GN Could Make a PC Case: We Need Your Input on This Opportunity
video description
I know people will start shitting on me in the replies, but hey, you asked for out help and opinion, so here it is. Hope it helps. Cheers.
Date: 2020-11-16
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Comments and reviews: 9
DreadZeppelin
Short version:
First off: yes I'm interested.
On the 'bramble' you mentioned, I think that due to- and because of the trust you've built in the GN brand over the years you have a lot of goodwill in the community. But I feel people will still watch to see what other reviews will say, this is partially because I feel unbiased opinions and transparency are basically core values of the GN brand. And partially because I think the more of a superuser someone is the more discerning they will be, even towards something made by a brand they trust (sometimes especially so if it's the first product of a new type from that brand). So those are things you might expect.
Personalisation of the case(s) (if possible without exceeding costs) would be a plus in my opinion.
If you decide to do this try to keep the project fun for yourself, don't forget to get feedback from some fresh pairs of eyes before going into production.
Bonus points for instructional videos (for beginners).
- - -
Long version with partially parroted concerns due to writing while watching:
If you make a product like this you'll obviously have to decide how many options you want to give the buyer/user.
Because while I personally might like to see a clean understated case with maybe a small GN logo (possibly with LED backlight) I can understand you or other users would want your (definitely well-designed) logo front and center. So if the option is available and it doesn't drive the cost through the roof that might be an idea aside from other things like sidepanel variations.
Aside from that I trust you and your team have enough experience with different cases to know what to avoid. And possibly how to add some type of build customisation in the form of removable parts. And from the video I understand that you realise the trust you've built with the audience and the amount of responsibility that comes from that. Just don't let the pressure crush you and suck all of the fun out of actually creating something.
Bonus points if you can add a video or point by point building guide for beginners (because the more people really get into tech, the better the products will have to be to satisfy base customer demands). And finally, if you work on a project for a long time it's smart to get fresh eyes on it and some feedback before you go into full production.
I'm sorry for possibly addressing things that you're already keeping in mind or things that are very obvious. I was writing this while watching the full video so I wouldn't forget anything.
-Written by someone who studied UD/UX and is now studying marketing, if that means anything.
(P.S. If you've read all of this, congratulations on reading this thesis! I might have made assumptions and be wrong at points but I hope the community as a whole can help create the best GN can make)
reply
Short version:
First off: yes I'm interested.
On the 'bramble' you mentioned, I think that due to- and because of the trust you've built in the GN brand over the years you have a lot of goodwill in the community. But I feel people will still watch to see what other reviews will say, this is partially because I feel unbiased opinions and transparency are basically core values of the GN brand. And partially because I think the more of a superuser someone is the more discerning they will be, even towards something made by a brand they trust (sometimes especially so if it's the first product of a new type from that brand). So those are things you might expect.
Personalisation of the case(s) (if possible without exceeding costs) would be a plus in my opinion.
If you decide to do this try to keep the project fun for yourself, don't forget to get feedback from some fresh pairs of eyes before going into production.
Bonus points for instructional videos (for beginners).
- - -
Long version with partially parroted concerns due to writing while watching:
If you make a product like this you'll obviously have to decide how many options you want to give the buyer/user.
Because while I personally might like to see a clean understated case with maybe a small GN logo (possibly with LED backlight) I can understand you or other users would want your (definitely well-designed) logo front and center. So if the option is available and it doesn't drive the cost through the roof that might be an idea aside from other things like sidepanel variations.
Aside from that I trust you and your team have enough experience with different cases to know what to avoid. And possibly how to add some type of build customisation in the form of removable parts. And from the video I understand that you realise the trust you've built with the audience and the amount of responsibility that comes from that. Just don't let the pressure crush you and suck all of the fun out of actually creating something.
Bonus points if you can add a video or point by point building guide for beginners (because the more people really get into tech, the better the products will have to be to satisfy base customer demands). And finally, if you work on a project for a long time it's smart to get fresh eyes on it and some feedback before you go into full production.
I'm sorry for possibly addressing things that you're already keeping in mind or things that are very obvious. I was writing this while watching the full video so I wouldn't forget anything.
-Written by someone who studied UD/UX and is now studying marketing, if that means anything.
