NZXT PODCAST - #171 - Founder and CEO Johnny Hou (and the new H6 Flow!)

Episode Date: November 3, 2023

On this week's episode of the NZXT Podcast... We have Johnny, Founder and CEO of NZXT, with us to talk about the new H6 Flow case and answer questions from the community! Watch the VOD at twitch.tv/NZXT and join our Discord server to let us know what you think about these sites: discord.gg/NZXT

Am I supposed to be able to hear the music? No, I'm explaining. All right. Hello, everyone. Welcome to episode 171 of the NXT podcast, the official podcast of the N60 community. This podcast is recorded live every Friday at 10 a.m. Pacific Standard Time on the official NXT Twitch and is available to stream on demand on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcast, Spotify, and SoundCloud. My name is Mike. It's me as always as Ivan.

How are you doing, Ivan? How we do, Baby Boo. Happy to be here for another podcast with you. It's a very special podcast. podcast. It only took 171 episodes to get this person on here, so I'm stoked to have him. But before I introduce our special guest, I do want to make a quick announcement. So we got two things going on. If you are tuned in live to the podcast right now on Twitch.tv slash NZXT, type exclamation giveaway in the chat. You will get a link to win some awesome NZXT swag.

You'll get a chance to win a hoodie, t-shirt, stickers, lanyard, etc. And if you are also tuned in live, or even if you're listening after the fact, go to nzxte.co-8-6 giveaway for a chance to win our brand-new H-6-Flow case. And if you stick around to the end of the show, you'll get a super secret extra special word that will get you a bunch of bonus entries. So stick around. And speaking of the H-6 Flow, that's the reason we have our special guest today. His name is Johnny. Johnny, how are you? Hey, how's it going?

Doing good. For those who don't know who Johnny is, can you introduce yourself and let us know what you do here at NST? Yeah, my name is Johnny Ho, and I'm the founder and CEO of NST. I've been here for 20 years. Yeah, congratulations on 20 years. It's a amazing achievement. I guess next year is coming up on 20 years. It's a long time.

It has been a long time. Yeah, and you've done a lot at this company, obviously, because you've been here from day one. And we're going to get into all that stuff you've done and worked on. But we are here specifically today to talk about our latest product, which is the H6 float case. So, Mike, can you roll the video? Yeah. Show everyone what this case is all about. I'll get rid of our cameras real quick so everyone you can see.

Wow, this case is awesome. That song always makes me dance. I honestly love the, love the... This is probably one of my favorite product videos we've done so far. Yeah, it was cool. So I guess, since we're talking about this lovely H6, which is actually the case behind me, I guess we'll go a little bit into it.

First off, first I just want to show off the case itself. I'll show the little product real quick. Here you go. So I'll show off the product a little bit. So this is the H6 flow, everyone. It's a beautiful, beautiful case. Panoramic glass panels got USB here on the bottom. And then the most important part, which is this angle, this angled front corner, which is made specifically for GPU cooling, as you saw in the video. And honestly, this case is all about, like, airflow and cooling. It's got, you can have room for two 140 millimeter fans on the bottom, up to 360 millimeters on top. The back panel is also perforated as well.

I'll show the case off in a little bit, but this case is beautiful. And I guess to go into that is Johnny, like, so when he first started this case, like what was the division for this thing in the first reiteration? And how did it change throughout this process? Okay. Stop me, by the way, if I'm getting too much in the weeds.

I guess, you know, H6 is a, new product line for us in the case, all of the case line, right? So we have obviously the five, the seven, which had been around for a while now. We introduced the nine last year, we had the H1. And really, the reason why we wanted to introduce the H6 is because the nine was received super well last year and we're like, okay, but not everyone needs a massive case with all this cooling capacity, right?

So like, how do we make a little slightly smaller and like a cheaper, version of H9, but we also didn't just want to take the H9 and like shrink it down because I think that would not be super interesting and impressive. So we spent a lot of time thinking about like, okay, just so these type of cases are like what people call it dual chamber cases. So we started to spend a lot of time thinking about how do we make a dual chamber cases a little bit more different. And one of the things that one of our engineers called out was like, well, like air

doesn't really turn in these dual chamber cases where the air just blows directly to the side panel isn't like like great for cooling and we're like okay well we had these angles fans if you guys remember on the h5 flow coin the toilet fan by some but but but like the idea is similar there right we angle the fan to try to drive more direct air flow towards the GPU so we kind of like took that concept concept and then we like turn the fans on a dual chamber case if you will right and we like did all testing we're like oh wow this actually works right and then it creates like a unique look i don't know if you guys like if you go if you look at the left side of the case you can't you kind of can't see that like angle on the right and it creates this like weird visual

optical illusion where the case looks a little bit narrower even though it's actually pretty wide and big so yeah again stop me if i'm getting too much into the weeds but like Like, there's a lot going on in this case between the design, the airflow. Like, the airflow decision led to the design. And I think I'm obviously really happy with the results. And the other thing is, like, there aren't that many great, there aren't that many dual chamber cases at this price point, frankly. Traditionally, dual chamber cases have been pretty expensive.

So we're just, you know, we obviously very proud of the case and the work we put in and hope this is a sign of things to come from ZXT, because I know people have been looking for us to do some. something that's a little bit more different, right? Yeah. And you mentioned that you wanted to make a smaller version of the H9, but a little different, or is there any specific user feedback you had in mind or needs that you wanted to focus on and address with this design?

