Notice to wholesalers and retailers who read here

[jayhall0315]

Dear Performance PCs, Frozen CPU, Swiftech, Danger Den, Sidewinder Computers, Crazy PC, Xoxide, Petra Tech, Coolerguys, and numerous others ......

Perhaps it is the foul mood I am in from ordering stuff which simply does not work or is said to be 'engineered' when in fact it was designed by some dip$hit on photoshop, who failed pre-calculus in high school, took no physics (ever) and whose only experience with real engineering was watching some project on the Discovery channel, but here are a few simple rules to live by if you want to earn business and keep repeat customers happy:

1 - Only list on your website what you directly have in stock. None of this Petra Tech crap where you list all kinds of crap that is always out of stock. That is foogling (fishing for folks thru Google matches) that simply makes me rather give the sale to someone else. An example of a non liquid cooling retailer would be Provantage ... I avoid them like the plague.

2 - It does not cost $14 to ship 20 rubber o-rings by USPS priority mail. So stop the lying and BS, and simply charge what it really costs. Some of you do, .... and .....some of you dont, and try to take on an extra 5% under the table (thru trumped up shipping charges). My message to you....GFY. If it honestly costs $4.80 to send something from New York to California, then charge the customer $4.80..... exactly.

3 - It is fine to take a cut for yourself... after all ... it is a damn business and not a charity. You are in it to make money, for yourself, .... but window stripping does not cost $1.50 per foot, tubing does not cost $1 per foot, Tygon does not cost $3 per foot and barbs do not cost $8 for one compression fitting. If that is what the nut jobs at Bitspower say you have to pay, .... give em the international symbol of good will, ... and go make your own contract. (trust me, it will not cost you even $1 to have a fitting made on a decent Chinese or Taiwanese line).

If you want to know how things should run, look at how Michelle at Swiftech gets stuff done. Lets say my Apogee XT block came with a bent bolt or missing nut .... No questions asked, ...no BS, simply gets the address and phone number and 3 days later you get what you need. Also, Alex (the original owner of Petras) did a fairly good job of getting stuff returned or fixed.

Quit with the BS, ... and be honest - Jay

[OC Maximus]

[jayhall0315]

Perhaps it sounds like a soap box Maximus, but IMHO all valid points as well. It is time someone finally mentioned it.

[OC Maximus]

Nothing wrong with standing up on the soap box and expressing your view every once in a while. I'm sure many will respect and agree with what you have stated.

BTW, I did fail Pre-Cal in High School..... Twice

Regardless, I do very well today.

OCM

[Movieman]

Dear Performance PCs, Frozen CPU, Swiftech, Danger Den, Sidewinder Computers, Crazy PC, Xoxide, Petra Tech, Coolerguys, and numerous others ......

Perhaps it is the foul mood I am in from ordering stuff which simply does not work or is said to be 'engineered' when in fact it was designed by some dip$hit on photoshop, who failed pre-calculus in high school, took no physics (ever) and whose only experience with real engineering was watching some project on the Discovery channel, but here are a few simple rules to live by if you want to earn business and keep repeat customers happy:

1 - Only list on your website what you stock. None of this Petra Tech crap where you list all kinds of crap that is always out of stock. That is foogling (fishing for folks thru Google matches) that simply makes me rather give the sale to someone else.

2 - It does not cost $14 to ship 20 rubber o-rings by USPS priority mail. So stop the lying and BS, and simply charge what it really costs. Some of you do, and some of you dont, and try to take on an extra 5% under the table. My message to you....GFY. If it honestly costs $4.80 to send something from NY to CA, then charge the customer $4.80..... exactly.

3 - It is fine to take a cut for yourself... after all ... it is a damn business and not a charity, but window stripping does not cost $1.50 per foot, tubing does not cost $1 per foot, Tygon does not cost $3 per foot and barbs do not cost $8 for one compression fitting. If that is what the nut jobs at Bitspower say you have to pay, .... give em the international symbol of good will, ... and go make your own contract. (trust me, it will not cost you even $1 to have a fitting made on a decent Chinese or Taiwanese line).

