Wud Legerity

For me, the question is less about Vessel and more about LTT. There's nothing else on vessel I'm interested in besides LTT. LTT does not produce enough relative content for me to justify 20$ a year. If I could buy all the LMG content access for say 20$ a year I would be interested. No ads of course...

Something I though would be cool is if you got two sheets of thick glass, one on bottom and another about 6 inches above it. You could put your keyboard, monitor, and computer up on the top sheet of glass for easy use, any other things would go on the bottom so you can still see them and have them in reach.  You can do this with any wood and some glass for pretty cheap.  LEDs would look great on it.  You can do a external water cooling setup on the bottom which would look great.  Just adding some brass anywhere you see fit would make it a great steam punk build.  If your computer is heavy don't put it on the glass.

Considering I recently went through this process, let me ask a couple of qualifying questions.
1. Is your budget lifetime firm? (Are you planning on upgrading as you go over the life of your rig.)
If yes, then im too assume in a couple years your just gonna sell this one off and restart.
If no, then can we agree that having a budget under 1,000 takes aesthetics out of the ball park but you can still have an awesomely functional rig.
2. What about a rig that comes in under your 800$ limit w/ no graphics card?
The idea being that you could spend some more on your PSU, CPU and MOBO. Allowing for greater upgrade range and longer relevant life of your rig.
I did this by purchasing a Intel chip with graphics included. I used my rig for CAD and other productivity based software. After 3 months, I purchased a gtx980. I did not plan on spending that much on my graphics card when I first started, however now im really happy I waited and got into my rig before I purchased my Gcard.
My thought process on pc building has changed entirley since I was in your shoes.
I see a lot of valid points above on the intricacies of pc componets. My thought is that you may need a build expectation plan, more than a
build purchase list.
"Slow is smooth and smooth is fast"

There isn't any issues with runnign your PC sideways, the PSU won't care really, DVD/Blueray drives can operate sideways, including HDD. As for scratching I'd add some feet onto the corners of the sidepanels where it meets the frame of the case if you want to elevate if off the table a bit.