Yeah, I mean, like the H9, I think was pretty good on thermals, but I know, like, historically, and I think someone shared internally in our Slack, there's been memes over the over the years, there are four or five years of NZT, like not having the best thermals, right? I mean, there was a time where cases with flat fronts were a thing, right? And we probably contributed to part of that trend. But like I think for us, like this time around,

we really wanted to nail performance. So, so like we spent a lot of time trying to figure out how to get more performance out of the H6. And I think we accomplished that. You've seen a lot of the test results come back out. Obviously it's like one of the like best cooling cases, especially in this door chamber type design. Yeah, and that's all due because of, you know, that angle that you mentioned that points the air directly at the hardware versus at the glass.

What was the first thing you thought when the design team showed you this angle? And like, what was my daughter is like so weird. I was like, man, this is kind of like awkward, right? Like, it's kind of weird cut on the right side of the case. But when the actual mock-up came out and we saw it in person and I think we knew we had made the right decision. But like initially when we decided to turn those fans 45 degrees, I think a ton of people were weirded out by it. And we're like, man, like, is this going to do well? maybe people would react like really negatively to it because it's not just a box, right?

You go on like, like market is basically 95, 99% boxes, right? So to go to, to like turn the angle and do that on the right side, it was a little bit weird. But like, again, like Mike, if you go back to like the standard angle, like you're sitting from a PC and typically people have their PC on the right side, right? Because you want to see the inside. It still looks like a box. So in some way, it's actually still. kind of traditional because most of the time when you're looking at it from the left side

it looks kind of boxy and like reminds you of an H-9 and the angle creates a little bit of differentiation and I think makes the case dead out. So you talked about like mockups and stuff like that so if you can give us information on that like

what was like the different stages of this angle like was it like different types of angles how much fans you could put in? Yeah yeah yeah yeah like how many fans you put in there like how close you gotta get the fans up to the GPU to actually influence the thermals, right? So usually at the early stages of a case concept,

we do a lot of mockups that are purely for performance, right? And then once we feel like pretty good about performance, then we do another mockup that has like the kind of the aesthetics, if you feel, right? And then if you feel good about that, then we'll like commit this to like a tool, right? And then from that point on, like, the products and it's, what we like to say is like, are you, things in the oven, you can't touch it anymore, right? Because you've already decided what you're going to make.

Yeah. Right, right. So angle, perforated front pan or back panel, 360 millimeter on top, 140 on the bottom. So this is, this entire, like, case is really about performance. And I assume you went through a lot of testing. And is this probably one of our best, like, performing cases so far? I think from a peer airflow perspective, it's got to be the best.

And part of it is how compact it is too, right? I never thought I would see this day, to be honest. But you mentioned the memes on Slack and whatnot. It was funny because when it was Borski that shared a meme yesterday, and there was a meme on there, but I was like, actually, that was a meme that Dennis and I had made a long time ago because we were so sick and tired of people. just asking us every single day to make a case with airflow.

It was like someone blowing a tuba into our faces about adding more airflow. So it's awesome that we finally did it and finally gave people what they've been asking for for so long. Specifically, though, about a dual chamber case. Are dual chambered cases harder to design and make than the regular box cases we've made in the past? Not necessarily. I think dual chambers, are dual chamber cases are just bigger. So that's kind of what I think part of what makes them a little bit more expensive because they need to be wider.

It ends up taking up a little bit more real estate. But I don't think they're that hard. I think people have been using the same layout for a long time in dual chamber cases. And again, we struggle a little bit in the early days of age six to do something different. So obviously we had this breakthrough when it, and it came to something that was aesthetically different, but also increased performance of the case. So, I mean, yeah, I don't think it's different.

I think all product, the hard part of all product is how do you do something that's different, right? And like, in the end of the day, we're in the PC market, right? The PC market has been around for like a long time, like longer than I've been at this business, right? Like 30 years or something like that. But like, yeah, like, how do you differentiate on a business that's been around for? for like 30 years, right? So, like, like the thing Ivan likes to say, right, you just got to believe, right? It starts with believing that you can actually do something different.

And then like you kind of experiment, you do something different, you poke around, you try different things and you eventually figure it out. Yeah. And a lot of times you fail doing those things. 100%. But that's like part of it, right? like all success is just littered with failure. That's like just part of the path to making good product.

Yeah. And you were talking a little bit about a little while ago about aesthetics and whatnot. And, you know, NXT, obviously, I think it's safe to say we are very well known and popular for our aesthetics. And one of the reasons why I think people love our cases is because historically it's been pretty easy. to do cable management on them. How does this case in particular address cable management and help people keep a nice and clean, organized build? That's actually one of the biggest benefits of dual chamber cases, right? Because there's so much space behind the motherboard.

So the realities, most people aren't even doing cable management behind the dual chamber case. Install the power supply and just check the cables and shut the iPad on. right. But in a traditional like ATX case, you know, where the power supply is below the motherboard, like an H5 or H7, right, there's a limited space behind the motherboard. So you have to really tie down the different cables in order to close the side panel. So I think that's the biggest benefit you get from the dual chamber case. You also get this like really clean view, right? Because because the power supplies on the right side, the tradeoff you have to make is the case is kind of wide, takes up a lot of space on your desk.

you got to have the space for it, right? Not everyone wants that. Some people like the narrower type of case, you know, with the less footprint. Yeah. Mike, I just sent you the image you requested. I'm going to go ahead to show everyone the attempts in this case. So no one can ever say NZXC has no airflow anymore

because I'm pulling up the testings of the, the H6 flow. I'm just got to grab my grab the file real quick. Of course my thing is taking a while.

My hard drive's taking a little bit. You know, I can just show it like this, I guess. Oh, here we go. Perfect.