If you want to know how things should run, look at how Michelle at Swiftech gets stuff done. No questions asked, ...no BS, simply gets the address and phone number and 3 days later you get what you need. Also, Alex (the original owner of Petras) did a fairly good job of getting stuff returned or fixed.

Quit with the BS, ... and be honest - Jay

Pretty well said but lets be fair, sometimes thing do go out of stock so we give them the benefit of the doubt on that one.
I agree with you on the shipping part.
I ship a lot of stuff and know the costs..
A buck either way doesn't bother me, an extra $10.00 for apadded mailer that weighs 4 ounces does.
BTW: Petra's doesn't exist anymore even if the web site does.
Alex sold it to another etailer so the service you got from him and Quoc is gone also.
He also had OOS issues but honest ones. He wasn't heavily funded from what I saw but and a big but, what he gave of himself in the way he did business much more than made up for it.
A little story about Alex:
One Friday night I realised I need a water block hold down kit..
It's app 8PM on the East Coast where I live.
I send him a PM hoping to catch him at the shop.
He gets it on his cell. Goes back to the shop, gets it out overnight and it's at my house 3000 miles away the next morning at 10:30am..
I say what do I owe ya and I'll paypal you the money.
He says it's a $4.00 part and forget it.
That's Alex.
I think I sent him $30.00 to cover and would have sent more if I had it.
Now I met him at CES and the guy I met was the guy I expected.
An open hand in friendship and a smile.
Alex; If you read this your welcome here anytime for a good meal.
Ok, I'll step off of my soapbox..

[aspire.comptech]

]
BTW: Petra's doesn't exist anymore even if the web site does.
Alex sold it to another etailer so the service you got from him and Quoc is gone also.
He also had OOS issues but honest ones. He wasn't heavily funded from what I saw but and a big but, what he gave of himself in the way he did business much more than made up for it.
A little story about Alex:
One Friday night I realised I need a water block hold down kit..
It's app 8PM on the East Coast where I live.
I send him a PM hoping to catch him at the shop.
He gets it on his cell. Goes back to the shop, gets it out overnight and it's at my house 3000 miles away the next morning at 10:30am..
I say what do I owe ya and I'll paypal you the money.
He says it's a $4.00 part and forget it.
That's Alex.
I think I sent him $30.00 to cover and would have sent more if I had it.
Now I met him at CES and the guy I met was the guy I expected.
An open hand in friendship and a smile.
Alex; If you read this your welcome here anytime for a good meal.
Ok, I'll step off of my soapbox..

That is most certainly Alex for ya, he's always been a good friend.

[penguins]

2 - It does not cost $14 to ship 20 rubber o-rings by USPS priority mail. So stop the lying and BS, and simply charge what it really costs. Some of you do, and some of you dont, and try to take on an extra 5% under the table. My message to you....GFY. If it honestly costs $4.80 to send something from NY to CA, then charge the customer $4.80..... exactly. - Jay

thank you!!!!!
i used to work for a company in the IT dept and i shipped 10-40 things every day, weighed them, printed labels, boxed them, packed them, you name it, and i would send whole desktops, 100 lbs servers whatever. and sometimes i pay for shipping on some small computer parts that can't be more than 4 lbs and paying the same as a ( albeit discounted ~10% ) overnight desktop PC... and made me wonder why they had such a cheap price on the item :\.

ebay had the biggest problem with this, and even THEY cracked down... cmon etailers, stop the bs.

nice post jay.

[Aquatuning]

Dear Performance PCs, Frozen CPU, Swiftech, Danger Den, Sidewinder Computers, Crazy PC, Xoxide, Petra Tech, Coolerguys, and numerous others ......

Perhaps it is the foul mood I am in from ordering stuff which simply does not work or is said to be 'engineered' when in fact it was designed by some dip$hit on photoshop, who failed pre-calculus in high school, took no physics (ever) and whose only experience with real engineering was watching some project on the Discovery channel, but here are a few simple rules to live by if you want to earn business and keep repeat customers happy:

1 - Only list on your website what you stock. None of this Petra Tech crap where you list all kinds of crap that is always out of stock. That is foogling (fishing for folks thru Google matches) that simply makes me rather give the sale to someone else.

