SENTRY: Console-sized gaming PC case project

[potatoproduction]

Try to contact them here:

http://zaber.com.pl/sentry/#contact

[darksable]

3 hours ago, GermanPCBuilder said:

I was looking at this case and im actually considering building in it , now my question, how much is it ? I cant find its price anywhere.

The ending price is going to be determined by how many people are interested in it - the creators can get a lot better deals from their metal shop (and less cost swallowed from ddefects) by buying in significant volume.

 

The case isn't for sale yet, as they're in negotiations with said metal shop, and then will be figuring out the easiest way to sell the case that can't screw either them or the consumer. Apperently EU law is somewhat troublesome and prevented them from just selling from their website like they were originally planning.

[SaperPL]

Almost correct except for:

40 minutes ago, darksable said:

Apperently EU law is somewhat troublesome and prevented them from just selling from their website like they were originally planning.

There are two problems storefront payment processing discouraging us from implementing it on our website:

1) There are rules making it so that in the end you need to sell from stock, at least for first three months (paypal, but similar in others)

We'd have to sell first 25 units out of stock and wait 3 months to get free of this lock.

 

2) There are rules letting the payment processor randomly audit our website for security and pull the plug on payments without alerting us beforehand.

I'm not an expert in web security and I can't be sure that our web server is going to be always rock solid since it's a 3rd party, so random audit may blow us away over some small misconfigurations of our website.

 

About the price - we can't be sure of it until we know where our metal subcontractor stands on our quality requirements. We just have to be sure they won't just stop manufacturing at some point because the product is too complex for the quality we want and leave us with all other orders to handle.

[Beeeyeee]

8 hours ago, GermanPCBuilder said:

I was looking at this case and im actually considering building in it , now my question, how much is it ? I cant find its price anywhere.

To answer your question they were thinking around $150-170. Not bad at all for a high quality case made by a not big company.

[YourWaifuIsShit]

3 hours ago, Beeeyeee said:

To answer your question they were thinking around $150-170. Not bad at all for a high quality case made by a not big company.

Believe they just said trying to keep it below $200. But let's hope it's around that range. With the CAD to USD conversion nowadays that's going to be more expensive for me. 

 

Saper and Zombi, great job on the design. My laptop has officially died 3 hr ago and I am definitely building a computer with this case when it is available. In the meanwhile I guess I will try to reuse the laptop screen, keyboard and touch pad as the IO for my build, for a ULTRA portable system.

 

I hope I don't need to wait toooo long for the case. Is there any way to get in on the first batch of 25? And what exactly do you mean by selling those first 25 unit "out of stock"?

 

P.S. Just take my money already jeez.

[ej24]

Hopefully the first batch/run is at least 100 units. 65 black/35 white or maybe 70/30. They'll definitely sell that many. Guessing the ratio of black to white may be difficult. Similar to Samsung guessing only 10% of sales of their Galaxy S would be the curved edge variety and drastically underestimated it leading to shortages forever. Granted, this is much smaller scale.

A survey sent out via the newsletter may be beneficial to get plausible numbers of genuine interest (ie. If it cost $100-150 would you buy? If $150-200?) and an idea for black vs white.

 

Honestly I'd buy two right now at almost any price. Maybe three sentries. 

[Midnightblaze]

I honestly hope you don't do crowd funding. 

personally i would love to purchase 2 unpainted models, however i'm not sure i'm to comfortable giving my credit card information to crowdfunding, in the past flexible funding I've seen used as a way to get money for a project and not follow through. 

 

if you would be so kind as to ease my nerves by guaranteeing us if we pay for a chassis that we will receive one. 

ive been following this since early January 2016 and when i checked this last page last night i was very worried to see that you were thinking about crowd funding.

 

from what i gather you are a company in Poland that makes wind turbines, and this case is a probe into the PC case market, i fear that if you don't get enough orders that this will be my only opportunity to purchase this chassis. (my dream case BTW).

 

please provide us with some guarantee that we can hold you to if we pay you and we don't receive the case i apologize for sounding pessimistic, but I've heard the horror stories about crowd funding in the past and i do not wish to be another sucker.

 

that being said I'm still really interested and would be willing to pay up to $170USD per chassis. when you do begin selling the case will there be an option to order an unpainted model? i saw you mention this in the past.