Got it. Look at the temps, guys. Yeah, and there's a, there's a lot of reviews on the case already. You guys haven't checked them out. You know,

um, there's a ton of reviews out there. A lot of, builds a lot of feedback a lot of just overview of the case in general so go on YouTube and search NZAC-H-6-flow you guys will find a lot of the the performance numbers out there too yeah different tests different media so this I think this is Robbie right this is I think yeah yeah and I guess uh since since this is like case has been,

obviously, this is probably one of my favorite cases so far. Like, what was, like, the most difficult

part of, like, figuring out about this case. Like, what was something that was like, this is so difficult to try to work into. I mean,

when we, when we turn the right side paddle, um, it created, there's less space behind that, uh, motherboard area. So it was like,

cases sometimes feels like, like, a puzzle or Lego, right? you do something and it impacts other part of the case and you have to figure out, okay, well, now that you have less space behind the motherboard, how do you make sure cable management is still good? How do you make sure you can still fit, storage and stuff like that, right?

And because we've never done a case where we angled the fan, we had to go figure that out. And then just the mechanicals, the structure and stuff like that, wire management, you know, that took time to learn. I think the challenge was so for the team because we were like saying, hey, we wanted to make like a mid-range dual chamber case as well, was like being able to make the right trade-offs to hit this price point. You know, it's very easy, I would say, relative to mid-range cases to build

because you just have so much more room to add products, grow the case. But when you have to build mid-range case, you have to be very thoughtful about where you spend the money. So that was a challenge probably for the team as well. I guess going along the other side, what was like the easiest part? part about designing this case. I'm like trying to figure out what was easy about this case. Was it relatively difficult all around? I think it was,

I mean, I think it was relatively easy for us to figure all the layout of the case because we had been doing this for so long. Right. Like, I think like the designers, the engineers on the team, some,

I mean, as you guys know, like our head of design has been working on cases for like 13 plus 14 years. So it's like, sure, it's a different. problem, but it's also like not that different. So I think I think the good news is like the experience of the team, you know, comes out when we try to do different things where, I mean,

cases are one of the categories where obviously NCST has the most amount of confidence. It's how the company was founded, right? So yeah. You know, and speaking of cases, um, case design has changed a lot in the last 10 years, you know, like the last 20 years. I mean, I guess since you started NST, it's really been just constantly evolving. Where do you see cases going in the next five, even 10 years from now? That's a good question. I don't know. There seems to be a lot of excitement around small-fam factor cases.

But at the same time, I think small-form factor builds are just, they're so expensive. You know, because there's them on the board and even power supplies if it's SFX. I generally don't think about things like in one category, like where our cases going. I kind of think of it like where our computers going because ultimately cases are one component of an entire PC, right? And obviously we're doing more than just cases, right?

We do coolers, vans, power supplies by the board. So, I mean, I don't, I can't tell you, like, I don't think it's going to be something like that, We can't imagine today. I think we arrived here over the past 20 years because of all the small innovations the industry has done around wire management. There used to be not a glass on the side. The side panel used to be acrylic. You used to be like this little hole that you punched through the side panel.

You put like this plastic acrylic. And then we moved to temper glass and then bigger temper glass, right? And then, yeah, and like now water cooling is way more common. Back in the day, it wasn't common. Like, I think things just evolve over time. But I have to imagine, and I hope that PCs 10 years, 5 years from now, will be more performance. They'll look better.

They'll continue to have high quality. They'll continue to be easier to build. And it will just be more integrated. The issue I have a lot often with gaming PCs, it just looks like it's a, random selection of parts coming together sometimes, right? And like my hope is like it can be a little bit more integrated, right? So I've always been like a little bit jealous of like system where integrators who can pick

every single part inside. But obviously the part of what makes DIY great, you know, when you build it yourself is your ability to pick your parts. Like how do you get a little bit of that integration but still have the benefit of being able to select your parts? So I always find that question. interesting to think about. Yeah.

And I think there's also definitely like a fine line and a balance between aesthetics and functionality in cases. Which do you think is more important? Absolutely. Function, performance, usability is number one priority. And I think design follows, right? And we've been very fortunate again with the H6. It's like we got, we did something to improve performance that happened to.

to make the design stand out. So they're very, very fortunate. I mean, kind of in the early days, right, when we decided, this is the old case, the H-440, right? I think we were the first case manufacturer to remove the five-and-a-quarter bay. We removed it because we thought, like, it was necessary anymore. But then enabled the ability to make the inside of the case more open, which added ability to add fans in the front because you don't have five-and-quarter bay anymore,

which allowed for a larger window. So you often find that, like, actually the right functional choices actually lead to better design versus the opposite way around. And probably it would be fair to say in Z16 in the past maybe didn't prioritize function and usability enough. And certainly that's like not the case anymore. Design is always important here, but we need to be sure the product performs and has great quality, great usability. Cool. All right, Johnny. Are you ready to answer some community questions?

We have a lot. Right. All right. So we've been collecting questions on our Discord server all week long. If you are not in the Discord server, please join. It's Discord.g.g slash NZXT. We have a lot of fun there. Last week we had a Ho Chi Pumpkin coloring contest.

We have a lot of giveaways we don't do on social. We also have a lot of helpful community members there. So if you are looking to build a new PC, buy a new PC, whatever, like, you can probably get your question answered there from a helpful NZT community member. So we'd be collecting questions there all week. We narrowed it down to about 2025 questions that we thought were pretty good. So I'll start off. This question is from Kalmick J. Their question is, Johnny, why did you start NZXT?