2 - It does not cost $14 to ship 20 rubber o-rings by USPS priority mail. So stop the lying and BS, and simply charge what it really costs. Some of you do, and some of you dont, and try to take on an extra 5% under the table. My message to you....GFY. If it honestly costs $4.80 to send something from NY to CA, then charge the customer $4.80..... exactly.

3 - It is fine to take a cut for yourself... after all ... it is a damn business and not a charity, but window stripping does not cost $1.50 per foot, tubing does not cost $1 per foot, Tygon does not cost $3 per foot and barbs do not cost $8 for one compression fitting. If that is what the nut jobs at Bitspower say you have to pay, .... give em the international symbol of good will, ... and go make your own contract. (trust me, it will not cost you even $1 to have a fitting made on a decent Chinese or Taiwanese line).

If you want to know how things should run, look at how Michelle at Swiftech gets stuff done. No questions asked, ...no BS, simply gets the address and phone number and 3 days later you get what you need. Also, Alex (the original owner of Petras) did a fairly good job of getting stuff returned or fixed.

Quit with the BS, ... and be honest - Jay

1. Although virtual warehousing is a common problem mainly with smaller or newer business there are valid reason why you favorite online shop may not have stock:

Manufacturer cannot meet demand / Is out of stock at the time - you can't re-order what you cant get.

There is not enough items out of stock to make an order worth while - i.e if your minimum order to get trade pricing is 20 blocks and only 5 are out of stock... This point is even more valid for the imported brands due to shipping and customs etc.

An improved item / version is on the way that the public does not know about. Your not going to order old stock when you know whats due out next week.

2. Postage - contrary to popular belief postage does actually cost more then the rate charged when you check the post offices or UPS's pricing. when you do this you are being told the cost for them to ship from A to B when they have the parcel. You are forgetting:

The nice box your order arrives in the, the the packing material that keeps your items safe, the tape we do the boxes up with and the label that we put your address on.... last time I checked we have to pay for these items...

Then there is the ever forgotten labour charge im not sure about the retailers you use but we currently do not have access to to an army of magical elves who pack your orders while we sleep. We have to pay workers to do it and they require wages...

Also remember in some cases there is the fuel costs and vehicle wear of getting the orders from the warehouse to the post office / depot if the courier does not collect. Even when they do we still get hit with a fuel surcharge another cost to consider.

Granted you should not take the pi$$ on the postage but don't be surprised if they are slightly higher then normal.

3. Now again I could go in to depth here about the costs that need to be covered to keep the business running inc rent, rates, heating, electric, water etc etc etc but I would be here all day.

Im most cases retailers are not actually making that much money on XYZ product. You have to remember that through the stages for an items production: design, development there are costs. There are then costs shipping the product to the distro then the distro has to take their cut. Then theres the shipping to the retailer and possibly the customs.

If the item is imported and the goods are heavy to ship it will cost alot to ship and the price will rise.

As for Bitspower - I would class it as luxury goods, yes they cost alot and yes they are very very shiny. But if you shiny things you have to pay for them

Otherwise buy a normal barb...

Remember there is always twos sides to a story.

[rehpyc]

There's a few different websites I'll commonly order things (non-watercooling related) from that are awesome when it comes to knowing whether a product is in stock or not. If there are <10 left in stock, it will specify that in red letters on the product's page. If your order requests more than they have in stock, these companies have typically been good about getting back to you the day of, or the day after if it's passed business hours that day, about the shortage and provide great customer service in how you'd like to take things from there. I've ran inventory at 2 different businesses before, and it's far from hard to keep a system that provides you up-to-date information on your stock given what you've ordered/received and what have been purchased by your customers. That is, unless your business has a terrible shrinkage problem.