 

TLDR: I'm nervous about  crowd funding as i feel that there is no guarantee that we will get a case if we pay for one (Mentioning Flexible funding didn't help either). all I'm looking for is some form of LEGAL guarantee that we will not be getting scammed if we chose to support you through crowd funding. also Are you still thinking about offering unpainted models and if so would they be cheaper?

[SaperPL]

The thing with flexible funding is that the campaigner has to declare "risk and challenges" where many projects made things unclear and shady so thus they could get out of it saying they couldn't do it in the end while still taking the money.

 

I'll make sure this is how it works and we'll state to guarantee of getting your unit, regardless if we go with flexible funding or not, since we can go for 100 units target and then have like 1000% funding reached etc. used to promote it even more.

 

We definitely don't want to scam people over our side project when selling it as mechanical engineering company with over 25 years of existence 

[Midnightblaze]

11 minutes ago, SaperPL said:

The thing with flexible funding is that the campaigner has to declare "risk and challenges" where many projects made things unclear and shady so thus they could get out of it saying they couldn't do it in the end while still taking the money.

 

I'll make sure this is how it works and we'll state to guarantee of getting your unit, regardless if we go with flexible funding or not, since we can go for 100 units target and then have like 1000% funding reached etc. used to promote it even more.

 

We definitely don't want to scam people over our side project when selling it as mechanical engineering company with over 25 years of existence

thank you. 

 

i'll be honest im still a little nervous about that, but if there is a clearly written guarantee then I'm inclined to belive you. 

 

Will there be an option to order unpainted models, and will they be cheaper?

 

also will you be able to ship to Canada?

 

and could you provide a rough timeline of where you are in the process? ie. are you talking to a metal fabricator and can we expect this sometime around December or earlier?

[Beeeyeee]

2 hours ago, Midnightblaze said:

thank you. 

 

i'll be honest im still a little nervous about that, but if there is a clearly written guarantee then I'm inclined to belive you. 

 

Will there be an option to order unpainted models, and will they be cheaper?

 

also will you be able to ship to Canada?

 

and could you provide a rough timeline of where you are in the process? ie. are you talking to a metal fabricator and can we expect this sometime around December or earlier?

It would be nice to see some barebones unpainted models.

[Tech Inquisition]

11 hours ago, SaperPL said:

The thing with flexible funding is that the campaigner has to declare "risk and challenges" where many projects made things unclear and shady so thus they could get out of it saying they couldn't do it in the end while still taking the money.

 

I'll make sure this is how it works and we'll state to guarantee of getting your unit, regardless if we go with flexible funding or not, since we can go for 100 units target and then have like 1000% funding reached etc. used to promote it even more.

 

We definitely don't want to scam people over our side project when selling it as mechanical engineering company with over 25 years of existence 

Will keep my eyes open, but if you guys do open a Kickstarter or similar funding page... link it here so we can "invest"

[nilaoba]

Wondering if the case comes out first or the coolchip kinetic CPU cooler. Need both to complete my dream build

[79 Potatoes]

I noticed the "Ą" in the name

I've been lied all this time!

 

[Midnightblaze]

2 hours ago, 79 Potatoes said:

 

I noticed the "Ą" in the name

I've been lied all this time!

 

What "A" in what name?

[79 Potatoes]

6 hours ago, Midnightblaze said:

What "A" in what name?

"Ą" not "A"

Noticeably different pronunciation

It's Ząber not zaber

[Octagoncow]

26 minutes ago, 79 Potatoes said:

"Ą" not "A"

Noticeably different pronunciation

It's Ząber not zaber

I'm amazed that I haven't noticed this before. I'm pretty sure I would have gone the rest of my life without realizing that it's not "A" if you hadn't pointed this out. How is it pronounced then? 

[79 Potatoes]

22 minutes ago, Octagoncow said:

I'm amazed that I haven't noticed this before. I'm pretty sure I would have gone the rest of my life without realizing that it's not "A" if you hadn't pointed this out. How is it pronounced then? 

similar to a nasal o, similar to french "bon" (not the same, I just can't think of an example )

[YourWaifuIsShit]

Can you give us a quick update after you talk to the metal contractors Saper and Zombi? Would help if I can plan ahead.