So I started in ZFT1 because I like I'm a big gamer So like part of the reason was like I was very passionate about this space specifically PC gamer But like a 20 plus years ago Like this is like there was there's a company you get everyone should know this Alienware right alienware was like at its peak probably 20 something years ago It's before alien war became part of Dell and like at least at the time Keep in mind I was like 19. Like I thought I thought those case designs like with the alien head was like the coolest thing ever, right?

Like especially compared to all like the beige and like boring cases that were on the market. But like the alien were PCs back in the day were like four or five thousand dollars like in 20 years ago, four or five thousand dollars a lot today. It's like an insane amount of money for a 19 year old 20 something years ago. right so and I had already been like doing some consulting work and design work for some case brands in the market. I just like some website and logo work and even consulted on design work and I was like okay what if I like made something like an alien or design but not an alien but like available to everyone you could buy the case and build something yourself right so like of course like what's it might my mind, I was like, what's the opposite? Like, what could go up against aliens? And I was like, well, of course, like robots, right? We're about to be, like, the right type of creature

to go up against robots. So, like, the first case design was essentially, like, Gundam with, like, Knight Rider with, like, dragons. Like, basically all of, like, the cool gaming things I like, in one case. I mean, it's a nasty case. Don't, don't look at it. I'm embarrassed by it now. But at the time, there weren't many, many, many cases like that. And so anyway, the case was called a Guardian, shipped it in 2004. And it ended up doing, like, super well because, like, you know, there were very little options like that available to buy, right? The only type of kind of gaming design case you could buy was like from alien wear.

And you had to buy a machine. So it was very fortunate with very little investments on money. borrow from my family that like basically the first investment paid for itself. I was still in school at the time. So like it did like one more product. The next year I was part-timeing it. But yeah, like that was kind of the beginning of NZT. We did like one.

Oh God. I've seen this image. We did like one case design, I think like every year for a couple years until like I graduated from school and then like started to like take this thing a little bit more. more seriously. But early on, it was like I was basically designing a product for myself, right? And today, in some ways, I'm still designing products myself. I'd obviously be way more thoughtful about that.

Now, it's not just about me. It's about the PC gaming community. What can we, how can we create value for the community versus just like, wouldn't it be cool if I just wanted to did that, right? But certainly early days, I felt like I was really just designing products myself, you know, things that I felt like was missing in the market. Shout out to the UCI anteaters who are tuning in. That's not thought.

All right. Next question is from Asian Venom. What was your vision for NST from the beginning? And do you feel you have reached it or what has changed? Yeah. I mean, as I was explaining earlier, for me, the first, like, five, ten years of NZXT was, like, me being able to do, like, design products for myself. It was very much about, I think, like, me, my interest,

and because, like, I love gaming and it was like, this is like a fun hobbyist type of thing I had on the side. You know, it's changed a lot over the years. I mean, again, it's been 20 years, right? So now, I think nowadays our vision, frankly, is just like, how do we bring PC gaming to more people? How do we make it easier? How do we make it more accessible?

You know, like, how do we get everyone in PC gaming? Right, like the, like I play on other platforms too, like consoles and stuff like that. But but like because I was a big gamer growing up and like I liked all games, I literally had every single console because of the exclusives. Like, oh, you want to play Halo? You got to get Xbox. Or you want to play like out of war, you got to get like Sony PlayStation or Final Fantasy. You got to get Sony PlayStation.

You like, do you like Mario? You got to get the Nintendo platform. World Warcraft, you got like a gaming PC. Like, right? It's like, it's like, it makes no freaking sense, right? Like, because in the end of the day, all these, like, things are like computers, right? Like, and they just, you know, and the reason why there's these different platforms are exclusive. So I'm like, you know, I'm always, and I, and PC is probably arguably the most open, right?

Anyone can develop on PC. So I really like the idea of making PC, like, a really dominant platform because then there will be a lot of content that comes to the PC platform. And then we don't have to deal with these stupid exclusives. And as gamers, we don't have to buy all these different, consoles right just to play a particular IP yeah oh uh i remember when so when you first began you created this like futuristic like you said gundom style looking guardian but then after that it then changed to like the the more boxy type yeah so what so why did it change from this like beige to the crazy angles and colors then now back to minimalistic uh why

Why did that change? Yeah, like me and Shin, who's, again, the head of design, we described the first five, 10 years of NXT designed to beat our, the art years. Like, we weren't doing product design. We were basically designing art. Like, every product was like an art piece. It was different.

And it was a little bit random, right? So we were also getting older, right? Like 10 years in, I was approaching 30 versus being 19, right? And I started to like, okay, like, I don't know if I really actually seeing myself as a more grown adult, I actually want all these like, you know, robots and really aggressive designs, right? And the market also like started to head towards that direction. We saw that like there were other gamers like us who are like, like, by the way, especially if you're married, it's like not going to be cool to put like this crazy thing computer that looks like a toy in your,

in your office or in your house, right? It doesn't kind of fit the decor of the rest of the house, right? So we felt like, hey, like gamers have taste too. We care about the way things look and when all of us just want these really gaming designs, right? Like, we kind of grew out of the things we were designing when we were younger. And we also wanted the ability to have like a more memorable design and more consistent design. and when we look at when we look towards like car world right whether it's like you know bnw or tesla like there's a consistent design language across their product line so at one at basically

at a particular moment in time i want to say it started with the s240 or the h series we basically said we're going to stop doing random stuff we're going to make everything consistent we're going to have a design language we're going to develop a guide for it and we're to try to keep everything consistent across everything we do to start to create this like look around minimalism around like good taste you know stuff like that right like that gamers aren't all looking for robots and dragons and aliens and whatever animal you know that gaming companies like to pick right and then uh i i saw a couple questions and this came from its infinity why did you name the company nzxte does it stand for something yeah so like i was i wanted to do something around

