Honestly, this is probably a better solution than you might have guessed. Especially when it comes to fake inflation price hikes.
Companies have this way of shit-testing the economy to see what you're willing to pay. If there isn't a significant reduction in turnover rates, then say hello to the new prices!
Prime example being NVIDIA with their bogus GPU pricing. Turns out that their shit still sells at $2000 a GPU, and people seem way to quick to accept this as the new reality.
If we all agreed that $2000 GPUs, $3000 laptops and $1500 phones are bullshit, those price points wouldn't exist. Unfortunately we live in a world where normies are more interested in fancy features and the general public is incapable of estimating specs based on their needs. Which leaves all of us being played for absolute fools by companies manipulating the supply chain.
I'm with you on GPU prices. The old style of a high end GPU was like 600CAD. That's what I paid for my 2000 series card. I'll rock this until things become more sane. I ain't payin 1k or more for a GPU. Ridiculous. You could get a console with probably the same GPU for that price.
Having dual-purposed my 3080 for both work (product marketing renders) and gaming, the cost was actually manageable and I've since earned back the costs. But it is what we've come to. Enthousiast hardware is only really feasible if you have a businesscase for it. If it doesn't pay for itself, it doesn't make sense.
Part of what got us into this mess is that GPUs started to become their own business case due to crypto mining. Which added a bunch of RoI value to the cards, which was ultimately reflected in their pricing. Now that consumer mining is pretty much unfeasable, we're still seeing ridiculous pricing, and the only ways to make money using a GPU require a skillset or twisted morals (scalping).
If I were to buy something for gaming only, $1k definitely does not make any sense at all. And if that part requires at least $800 in other parts to make a full system it's even less reasonable. Consoles are the other extreme though, and are usually sold at a loss to get you spending money on the platform instead.
On behalf of all of you in this community, fuck the status quo!
Ya I dunno. It used to be you could build a decent gaming of for 1500$. So 1k +500 in other stuff isn't super horrible. But now a decent motherboard is 400$. Same for CPU and everything else. Chaching