[Beeeyeee]

3 minutes ago, YourWaifuIsShit said:

Can you give us a quick update after you talk to the metal contractors Saper and Zombi? Would help if I can plan ahead.

I'm sure they will, they update as frequently as there is big enough news.

[Midnightblaze]

On 7/17/2015 at 4:13 PM, SaperPL said:

Our target client is someone that wants the smallest possible case fitting top notch components and willing to spent some additional bucks on that at this moment. Also people that want to mod the case for any reason or idea they have since we're making it out of quite thick 1mm metal so you can probably drill some additional holes for mounts and even maybe some water cooling tubing without tearing the metal all around those cuts or you can order the case unpainted and paint it yourself as you wish from scratch. Additionally as the case is almost fully metal you won't have degraded plastics over time especially if you want a white case.

Will you still offer unpainted models? I've seen this multiple times in the thread and when i asked i wasnt given a clear response. I feel that this will impact on my decision to purchase the chassis.

 

Please provide a clear answer if you can as i have adjusted the components i bought to match the colors I'm planning to plant the case. 

 

I don't mean to be pushy or rude but i would really appreciate a clear response as well as others who have commented that they would also like to see unpainted models.

 

also is the case equipped with a kensington lock slot if not i is the steel strong enough to withstand me installing one?

[SaperPL]

On 21.09.2016 at 5:23 PM, Midnightblaze said:

thank you. 

 

i'll be honest im still a little nervous about that, but if there is a clearly written guarantee then I'm inclined to belive you. 

 

Will there be an option to order unpainted models, and will they be cheaper?

 

also will you be able to ship to Canada?

 

and could you provide a rough timeline of where you are in the process? ie. are you talking to a metal fabricator and can we expect this sometime around December or earlier?

We want to ship worldwide but we're not yet sure how will this work with multiple shipping rates with crowdfunding.

 

We're not sure about the timeline yet and at this point we don't want to predict this anymore. We'll be ready when we're ready and we don't want to launch until we are.

 

2 hours ago, Midnightblaze said:

Will you still offer unpainted models? I've seen this multiple times in the thread and when i asked i wasnt given a clear response. I feel that this will impact on my decision to purchase the chassis.

 

Please provide a clear answer if you can as i have adjusted the components i bought to match the colors I'm planning to plant the case. 

 

I don't mean to be pushy or rude but i would really appreciate a clear response as well as others who have commented that they would also like to see unpainted models.

 

also is the case equipped with a kensington lock slot if not i is the steel strong enough to withstand me installing one?

 

We're not sure about selling an unpainted model as an option in crowdfunding since painting is an additional protection against rust and while laser cutting may cauterise galvanic surface, it's still not perfect (laser cutting) and some edges need to be additionally cleared off manually and those spots are finally protected by paint surface.

 

Also powder coating is tiny part of the manufacturing cost - most of it is the metal bending and there are many smaller pieces that are required for whole set like cables, screws and packaging. Getting unpainted version could shave off something like $5 off the final price. 

 

I think that we should probably do a poll on such options to know how many of you are interested in this and other options.

 

Case is not equipped with kensington lock slot since there's literally no space for that (talking about the external piece of the lock) at the back of the case. If you were to make a slot yourself the 1mm steel is enough for the slot, but you should add internal piece of unpainted metal, like in the kensington lock specification, to protect internal paint surface. 

[ZombiPL]

There was no bigger update for a while, so i think You all want to know what we are working on at this moment:

***LITTLE UPDATE***

 

Since this is a community project, we decided to reveal the costs of finalized design of SENTRY and its most probable price selling point (we never had anything to hide J).

 

PROTOTYPING COSTS

 

We’ve made 5 prototypes of SENTRY with 5 or 6 pre-prototypes. The average cost of each of those 5 big prototypes calculated by our accountant was over 4500 USD. If we would like to sum up everything, it would be nearly 30 000 USD  per those 2 years of our „small hobby project”. Of course we didn’t pay all of those money from our pockets, because most of them are our development „working hours”, which we treat as spent for our hobby, but it also includes materials,  production costs, checking quality of different manufacturing companies, our travelling between those companies,  checking different types of manufacturing methods,  ordering small batches of many SENTRY components (most of them just for check), etc.