like next generation, something around the future. Like I thought like the company was always thinking about the next thing. So I was like, it wouldn't be cool to name the company next. You know, so I like looked it up like registered. Like damn it. Right. And then like, okay, well like Z kind of looks like E. Right. Especially, you know, sometimes people write Z with like a line through it. So I'm like, okay, well like what I just named it Z? And like no one obviously had trademarked it because it means nothing. But I also like the idea that meant nothing because like we could build meaning into the brand. And for the longest time, people couldn't remember that people still spell it wrong

and XZT. People try to pronounce it, but I feel like after 20 years of NZXT, people are finally able to know that you don't pronounce it. You say the four letters and it means something to people. Like, it means gaming and stuff like that. But side fact, if you don't know, like when Steve Jobs left Apple, he went and started a company call next. And then, you know, when we rejoined Apple, they acquired Next in, like, 1997, I think.

I had no clue what Next was. I just knew someone had, like, trademarked it. So, of course, like, being super ignorant and, like, not knowing anything. Like, I tried to trademark next when, like, obviously, like, a ton of people. They were already a very important company. It just goes to show you how little I knew around, like, important business people, business. going into this right i got no idea who the hell was doing what the hell was doing i wonder i wonder if steve jobs ever found out you know there was this company called n zxte and uh yeah and it's funny

because we spell it totally cap right and if you go look at next they do like cap n and small e and then um x t so they do x t in caps too which i thought was really funny yeah yeah i wonder if you ever saw that um all right this question is from P-987. What is one thing you regret not doing before you started in ZXT? Oh, wow. That's a hard question. I think, well, wow.

I mean, my honest opinion is I regret not being like more studious in school. And now this sounds like very like generic advice. But, like, I was like, wasn't, didn't do super well in school. Like, I actually almost flunked out of UC Irvine, by the way. I was like, I'd been on academic probation. Yeah, exactly, yeah. It's always weird when they invite me back to speak and I have to ask the school. Is it cool if I talk about that I almost flunked out of UC Irvine at, like,

two straight quarters of academic probation? Anyway, like, I wasn't, like, really, like, into school. And then I found, like, I found myself, like, should be reading a lot, like, in my late 20s, you know. And like I finally was able to connect like, okay, why you study, why you read, you know. And like I just wish I did a lot more of that because I made so many like what I call low grade mistakes, right? Like expensive things that were actually easy to avoid because I just didn't know what I was doing. And I think I just like I was too intuitive about everything versus like I could actually have people teach you this stuff. Like, I wish I had more mentors.

Like, went and looked for mentors at a younger age, right? Yeah. Well, speaking of mentors, that's a great segue into this next question from Swipe HD. Who did you look up to growing up? I mean, honestly, being, being like a gamer, most of, like, it's going to be a weird example because I've actually said this, I think, at a town hall. But like, I didn't have like business people I looked up to because again, like I didn't, it's not like I was reading business books, right?

Like, of course, you always look up to your parents. My parents immigrated from Taiwan and with very little. And, you know, I had to like to build a business and like, oh, a lot of debt. So watching them like come here with not being able to speak the language and with a lot of debt and having to rebuild their lives here. like very told like at least like told me that I have nothing to complain about so whenever things get tough at in ZXT I was like dude you got nothing to complain about man your your parents went through like so much more than than you did to get here so like just get your

shit together right and like man up whatever right so like so i think that's like probably for me like the biggest takeaway from like people i looked up to but beyond that like a lot of the the the morals I have actually come from like gaming characters and stuff like that you know like I don't know I think about like Goku you guys know I love Dragon Ball right like the guy like is always beaten until near death but comes back stronger like I just like love that aspect of it

he's like super chill super low key he's just working on his craft every day he's not interested in anything else but like being the most strongest person in the world and there's something about that I like. So, like, that's like, it would be like one example, right? And obviously nowadays, because I read a lot of business books, there's plenty of business people that I'm a very like, like,

like a big fan of like, you know, I don't know, shoot, like if you read shoot dog, Phil Knight's an amazing entrepreneur if you hear a story. But anyway, yeah. So I guess that's another way to kind of transition to it. You know, like Goku being being up, but not giving up. Was there ever from Janus, was there ever a point that you thought you were going to give up on NZXT? And if so, like, why didn't you?

Oh my God, like, I think I've, again, I think I've said this before, but if I haven't, then I hope I even at my days. I think at least once a year, if not twice a year, I think about giving up. There's like, you know, this is so up and down. is this is such up and down that lows could be really low and highs are really high and then like there are days where like I'm like F this like I 20 years

I'm good I'm like I'm just going to go and chill right and like you know you always find ways to pick yourself back up right like and it's like like so you get that you a question is like why right well like I first of all I really love my job I also love the people working at NST and the passion we all share together.

And I think in some ways, one, I don't know what I would do if I wasn't doing NCXT. That's probably one of them. Two, I have this feeling that the job's not done yet. You know, I go back to like making PC gaming easier. Like I just feel like the job's not done. You know, like I'm trying to finish the job. And then when I feel like the job is done, maybe I'll go away, you know. So that's like part of it, right?

It's like I'm here for the people who are at ZXT. I'm here for this, like we say we call Promise Land that we're trying to build a company towards. I'm here because I also love my job. So, and again, I'm here because I also don't know what else I would be doing. Good reasons, I guess. Yeah. From Eat Your Heart Out, what has been your favorite fan interaction experience since starting the company? Yeah, I mean, I think I always get like, I always get energy from reading comments, you know, whether it's like, reviews are great and all.

