power draw, just less performance. Given the TDPs, Pascal cards will run cooler and draw less power than Turing ones.

yeah if you compare 1080s with 2080s then off course. Considering the RTX 2070 will perform between a GTX 1080 and a GTX 1080Ti, I think that's pretty good. BTW the 30W higher power draw is due the USB-C Port I guess.
 
Last edited:

Freeman1

Chassis Packer
Original poster
Sep 12, 2018
16
4
Been here (except with private and personal funding) and done that.

After 5 years of pain I asked myself this question:

Why would I go through the massive effort and cost designing, building, storing, shipping, and supporting systems for FREE when I could just sell the ONLY thing people were buying our system for in the first place.

Isolate what makes your idea valuable, sell it for the same amount you would take home with a complete system and save yourself the huge cost and monopoly of your life. The total expenses of what you are proposing are very high--it isn't just about the sticker price on power supplies and GPUs. Crowdfunding is not the answer.

If you go through with this all you are doing is alot of free work for NextComputing, Pudget Systems, Logic Supply, or some other S.I. that you will end up paying to do all this for you professionally.

My 2c :)

Peace and good luck in your adventure!

Right. The case I built right now will be definitly not good to sell as a case. When I would want to sell a case I've another project. Maybe I will work on this sometime later. I feel very confident about what I want to do, I understand what it involves. I want people to be able to purchase complete builds from my site anyways at some time later in my life. Why not do it now. I will keep you all updated.