 

SENTRY TARGET PRICE (indiegogo campaign)

 

During those 2 years we were working not only on the quality of our design, but also to make our production profitable with a small number of  100 units per batch. Average cost of 4500 USD per one prototype can be scary for some, but in mass production we want to lower this price over 20-times (at least). It means, our most probable target selling price for SENTRY should be:

$195 USD + transport costs

This price includes (at this moment):

- 31% - manufacturing costs of metal parts (galvanized steel, laser cutting, punching venting holes, bending,
           point welding, inserting threaded bushings, structural powder coating)
- 19% - components costs (shielded PCI-E riser, USB.3.0 cable, power extension cable, rubber feet, screws,
           foil bags, plastic plugs, rubbers, printed carton boxes, transport boxes, silica gels, etc.)
- 3,2% - internal transport and storage costs
- 4,2% - cost of renting the facility for assembling purposes
- 7,6% - cost of hiring staff for assembling purposes (probably 3-5 people)
- 5% - indiegogo campaign cost
- 3-5% - paypal cost
- 5% - reserve for future improvements,
- 10% - reserve for handling warranty,
- 10% - our profit

 

You all know that we are not a PC-case manufacturers, but we make wind turbines and other heavy-duty stuff, so we understand that, we won’t be doing SENTRY for ever… and we are OK with that. We wanted to make SENTRY as cheap as possible, so we set our profit on a such low level. In time it can rise up to 20% if there won’t be any quality issues in over 100pcs batches (this 10% reserve for handling warranty can change into our profit), plus another 5% if we will get better prices for SENTRY components (if our indiegogo campaign gather bigger number of orders). Some of you will say it’s still not as profitable as PC-cases made with molds in standard PC-cases factories (often over 100%), but for us it’s enought as for a small hobby project, which we’re not doing for living but mostly for fun and as our company’s promotion.

 

OUR NEXT MOVES

 

1.      Final improvements of SENTRY (according to our external reviewers suggestions)
2.      Waiting for our two more external benchmarks, to get better view if we made everything right
3.      Finishing design of rubber-pads serial cutter for SENTRY vertical stand
4.      Signing a contract for a bigger batch with our metal-parts manufacturer
5.      Getting better prices of SENTRY components from our suppliers
6.      Preparing a promotional intro-video for indiegogo campaign
7.      Preparing an indiegogo campaign
8.      Start of indiegogo campaign
9.      Finish of indiegogo campaign
10.    Renting facilities and hiring staff for assembling purposes
11.    Ordering metal parts and SENTRY components
12.    Production/assembling
13.    Sending SENTRY to the indiegogo backers

 

All of those moves we are making simultaneously, so please do not look at them like this is a straight timeline made point-by-point.  What is more, we are not giving any dates, because we are also waiting for answers from our subcontractors, and we still didn’t get them. Not everything depend on us in terms of time.

 

I hope this update satisfied your curiosity (at least for now ).

[Midnightblaze]

Ignore this post I'm trying to quote but it won't let me add it. and i cant seem to delete this post.

[Midnightblaze]

On 9/24/2016 at 1:51 AM, SaperPL said:

I think that we should probably do a poll on such options to know how many of you are interested in this and other options.

So we can Expect somewhere around $200 USD (plus Shipping)?

Will we be able to order multiple units and can we order them unpainted? in an earlier post you said that you might do a poll.

 

Main Question. Can we order Multiple units when they go on sale?

 

and can the case be disassembled to the point where i could strip it with either aircraft stripper or an angle grinder with a wire brush wheel? (how much of it is welded together? can we take it apart to paint it?

11 minutes ago, ZombiPL said:

SENTRY TARGET PRICE (indiegogo campaign)

 

During those 2 years we were working not only on the quality of our design, but also to make our production profitable with a small number of  100 units per batch. Average cost of 4500 USD per one prototype can be scary for some, but in mass production we want to lower this price over 20-times (at least). It means, our most probable target selling price for SENTRY should be:

$195 USD + transport costs

 

[Beeeyeee]

Awesome! I'm glad to hear how well everything is planned out. that means you guys know what you're doing. Can't wait for the case to come out!