And obviously, I respect all the media and what they do. But like for me, like that and for me, the customer we serve as the end user, right? So whenever I read an user review, when I get a letter, I get an email from someone saying like they had such a great experience with our product or even with our customer service. team, that gives me so much energy, right? It gives me, like, that's, those are the reasons why I get back up again is because, like, the positive, like, feedback I give from the community. And, like, um, not to continue to use Goku example, but like, for me, it's like that, right, the spirit bomb, right?

It's like everyone's giving energy to this thing that Goku is doing. And, um, yeah, so, so I can't think of one particular one, but every positive thing I read around the community that validates what we do, I think gives me a ton of energy. From Shaq, what were the specs of your first PC build? My first PC build, I didn't build it myself, but the first PC I played on was like a 286. The games were very pixelated then. You have to be old school enough, but it was like King's Quest, like, Sork, 80s. 10 tank killer.

Back in the day, like RGBs or RPGs or like with these months where you just like typed, look around, open door, walk north, attack this thing, pick up this thing. And you have to imagine the room all in your head,

right? But yeah, that's kind of like how early I had access to a PC. I was very fortunate, but, 286. Wow. Old school. From Hadukean 80.

Salutations, Johnny. I like salutations, by the way. That's a great great. Salutation. Are there any plans to make small four-factor cases or components, motherboard specifically? And then another question after, what's your favorite kaiju monster? Okay, so I need context.

What's a Kaju? Oh, like a Godzilla, Mothra. Well, I don't, I've never thought about that question. So I'll start there. Because I haven't thought about that question, I'm going to have to say Godzilla just because growing up kind of watching all these Godzilla movies, the Japanese versions and the American versions. Small phone factory cases, obviously you have the H1. It's been a while since we updated.

Yeah, yeah, the H210, but that's basically a case that's going away. We are a case brand, right, at our core. I would say like we think Well we know nothing We know the small form factor is like The small phone factor market is not big It's actually very small But we recognize the importance of it

And as a case brand I think we can't miss out On a key market So I guess I'll leave you with that Like I think it's important It's you know Because we're a case brand So yeah We're definitely thinking about

Small Farm factors again Can't promise when, but it's certainly something we're thinking about. And I guess going along with that from GamerC, since a lot of the market changes, and that's how we pretty much product or market our products, is like what are your thoughts in the current state of PC gaming, especially with the rise of like cloud gaming services? How is Ed Z60 adapting to these changes?

Yeah, so, um, The first time we heard about cloud gaming services was actually even before Microsoft X cloud or Nvidia, G4Snow. I want to say the first time we heard about it was a company called OnLive. If anyone is been around long enough, like 10 plus years, 10 years ago they were talking about cloud gaming. Obviously, it's getting better over time. But if you look at Google Stadia, Amazon has one, two, I forgot the name of it, Amazon. Luna, there you go, Luna, and then there's X Cloud, of course, and then G4Snow, is I think the adoption is actually quite low.

And it says something about, like, what gamers actually want. It's funny, like, because when I talk to people around cloud gaming, they're all like, oh, yeah, it seems like a great idea, but it's not for me. Like, I have not met a single person yet that's like, oh, I actually, it's for me. Most people think it's a great idea for someone else. And, like, I guess my personal take. around cloud gaming is it's going to be great for people who want a very easy way of getting into gaming without needing to buy a machine, right? It's like I think it's a good thing actually to, to again lower the bar to get people into gaming.

But once you're into gaming and you want something more, you care about latency, you want to have the full experience. I actually think most people will commit the investment to the hardware because the reality is like, well, that first gaming rig and hardware is, expensive, it like can last for years, right? Like easily three years, probably four or five years. If people upgrade cycles between three and five years, right? Like, so like it's expensive, but it lasts a long time. And a lot of games are free to play. So really, gaming is like a super, super cheap form of entertainment. It's probably cheaper than going to watch every major movie coming out. Again, you have to invest in the hardware, but like it's pretty cheap, right?

Rare Ricebag asks Hey Johnny I've been wanting to get into the PC building hobby for years now But I don't know where to start Could I get some tips and tricks And just any advice on starting out Yeah I mean I think it starts with establishing Your budget but like if you go on YouTube

There's kind of I want to say it's like 10 channels I do build guides right There's a lot So like yeah there's a lot If you're worried about compatibility You could always use our configurator To like configure your parts and then build it yourself, right?

The good news is about... The good news is building PCs nowadays is like 10 times easier than it was 20 years ago. We had to deal with compatibility and pins, and there was a lot of issues between different parts. Nowadays, most of that is gone away, and companies, different parts and different brands actually work pretty well together.

Bacian 32 from the Twitch chat here, they ask, what did you? feel after selling your very first NZT product? Oh, like, I want to say confidence slash validated. You know, like you never know if you actually, actually have the right idea. It's all like in your head until you go out there and do something with it. So that when you sold, you're like, holy crap, people really do spend money on this thing I created. It's like pretty validated.

And it's like, maybe I am on something. Right. So I think, and that was like the first product we sold. And obviously then it's like, maybe people would consider X-Exti Coolers one day. And then maybe NZT could potentially think about software. So like, even though that experience was 20 years ago, selling that first product, I still have that experience today.

Because we're trying to do a lot of stuff that's in new categories. And it's like, man, I wonder if people would consider us in these new categories. And it's going to take time, right? It took us 20 years to get here. It may take, I don't know, 20 years for us to get into these categories. I hope not. But if it takes 20 years, then it takes 20 years because, again, I have, like, nothing else I want to do. Luckily, I'm, like, still fairly young, so I probably will still be around 20 years.