As for shipping costs, while it's true that the boxes, packaging material, and other resources add extra cost to what the typical person can ship something on their own for, some companies have exceptionally high costs. I haven't ordered any watercooling parts for quite some time now, but I remember PPC having ridiculously high shipping costs for something that could simply be put in a padded manila shipping envelope. I'm sure others are just the same. Half of the stuff I ordered was actually bought from ncixus.com because their prices were less than the highly bloated ones on PPC and others' sites. Granted the shipping costs were rightfully higher than these other businesses due to some parts coming from Canada, the overall cost evened out and Linus provided amazing, personable customer service whilst PPC and FrozenCPU were lackluster. An added kudos to Alex at PTS who was able to mail a single barb at a fair shipping cost compared to PPC, FrozenCPU, and others wanting $8+.

[Movieman]

Lots of valid points made here.
I think the thing that pisses off most customers is like a situation I had happen to me.
Bought a Kill-a-watt,sold for $15.99..
Shipping was 9.95 from California to NH..
When it arrived it was in a manila envelope( NOT a padded mailer) sent first class at a cost of postage of $.85.. Yea,eighty five cents and no tape used.
I can buy that manila envelope for app 25 cents.
That's $1.10 total and the time it took the guy to stick it in the envelope,maybe 30 seconds..
These are the things that make you feel like someone just lifted your wallet.

[jayhall0315]

1. Although virtual warehousing is a common problem mainly with smaller or newer business there are valid reason why you favorite online shop may not have stock:

Manufacturer cannot meet demand / Is out of stock at the time - you can't re-order what you cant get.

There is not enough items out of stock to make an order worth while - i.e if your minimum order to get trade pricing is 20 blocks and only 5 are out of stock... This point is even more valid for the imported brands due to shipping and customs etc.

An improved item / version is on the way that the public does not know about. Your not going to order old stock when you know whats due out next week.

2. Postage - contrary to popular belief postage does actually cost more then the rate charged when you check the post offices or UPS's pricing. when you do this you are being told the cost for them to ship from A to B when they have the parcel. You are forgetting:

The nice box your order arrives in the, the the packing material that keeps your items safe, the tape we do the boxes up with and the label that we put your address on.... last time I checked we have to pay for these items...

Then there is the ever forgotten labour charge im not sure about the retailers you use but we currently do not have access to to an army of magical elves who pack your orders while we sleep. We have to pay workers to do it and they require wages...

Also remember in some cases there is the fuel costs and vehicle wear of getting the orders from the warehouse to the post office / depot if the courier does not collect. Even when they do we still get hit with a fuel surcharge another cost to consider.

Granted you should not take the pi$$ on the postage but don't be surprised if they are slightly higher then normal.

3. Now again I could go in to depth here about the costs that need to be covered to keep the business running inc rent, rates, heating, electric, water etc etc etc but I would be here all day.

Im most cases retailers are not actually making that much money on XYZ product. You have to remember that through the stages for an items production: design, development there are costs. There are then costs shipping the product to the distro then the distro has to take their cut. Then theres the shipping to the retailer and possibly the customs.

If the item is imported and the goods are heavy to ship it will cost alot to ship and the price will rise.

As for Bitspower - I would class it as luxury goods, yes they cost alot and yes they are very very shiny. But if you shiny things you have to pay for them

Otherwise buy a normal barb...

Remember there is always twos sides to a story.

Valid points ... all. But a few caveats. With respect to 1, if something is not in stock in real time, it needs to not show up. I can see where a larger retailer who stocks hundreds or thousands of individual items can not always in real time remove all items that are out of stock, but far too many sellers now are simply listing mounds of products which they simply dont have in stock (and wont any time soon ... and they know it). It is like a garage sale that advertises $5000 mountain bikes for $50, only when you get there, .... they are out of stock. Titillation with out the tits so to speak.

On 2 and 3, your points do have validity, but then give the buyer an estimation at checkout as to the costs if you are charging for extra large boxing, or special wrapping, etc.... Being shown in detail what makes up the extra 7 bucks is much easier to swallow than just feeling you got ripped. Most reasonable folks have no problem with a fair estimate. Unfortunately, several retailers in the US have been padding the bottom line with an extra 5% (especially on all the small orders that cost less than $30).

