There's just no margin in building PC's these days and it been like that for at least the last 10 to 15 years. You need millions of units of volume to play in that space. Even a case couldn't be cost competitive. The only possible way is if there was enough niche interest in a Stardock case that folks would be willing to pay double the cost of a comparable "off the shelf" case and even then they'd be doing well just to break even.

I could see my laptop all done up with a matching MyColors sticker set to go with the Harley Davidson theme..

18 years ago - there was a thing called Disco. My Corolla SR5 had a brand new black paint job and the only sticker i had on it wasn't computer related, more like a "eat my dust" cigar smokin' woodpecker. Mufflers do make noise.

Three streets corner later, blown tire... bof, i said to my wife -- we've got spares, care to handle me that key for the wheel bolts locking mechanism. Only to receive a tricky reply; we're gonna be late as usual. To which i could only beg... i'm good at braking for emergency but not swirling away from nails at 50kmhs. Guess what i had in my hands after that.

So,

-- again, stick(er) to what you're best at.

No.

So drop gaming,desktop customization and go back to building PC's? 

If Brad had been given your advise way back then and took it, there would be no impulse, nor Galciv,sins,My Colors, Windowblinds etc.

IMO SD could pull off what ever they set their minds too... look how far they have come already....

Euh?

The OP question was quite clear; "Should Stardock build computers?"

I answered No three times.

The trivia insert Frogboy wrote was a simple way for me to express that life itself revolves around snap decisions like being forced into changing a flat tire (you don't take it, you failed at THAT moment)... now, if you didn't get that, HG_eliminator you're confusing 18 years with the present situation.

Which is keep making great softwares and once you stack enough tera_giga_bazillions to compete with mobo makers by all means - risk or venture away SD.

It is a considerable industrial infra-structure, minimal. M$ is building X-Boxes, care to tell me how long it took Gates to gather reasonable capitalization?

Yup, and custom builds with unique cases and Object Desktop/Object Dock pre-loaded would do well because of their uniqueness.

This would be true for off the shelf buyers, but not necessarily so for discerning buyers who want that much more from their PC's.  A built to their specifications custom rig would not have to compete with one right off the shelf in price because the customer is expecting to pay that bit more to have a custom-cased rig built for them.

So yeah, it would be catering to a niche market, but other companies have done this successfully and Stardock would have an advantage over others with the inclusion of Stardock software... ie, games for gaming rigs; Object Desktop, etc for customiser rigs.

Oh well, Frogboy has said it won't be happening, so it's a moot subject now anyway.

I had figured since you used Sticker 2 times in the post directly after mine, you were indirectly saying no to my thoughts of a custom Case or stickers to skin ones PC.. My bad if I took it in the wrong context..

But...If alienware can make PC's on demand, why couldnt SD? I mean no need to go all Box on the shelf like others, build them as their ordered.

hell they could even work with Alienware to offer a custom SD machine, built to one's spec's with custom case's or even ones just stickerd up to look hot for stuff like Galciv, sins, WC, etc. and Object desktop installed akin to the OS.  Sure it would be a nitche market, but then again so was Desktop customization and gaming once upon a time.

Hey Phily, You can get some SD stickers if you want a SD pc. I think any modern pc would be compatible with SD products.

There are so many competitors in pc market. Besides, most people prefer assembling a desktop than buying a branded one as it can be custom built and is more stable and warrantied.

But in dektop customization, SD almost has a monopoly. How can you imagine a seller to quit its monopoly market and nosedive into a monopolistic market. lol

I dont think he was infering SD to Quit desktop customization, but do more like they did with gaming by diversifying and adding Custom PC's to the ever growing plethora of Stardock goodies to buy.

Precisely, to compete with off the shelf machines such as Acer, Dell, etc, would not work as pre-builds are a dime a dozen and saturating the market.  However, custom builds require fewer/less intensive manufacturing resources (stock, labour, etc) and are highly popular among those who want/need more from their PC and are tired of "get what you're given", bloatware loaded pre-builds that essentially fall short of the mark.

My local PC store builds between 20 to 30 custom rigs per week, and that's a just 3 man operation servicing half a dozen suburbs or so... and most of the servicing/repairs is on custom rigs... might see a Dell or HP in there once in a while, but most are customs built there/elsewhere and home builds.

And yet another intermediate provider would join the party?

Maybe, but not if their devs are busy doing some favors to the current gamers steadily supporting them. If Impulse phase 3,4,5,6,7,8+ has gained sooooo much grasp over softwares distribution that multiplayer gaming slows down Yahoo! & Google search engines to an halt, indirectly. If customization is all what people truly would pay for since Towers become spheres locked into rings or ellipses rather than rectangular desktop casings. If mouse, keyboards & multiple accessories are still "good" enough to fit the highest quality standards defined by business principles so solid they'd make a single $ of profit per year.

Yep, they could.

In all theory or dreamy perspectives, should they?

No.

For a simple reason ; Who am i to decide how & when extra floors need to be added to the place for expansion. Btw, all i see in my own magic crystal ball is two GC expansions tweaked & updated - at this point in time. I'm no psychic, but maybe Elemental will give them all some of that spiritual juice. Who knows.

50% of luck is still a coin (100 pennies, probably) toss.

Cover it.

If I recall correctly Stardock Systems started as a computer builder before Brad branched into software. That's where the "Systems" comes from in the name.

And the OS he installed was OS/2.

Just see that it was already answered.

Profit margins for computer systems are extremely tight. The commodity type pricing of components and the rapid releases of newer better components makes it very difficult to stock efficiently. I don't think it would be financially viable for Stardock to build systems without making them pricier than many of us would be willing to spend.

Having said that a marketing agreement with another hardware vendor might not be a bad idea. If say Acer, of Alienware for instance would enter into an agreememtn where they offered a Stardock branded PC and Stardock could sell through the site and make a small cut on the price, that might work quite well.

I personally wouldn't buy one simply because I've been building my own PCs since about 1998 and don't foresee stopping any time soon.

Yepp. Because the "nokia" brand is known for their boots and tires, and not really for the cellphones they make?