Keep going at this, right? So, yeah. Nice. From Alex Cheeseboy. What's a product you personally would like for? for NZXT to make? And then what's a product you would like to bring back? Yeah, I have, I guess right now,

I'm, there are things that are better left in the past. Sometimes I think about something like the Phantom, like these like crazy organic cases. I'm like, man, it would be cool. We'd do another design like that. But I'm like, now let's leave that in the past where it's probably was a cool idea in your head. But in practice, it's probably a terrible idea. People ask us to make that case again.

all the time. I know, but like, right? That's like literally the opposite of thermals and usability. It's like all this like design for the sake of design, you know. And if you want to have really good thermals, you can't cover all the stuff up with all this plastic, right? It also doesn't feel great, right? The plastic quality is definitely not nearly as good as the, that's kind of steel, steel, full steel designs we do today. Yeah.

In terms of new categories, I mean, like, Yeah, if I could wave a wand today, I'd be like, yeah, I'd love to have, like, laptops. I'd love to have, like, the handheld device. Actually, funny enough, we've been talking internally around, like, man, I wish someone would make it, like, a... Basically, PC gaming version of Nintendo Switch. So now we have Steam Deck. We have our, you know, the Rog ally, and then Lenovo's got a new one. There's a ton of, ton of these coming out now.

So, like, what, we didn't get to do it. I'm so glad that it's here, because I personally find it. a really convenient way of PC gaming without needing to be in front of my gaming desktop. So I've gotten a lot of hours in. I've been able to play like Hades on it, being able to play like Starfield on it. So, yeah, so those are things that like I wish it was us, but we're just like, we're not there yet, right? We've got a lot of stuff on our plate already. But again, right, in 10, 20 years or five years, 10 years, I don't know, right?

Like, I mean, I would love for NSFC to be the company you can consider for all your PC gaming needs, right? And it's not easy to do that because that requires you to do a lot of categories. But like, I want to believe that's possible to do. Yeah, I want to believe. I want to believe. Yes. I want to believe. This next question is actually my favorite question out of all the questions we got.

We got hundreds of questions. And when I saw this one, I was like, man, this is like, I want to know the answer to this one myself. So this is from Infinite Access. If you could go back and start NZT all over, would you do anything different? I want to say no. You know, sometimes I wish I was a little bit more mature in my 20s. I felt like a waste a lot of time. The first 10 years of NZT being someone in their 20s, you know, single, you know, blah, blah, blah.

You know, I felt like a waste a lot of time. But like that journey is something that you also have to. embark to mature and grow up, if you will, right? So it's like also the reason who I am, like, why I'm the person who I am today. So, yeah, and especially because I was able to start it so young, I think that's like the number one thing I was like, I'm most grateful for. And that's why I wouldn't change anything. And I think the ability to find something you're passionate

about that you want to do basically for the rest of your life at age 19 is really hard. All right. It's just really hard, right? Because like we, you know, when you're young, you like don't know what you want to do. You're trying different things. You don't even know what you're good at. Right. So you're trying to figure out, right?

I got very lucky to do something I love and I happen to be okay at. I'm not bad at this, I think. Right. So, yeah. Cool. I like that answer. from Stealth the Fox Did you ever think that NZXT would grow to the size it is now?

Totally not Ivan can tell you this story when he joined NZT What were eight years, nine years now? I'm going on nine years and when I first joined The company was so small Like we were all literally in one room Even you like Johnny was in the middle Like I designed the cases sat next to him

And then the person working on the on the website sat next to him and then I sat next to them it was just totally different though when it is now and I never thought

it would be this big yeah yeah I think I think I think I told I haven't doing the interviews I'm like you know one day

we're gonna do like over a hundred million dollars in revenue and he was kind of like bullshit this guy doesn't want you fucking talking about like we're doing more than that today

so and I could tell you at that moment in time when I told you that I was probably 50% I was like, I don't know, maybe. And it was like, I for sure know there was like on my bucket list.

I thought like it would take the day like basically before I died to get to the scale of the business that we got to basically like two years ago. So the answer is no. So I don't I don't I'm like I'm not an believer in like people like founders or entrepreneurs like they could see like super far into the future and like they knew they were going to build this company.

it's so bullshit. I think people basically try to figure, figure things out along the way. And I'm basically still freaking things out 20 years into this job, right? Like every day is a new day, every year's a new year. We had like crazy, crazy stuff going on around the world the past couple of years with the pandemic and just crazy stuff. Yeah. I did. You know, honestly, when I first met you and you did tell me, you know, that number and like the aspirations you had, I did think you were crazy, to be honest, but I also, like you pointed out earlier, how you told Mike, you know, we got to be like Ivan.

You just have to want to believe. I did believe. I always believe. And it's been awesome to be a part of this journey with you and just seeing all the stuff we've been doing and seeing the company grow and seeing the community grow, seeing everything grow and get bigger and bigger. And I have no doubt that like 20 years from now, we're going to look back at today and be like, remember when we, in 20, 23, when we were that small, it's going to be

It's going to be nuts looking back. And it was like a, oh, we're streaming here, but the feeling is mutual, Ivan. You know, like, obviously, like, whatever you feel for me and in ZXT, I feel the same for you. You know, just like, I get just as much energy from you. And, like, Ivan knows this. There have been times where I called him when I had, like, it was, like, a super difficult day. And he, like, try to pump me up, make me feel better. Like, right?

So, like, this is certainly not something. like I can do alone and it takes everyone to make this happen, right? One team, one dream. We have two more questions and I'm actually really excited to ask about this next one. From Obsessed Wolf from in chat actually, best moment within the 20 years of NCC's journey, like which feels closest to your heart and keeps you going, keeps you keep going without quitting?

