For the price of existing converters, the main answer imo is profit and exclusivity, which can be easily justified by the relation with the price of AES games. The mold for plastic injection is very expensive too, that's certainly why the new blue SMVSC has exactly the same case than the previous ones, just with an added cutout for the update ports.
After that, I guess the connectors are the most expensive, then the boards, and finally the chip that does all the work.
Is this the final product, or will there be a hard sell to house the converter?
If anyone needs a shell I'm sure someone can design one and just have it 3D printed. That way it would be cheaper in the end for everyone. If I did that I would probably refinish the shell with some wetsanding and buffing to make it presentable with no layering as an eye sore.
If anyone needs a shell I'm sure someone can design one and just have it 3D printed. That way it would be cheaper in the end for everyone. If I did that I would probably refinish the shell with some wetsanding and buffing to make it presentable with no layering as an eye sore.
I happen to know an old colleague who has a 3D printer as well, but we are both model-builders, so that's definitely a customizing model-builder's dream tool to own, and the reason that he bought one. I haven't had the opportunity to compare the quality of home-stored 3D printers to the bigger commercial ones, though.Perhaps I'm just fortunate to know multiple people that have 3d printers. It's getting to the point that most people in tech related fields should know someone that does, though...
I can probably throw something together if I had one of these in my possession. However, with the per-print cost of 3d printing for a 3 piece set (front, back, and pcb divider), getting an injection mold wouldn't be too far fetched if enough people could commit to getting one.
From the info I gathered it would be cheapest if the 3 pieces were tied together with breakaways to keep it as a single print and charged for materials of a single print rather than 3. It would take some time for the plans though. It would be cool if someone did it for the community.