[defect9]

Lots of valid points made here.
I think the thing that pisses off most customers is like a situation I had happen to me.
Bought a Kill-a-watt,sold for $15.99..
Shipping was 9.95 from California to NH..
When it arrived it was in a manila envelope( NOT a padded mailer) sent first class at a cost of postage of $.85.. Yea,eighty five cents and no tape used.
I can buy that manila envelope for app 25 cents.
That's $1.10 total and the time it took the guy to stick it in the envelope,maybe 30 seconds..
These are the things that make you feel like someone just lifted your wallet.

YES!!! that kinda crap is... (insert some sort of statement about a government here)!

something else I wish more businesses did, was keep them flat rate boxes around. I buy a lot of fiddly crap from lots of places, and I know it will all fit nicely into one of them $5 boxes 95% of the time. add $2 for 'assorted packing' (bubblewrap) and the $2 to pay the labor to pack it, and it doesnt cost no $15 for shipping.

But, if I want it bad enough, I'll still pay $15 in shipping. And they know it.

[shazza]

Hope you feel better soon, jayhall

I know it's frustrating, but I actually have a bigger concern. Will we someday get to the point where places like Newegg and Amazon stock the majority of parts we need for Liquid Cooling? Hmmmm ... certainly stocking/shipping/product cost will probably all improve. But, what then happens to the small retailers we've been dealing with for years? Do they all start to go the way of Petra's and others - getting bought out, or just fail? I know this is how business works - but I think it will be a sad day when we lose the specialized retailers we have today. Probably not something we need to be concerned about in the short term, but dunno what the coming years will bring.

For this reason, I support the specialized retailers, even if I can get something cheaper somewhere else.

[jayhall0315]

No comment Shazza, except I have ordered perhaps 200-300 items off Amazon over the last 10 years and only once ever had a bad experience. No taxes, no trumped up shipping, no exaggerated pricing, no 'handling' fees, ... just what you need with the price that the US Post Office actually charges to ship it as well.

Not saying it is better, but I am a big Amazon fan.

[shazza]

I am an Amazon fan as well (anxiously awaiting arrival of my new Kindle tomorrow). My point was that I think we will lose some of creativity in the hobby if it ever does go big time. I'm one of those who truly misses getting my hand written thank you notes and pens from Petra's. Believe it or not, Performance PCs has never let me down either - and the few times I've had questions on shipping costs, they've been quickly resolved. I know that's not the case for everyone, and their customer service can be a bit rough - but I like dealing with people I "know."

Guess it's the same analogy as the local hardware store being replaced by Home Depot and other big box stores. That said, every small business has to figure out how to survive, and taking care of the points you brought up in your original post is a good place to start.

[Afghan Mac]

I've got to throw my 2 cents in on this one.

I make a decent living, working in Afghanistan. The main problem is USPS only shipping and a 2 week wait for everything I order. I tend to always order more than what I need since it's better to have too many screws or too much sleeving than have to wait 2 more weeks to finish a project.

What burns me up is when I want to place an order for 4 screws from these PC shops, it's $2.50 plus $9 shipping. I can order 12 of the same screws from another shop for the same $2.50, and only pay $3 in shipping, and they still make a profit. For twice as much, that 12 screws becomes 50. I order a power supply, $45 for shipping. My case, $85 in shipping is what they wanted. For an 11 lb case. Which came screws missing.

I love supporting shops that support me, but how am I supposed to do that when they keep on fleecing me. If I want a processor, I would much rather order it from the guys that are on here supporting the community, but how am I supposed to do that when they want $100-150 more for the same thing with twice as much for shipping and refuse returns. I've spent weeks waiting for parts that never came, because the company decided to drop-ship and not inform me, and the drop-shipper won't ship to USPS. And they didn't refund my shipping cost.

I know what we do is a niche, and the phase guys have it way harder than us; but it's not impossible to fix. We tend to be a pretty loyal community - look at the massive grudges against Thermaltake and Koolance - and will spend loads of money on something shiny from a company we love without regrets. Don't be greedy. I got an email from Wal-Mart about a year ago apologizing for overcharging shipping costs to APO addresses, and they refunded shipping costs for my previous several orders and have paid actual cost or very very close for every order since. Amazon and other larger retailers give me free shipping on expensive orders. You're telling me when you're taking $2 for a foot of plain black heatshrink, you aren't making enough to give me a break? You still need that $9 for an envelope the post office gives you for free?