(P.S. If you've read all of this, congratulations on reading this thesis! I might have made assumptions and be wrong at points but I hope the community as a whole can help create the best GN can make)
reply
Jani
I don't think it's a bad idea to go with building a case, I just feel that if it's completely necessary to enter such a thing but that really depends on many things.
First I would think is the size of the case. While bigger cases are easier to work with and probably gain meaningful improvements with simple changes, I still would rather see GN go with ITX design, 9-20 liter range. But such cases haven't really been what most of the reviews have been in GN, so somehow I don't quite expect those to be what your after, maybe. Smaller case would be really interesting as a design and let's focus on Formd T1 ITX-case. CNC'd aluminum which user puts together him/herself, easier to storage logisticswise, improvements would probably be easier to do and on the fly if mainframe doesn't get changed.
If not that T1 route, then just improve In Win A1, since that got so much love out of you.
Smaller cases would have their own problems to deal with but it would be really interesting to see how you deal with them.
If the design would be bigger, then you'd really be competing with Lian Li O11 cases and some others, which are really big cases and I think many companies will try compete with. And if you'd go with bigger case I'd as why make such a thing, all you would get is a lot of empty space underutilized inside the case.
I'd rather see yourself challenged with this and not take the easy route.
One conflict might be if you design or build a case, how it might situate you to review other company cases if you have financial interest in similar product range. Might be far fetched but I might see someone try to discredit with. Personally I don't see this as a problem knowing how GN works.
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I don't think it's a bad idea to go with building a case, I just feel that if it's completely necessary to enter such a thing but that really depends on many things.
First I would think is the size of the case. While bigger cases are easier to work with and probably gain meaningful improvements with simple changes, I still would rather see GN go with ITX design, 9-20 liter range. But such cases haven't really been what most of the reviews have been in GN, so somehow I don't quite expect those to be what your after, maybe. Smaller case would be really interesting as a design and let's focus on Formd T1 ITX-case. CNC'd aluminum which user puts together him/herself, easier to storage logisticswise, improvements would probably be easier to do and on the fly if mainframe doesn't get changed.
If not that T1 route, then just improve In Win A1, since that got so much love out of you.
Smaller cases would have their own problems to deal with but it would be really interesting to see how you deal with them.
If the design would be bigger, then you'd really be competing with Lian Li O11 cases and some others, which are really big cases and I think many companies will try compete with. And if you'd go with bigger case I'd as why make such a thing, all you would get is a lot of empty space underutilized inside the case.
I'd rather see yourself challenged with this and not take the easy route.
One conflict might be if you design or build a case, how it might situate you to review other company cases if you have financial interest in similar product range. Might be far fetched but I might see someone try to discredit with. Personally I don't see this as a problem knowing how GN works.
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Ron
As a Financial Guy I see nothing but risk here. Primarily, you run the risk of undermining your core product (yourselves as reviewers.) As soon as a manufacturer takes whatever design you want, and interprets it, you lose control. Yes you can tie yourselves up in legal protection to try to avoid that situation, but you may find pulling your name from a product a lot harder, longer and far more expensive than you're expecting. You could potentially be involved in litigation for years. The only way to avoid this problem is to manufacture for yourselves, which you say you're not in a position to do right now. Given that, I'd give this option a hard pass. Focus on what you do best - in depth testing and reviews. If you decided to partner-up, even if your end-product is a TOTAL success, every other case review you do after that will be inherently undermined - because you'll be (rightly) viewed as its competitor from the outset. This affect will then spread from just cases to any other product you review. Anything from a supplier that's not the one you're partnered with will be viewed as similarly tainted too. You could fatally damage your hard-earned high standing by doing absolutely nothing wrong - you know how fickle the internet can be. So, from a Financial / Investment viewpoint: For me, there are far too many significant dangers here, and not enough potential rewards. I wish you the best whichever way you decide to go.