For the companies overseas, I can understand. I'll pay 35 Euros for the order, since I obviously want that thing bad enough; but if it breaks, you want me to pay the shipping to send it back, wait until you look at it, and wait for the replacement, on a 99 Euro hunk of plastic and metal that couldn't have cost you more than 10 Euros to produce. We are the ultimate repeat customers, we aren't ordering OEM parts here, we're using our Dremels and soldering irons to use the stuff you're selling us. We'll spend a few hundred bucks because the color isn't quite right. We have no qualms voiding warranties on a thousand dollar item the day we get it.

Give us one shop, just one single shop, that gives us decent service and you'll become the biggest moneymaker in the industry. Bump prices on the flashy new blocks, I don't care, but not on screws, sandpaper, zip-ties, and shipping. We are all educated consumers here, and you are insulting us. We spend hundreds of hours researching hose, you think we don't know how much a screw, padded envelope and a few stamps cost?

[shazza]

Great points, Afghan Mac. I can't even imagine how you folks who don't have easy access do projects - takes patience and planning.

I think the point on screws and other items that you can get somewhere else is these are "supplementary" items carried by the specialty shops. It's a pain to stock them, and I imagine most people only order them if they are getting a larger order. But, your point is valid. I should also clarify that when I said I support the specialty shops, I'm talking about items that are specific to liquid cooling. For example, even though I can order a Swiftech Pump from Newegg, I'll get it from PPCs or another specialty retailer. If I'm ordering a motherboard, CPU, etc - it will come from Newegg, even though PPCs carries some of these products. Same with an order of screws and other odds and ends - if I can't get them locally, I usually go to McMaster Carr (but talk about shipping cost fleecing ).

(Not trying to take over jayhall's thread - just enjoying catching up on the forum with my morning coffee)

[Panther_Seraphi]

Agree with shipping

If a company can offer free shipping then i dont understand how it can cost 10+ pounds to have it shipped on a particular day :S

Yes im looking at ebuyer for that one even though they are probably my favorite place to shop for parts

[Elpy]

and I imagine most people only order them if they are getting a larger order.

I ordered my thermochill screws from chilledpc(= UK. Notice my location) without anything else just because I was too lazy to go to any local hardware stone just for the screws.


But that's just me

However on a good note. Chilledpc doesnt screw you up with shipping. I paid just a few euros for the postage on those screws. They have a really good system imo. The postage fee raises slowly when you add more stuff to the package and once you're order gets expensive and large enough, it then switched from royal mail to UPS/DHL and still isnt really overpriced.

[jayhall0315]

Shazza - I agree with ya (basically), it is a duel edged sword. Hopefully a few retailers will read this and rethink their web design, shipping costs a bit. And yes, I still have a Petra pen in my desk coffee cup

Mac - Magnifico ! I lived overseas during several parts of my education and your post completely sums up the poor expat trying to get what he/she needs for a decent price. Your are solidly correct, if someone is going to research Tygon tubing for 4 hours over three weekends, surely they will know how much it really costs per foot and how much it costs exactly to ship it. It is funny how the human mind works; we might willing pay $80 for an Apogee XT or EK Supreme waterblock we know only costs $40 to make and not feel bad, but when it costs $5.72 to ship it and we get charged $11, then it is time to bring out the one legged a$$ kicker.

[Lu(ky]

Note to all stores listed above the post office now offers USPS Priority "FLAT RATE boxes for FREE... Fit anything inside the FLAT RATE box with no weight overcharge.. Cough Performancepcs.. Also yeah Michelle & Gabe at Swiftech are very very nice I met them last year here in Long Beach Swiftech store.

[Afghan Mac]

Great points, Afghan Mac. I can't even imagine how you folks who don't have easy access do projects - takes patience and planning.