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As a Financial Guy I see nothing but risk here. Primarily, you run the risk of undermining your core product (yourselves as reviewers.) As soon as a manufacturer takes whatever design you want, and interprets it, you lose control. Yes you can tie yourselves up in legal protection to try to avoid that situation, but you may find pulling your name from a product a lot harder, longer and far more expensive than you're expecting. You could potentially be involved in litigation for years. The only way to avoid this problem is to manufacture for yourselves, which you say you're not in a position to do right now. Given that, I'd give this option a hard pass. Focus on what you do best - in depth testing and reviews. If you decided to partner-up, even if your end-product is a TOTAL success, every other case review you do after that will be inherently undermined - because you'll be (rightly) viewed as its competitor from the outset. This affect will then spread from just cases to any other product you review. Anything from a supplier that's not the one you're partnered with will be viewed as similarly tainted too. You could fatally damage your hard-earned high standing by doing absolutely nothing wrong - you know how fickle the internet can be. So, from a Financial / Investment viewpoint: For me, there are far too many significant dangers here, and not enough potential rewards. I wish you the best whichever way you decide to go.
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Gormador
This sounds like a fair bargain, as laid out in this video. Frankly, with your transparency reputation I am more concerned that this is yet another thing GN is tackling (though you guys don't require sleep apparently, so who knows), not really on how it could be perceived as a conflict of interest. The only thing I would be concerned with would be that you end up harsher on that company's other products when you review them, just to make it clear that you keep things separate. But I wouldn't be surprised if you stopped reviewing those products for the duration of GN's involvement with that company altogether, and doing benchmark only .
Regarding the pressure element to achieve what you ask of others: you probably won't on a first try, and that's fine by me. Also, there are too many different types of cases to reasonably please everyone and that's fine too, of course.
All in all, this looks like a project that would benefit all parties involved, us the viewers included.
I say have at it, have fun with it, pull your hair out (not too much, Steve) due to it and make us watch. :-)
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This sounds like a fair bargain, as laid out in this video. Frankly, with your transparency reputation I am more concerned that this is yet another thing GN is tackling (though you guys don't require sleep apparently, so who knows), not really on how it could be perceived as a conflict of interest. The only thing I would be concerned with would be that you end up harsher on that company's other products when you review them, just to make it clear that you keep things separate. But I wouldn't be surprised if you stopped reviewing those products for the duration of GN's involvement with that company altogether, and doing benchmark only .
Regarding the pressure element to achieve what you ask of others: you probably won't on a first try, and that's fine by me. Also, there are too many different types of cases to reasonably please everyone and that's fine too, of course.
All in all, this looks like a project that would benefit all parties involved, us the viewers included.
I say have at it, have fun with it, pull your hair out (not too much, Steve) due to it and make us watch. :-)
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Mille
What do I think? --> Your honesty, transparency and the fact that you are today fully unbiased is one of the most important factors that I choose watching your content. If this decision you are making now would put your unbiasedness at risk and possibly be colored in any way, I would start rethinking.
But...
What scenarios can you imagine ending up in?
What does this company have to loose / gain from this cooperation?
I hear you in the video that there is a very interesting financial possibility. The community gain would be a good case, but is that really a guarantee?
I would say a way to eat the cake and have it too: if you have a one time payment from the company, with your inputs as consultancy and open to any of the manufacturers, you would then not be biased towards just one company. This sort of opens up for further financial possibilities and does not limit you to any single manufacturer/company keeping you less biased. Or?
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What do I think? --> Your honesty, transparency and the fact that you are today fully unbiased is one of the most important factors that I choose watching your content. If this decision you are making now would put your unbiasedness at risk and possibly be colored in any way, I would start rethinking.
But...
What scenarios can you imagine ending up in?
What does this company have to loose / gain from this cooperation?
I hear you in the video that there is a very interesting financial possibility. The community gain would be a good case, but is that really a guarantee?
I would say a way to eat the cake and have it too: if you have a one time payment from the company, with your inputs as consultancy and open to any of the manufacturers, you would then not be biased towards just one company. This sort of opens up for further financial possibilities and does not limit you to any single manufacturer/company keeping you less biased. Or?
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Arda
I disagree with your performance before anything else approach to cases so I am guessing I won't be interested in your case. In my opinion the market lacks a clean minimal looking ATX case. Something that Apple could have made. NZXT H510 is the only popular case I can think of. PC cases can look minimal and beautiful while being well built and functional as we can see from many SFF cases. I am guessing you would prefer airflow and performance so much that it will end up not looking great but I would like to be surprised ofc.
To give an example the only reason I am looking for an sff build this black friday is that I need a tower that wont look horrible in a modern and well furnished space. Not on a test bench, not in a workshop, in a living space. Aesthetics in PCs have been going the wrong route for a long time imo. And this needs to change.
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I disagree with your performance before anything else approach to cases so I am guessing I won't be interested in your case. In my opinion the market lacks a clean minimal looking ATX case. Something that Apple could have made. NZXT H510 is the only popular case I can think of. PC cases can look minimal and beautiful while being well built and functional as we can see from many SFF cases. I am guessing you would prefer airflow and performance so much that it will end up not looking great but I would like to be surprised ofc.
To give an example the only reason I am looking for an sff build this black friday is that I need a tower that wont look horrible in a modern and well furnished space. Not on a test bench, not in a workshop, in a living space. Aesthetics in PCs have been going the wrong route for a long time imo. And this needs to change.
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valsunho
You've covered the ethics part quite comprehensively, but the one thing that popped to mind was the possible contract details of the case manufacturer in question. If the contract has some sort of royalty clause based on the amount of cases sold, that could, for some people, weaken the objectivity of the final coverage of the case. But I absolutely agree, that no other outlet has the sheer amount of quality data on case performance that you do, so you should still cover the case. I, for one, would be unaffected by this detail, but it could matter for some. GN is the only case reviewer that I can actually wholly trust, so to make clear: not questioning your ethics, just something that came to mind! So, if you really want to do it - you should. Many people, me included, would be very interested in a product designed by GN.
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You've covered the ethics part quite comprehensively, but the one thing that popped to mind was the possible contract details of the case manufacturer in question. If the contract has some sort of royalty clause based on the amount of cases sold, that could, for some people, weaken the objectivity of the final coverage of the case. But I absolutely agree, that no other outlet has the sheer amount of quality data on case performance that you do, so you should still cover the case. I, for one, would be unaffected by this detail, but it could matter for some. GN is the only case reviewer that I can actually wholly trust, so to make clear: not questioning your ethics, just something that came to mind! So, if you really want to do it - you should. Many people, me included, would be very interested in a product designed by GN.
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Gamers
Edit: Thank you to everyone who has been posting the well thought-out comments! We have been reading all of them. At this point, there are too many to respond to every single one, but we are reading them. Thank you to everyone who has put time in to think about this.
Please watch the whole video before leaving detailed or lengthy comments. Thank you for watching. It's important that, if you plan to leave a well-informed comment, you hear the points we made so that you don't just repeat things we already said or know/acknowledged. We'd appreciate it. We'd really like earnest feedback from the community and getting the best quality feedback requires that you hear what we said. Just watch it on 2x or something!
reply
Edit: Thank you to everyone who has been posting the well thought-out comments! We have been reading all of them. At this point, there are too many to respond to every single one, but we are reading them. Thank you to everyone who has put time in to think about this.
Please watch the whole video before leaving detailed or lengthy comments. Thank you for watching. It's important that, if you plan to leave a well-informed comment, you hear the points we made so that you don't just repeat things we already said or know/acknowledged. We'd appreciate it. We'd really like earnest feedback from the community and getting the best quality feedback requires that you hear what we said. Just watch it on 2x or something!
reply
Chaim
Conclusion : Yes.
Reasoning:
A) The biggest downside for me is not that the review of your case would be biased. It is that you would have a product in competition with other cases you are reviewing.
So how trustworthy are the case reviews published in the 3(-ish) years following the making of this case?
B) I am cheap. And I have a working tower. So I am neither going to be buying your case, nor any case that you recommend within the foreseeable future. So the independence of your tests is only tangently relevant to me.
C) The in-depth design process piece(s) are definitely going to be interested in.
Whatever you decide to do, good luck!
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Conclusion : Yes.
Reasoning:
A) The biggest downside for me is not that the review of your case would be biased. It is that you would have a product in competition with other cases you are reviewing.
So how trustworthy are the case reviews published in the 3(-ish) years following the making of this case?
B) I am cheap. And I have a working tower. So I am neither going to be buying your case, nor any case that you recommend within the foreseeable future. So the independence of your tests is only tangently relevant to me.
C) The in-depth design process piece(s) are definitely going to be interested in.
Whatever you decide to do, good luck!
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