I think the point on screws and other items that you can get somewhere else is these are "supplementary" items carried by the specialty shops. It's a pain to stock them, and I imagine most people only order them if they are getting a larger order. But, your point is valid. I should also clarify that when I said I support the specialty shops, I'm talking about items that are specific to liquid cooling. For example, even though I can order a Swiftech Pump from Newegg, I'll get it from PPCs or another specialty retailer. If I'm ordering a motherboard, CPU, etc - it will come from Newegg, even though PPCs carries some of these products. Same with an order of screws and other odds and ends - if I can't get them locally, I usually go to McMaster Carr (but talk about shipping cost fleecing ).

(Not trying to take over jayhall's thread - just enjoying catching up on the forum with my morning coffee)

You're right, Shazza, it take's a ton of planning. With my current build, I went with a H2gO case that took over 2 months of drawings to try and find the right components that would fit inside. Add a month and a half for everything to arrive once the orders were all placed. Then the reorders to replace the things that didn't quite match up with the plans and eyeball estimates.

I completely understand how difficult it is to stock these items, which is why I don't think they should even bother carrying the commodity items. Why stock a i7-980x when you are selling it at a 10% markup, nobody is going to buy it from you and it's just going to devalue as time goes on. I have to disagree with the screws though; you buy a box of 1000 M3 screws, you pay maybe 20 bucks, and they take up very little space. They are part of the ATX or whatever standard, they will sell eventually. They should be cheaper than a molex connector, not 6x the price.

I'll buy my pumps from the specialty shops, just like you. And I order the commodity parts from the big boys, just like you. I don't want to name any names to offend the owners, I know they come here and don't want to discourage them or their customers. My real point is this; give us good prices, good selection, and good service, and we'll come back. Be honest when you plan on drop-shipping. I'm dropping $1000 on an order, you know I can see on the box how much you actually paid to ship the box.

Most of all, I would love to hear from the shop owners. Justify yourselves. Just like jayhall said, we don't mind paying twice what something is worth as long as we don't FEEL fleeced. Help us out.

[pokipoki]

Most of the parts needed for watercooling is available from the local industrial area. More competition and better service there. Depend on yourself to find the best sources and stop feeling like what was described here.

If you like the convenience of a single store for sourcing your parts, it's inevitable to encounter some of the scenarios mentioned. That's just the way it is, not only in business or trade, but in life too. Kudos to those who are honest and fair, but don't expect the otherwise to be uncommon.

Being unconquerable lies with the self. - Sun Tzu, The Art of War

[SiGfever]

Small private business made America (and a lot of other countries) great, personal attention to each and every customer was a norm, not an exception. I know that in today's times with everything going International it is tough for a lot of them to compete with the giants in the market. That is how business has become and there is no going back. I do like to give my hard earned money to people like Alex when he owned Petra's. There are many good and decent small shops that work hard just to keep their heads above water and the store in the black. Where will we be when they go under? Do think that Amazon or Newegg will cater to our needs like these fine shops do? Will the giants have their finger on the pulse of the watercooling improvements? Or will they just sell what ever is mass produced regardless of whether it is the "Top Performer" currently being implemented?

A lot of anger has been expressed against Laing for their pump quality, but as NeaKuh stated we alter their design and increase the load on the pumps for a boost in performance for our rigs. Is this their fault? I think not. The moment you decide to "Mod" something you own the responsibility for your actions. And to whether another company such as XSPC tests their tops to the standards and detail that a company with Laing's reputation does is questionable at best. If you do not like the DDC series, simple, do not buy them. There are other options in the market today to meet most people's needs.

I am not directing this post at any one person just a generalized statement. The choices offered in today's market for us watercoolers are fantastic. Just a few years ago this was not the case. So instead of cursing the very existence of these companies why not contact the manufacturer and submit your suggestions for a new pump design with tops that have a proven track record in our field or a design of your own. just my $.015

[ryan92084]

Note to all stores listed above the post office now offers USPS Priority "FLAT RATE boxes for FREE... Fit anything inside the FLAT RATE box with no weight overcharge.. ...

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