I guess I'll give a more recent example maybe the past in a couple years So, you know, we started getting to the desktop The PC building business, right? Like in 2017, like the BLD service we launched. And I remember I was talking to people at the company about this idea and basically everyone thought it was nuts, right? like you got good

good case business you guys good cooling business we have a good reputation why would you go and try to compete with like HP and Dell like in this like super low margin undifferentiated business right

like everyone was like this is a waste of our time we should just continue to build a piece of component brand right and pre-builds like there's it's it's just you can't differentiate right because how are you going to beat these companies right

and like obviously I'm lucky because I'm the founder and CEO I get like well I don't care we're gonna go and try this thing and for the first three to six month man it was grim was like we were not getting orders there are people to two to two guys sitting in a warehouse waiting for orders to come in and like I remember the Shopify app we're like ching I mean oh we got one order it's like two PCs three PCs a day um but anyway like six months in seven months in because of some things we did, basically, like, it was proven right, you know? And, like, I've had multiple instances like that in my career where, like, I just had such,

I had a high conviction around the desktop business because I hated most of the services that were out there. It took two weeks to get a custom PC. Crazy complex. Didn't know what you were getting because, like, it, you know, like, it was all these specs. You expect people read all these specs. right. And like I wanted to like try and fix that, right, like through a much better experience.

So I just continued to push for it, you know, and eventually six months in, we started pick up from traction. And then it like doubled again and it doubled again and doubled again. And like the computer business is like basically close to half our business today. So like can you can imagine if we had given up? And honestly, I at one point thought we were. and give up because it was doing really bad at the start. And you mentioned like the early days. I remember we actually had a bell in the warehouse.

Every time someone ordered a PC, that bell would go, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding. And we had two PC builders and they would play rock paper scissors to see who would have to build a PC. Like, it was totally different than what it is now. And I'm glad Johnny that you stuck with it because, you know, I think it would have been very easy to just give up early on, but you stuck with it and here we are today. Yeah. And I guess for the final one from Shadow Death 25, where do you see the company, NXT, go in the future?

Next couple years, five, ten, twenty, thirty years? I mean, I think that's hard. I guess that'll answer the question in like, I'm a big believer in the PC gaming industry. I think the industry will continue to grow, right? And when I think about the entirety of the PC game industry, you think about all of the products and all the hardware, like, PC gamers, like, use on a daily basis,

it feels like it could be even way bigger than what it is today. And I know I've always had this feeling that, like, I think no one's really built that company. And an unfortunate thing is sometimes companies get sold or they get distracted, blah, blah, blah, blah. But I feel like there's still an opportunity to build the best, most impactful, potentially the biggest PC gaming brand in the world. And like what size that is, I don't know, right? Because I think today doesn't really exist. There's obviously a lot of big brands, like much bigger than us, right?

But even when I look at these big brands, I feel like they're not really covering all of PC gaming yet. Some are really focused on particular categories. So, yeah, I try not to think about like a finish line. I just keep running in that general direction. And if there's still more work to be done, then we'll just keep headed towards that direction. Yeah, I'm not, I don't have some sort of like endpoint in mind. I think again if you enjoy your job, you enjoy the people you work with

and you're getting a lot of learning out of it, you could do that every day for the rest of your life. Love that. Love it. And that is the end of the community questions. So I guess we'll go into the announcements. So final words and then a very special task for you, Johnny, at the end of the podcast. And for a couple of people in the chat that are wanting

the code. Well, we'll get to that one and gets to it. So first, uh, like we said, we just launched the H6 flow, uh, and the H6 flow RGB. Uh, this case, honestly is, it's beautiful. Like, I mean, I'm going to swap mine this weekend and I'll be making a time lapse of this because how awesome this case is. Uh, you know, it's got the angled front, got all this room for, um, you know, got the perforated top. There's some things on the bottom, perforated back panel. Um, um, This thing literally is amazing. Yeah, there's Asian Venom, exactly. There's been awesome reviews.

If you guys have a chance, check on YouTube. Look for some H6 reviews. Very positive reviews for this case. So take a look into them, see what they say. If you guys want to take a look at the H6, go ahead and type estimation point 86 flow in chat or go to nzc.com and get your orders there. We also just launched a creator PC series.

We Creator 1 and a Creator 1 Prime. These PCs are made four to create. creator for 3D rendering, video editing, simulation, scientific computations, take a look at nzexe.com or exclamation point creator PC in the chat to see your chance into seeing if you guys want to get into this like creator and creative flow realm. If you guys want to participate in the next giveaway and potentially ask Johnny to CEO some questions that you can have answered on the podcast, go to our Discord, discord.g. slash nzxte or exclamationway discord in chat um and like we are releasing cases

coolers monitors monitors uh power supplies everything you could think of we are releasing them if you guys want to take a look at it go to nzxc.com or look at nzxt on all social media platforms crazy stuff we're releasing guys um and like we said we're doing two giveaways right now we're doing a swag giveaway um for a hoodie t-shirt in a sticker and landing pack. So make sure to do that giveaway. That's just for you guys live on the podcast. And thank you for you guys for joining us and talking with us

and interacting with Johnny and stuff like that. But also, we are doing an 8-6-flow giveaway or giving away one of these cases to one of you. It is global. So if you guys want to win a or have a chance of winning an 8-6 flow of your choice, there's a secret code word for extra entries for a better chance at waiting this case. So we wanted to ask you, Johnny,

what should the code word be? Can I get the hard one? It can be anything. Literally anything we'll make it the code word. Guy brush three wood. Guy brush three wood. Three wood. Oh, this is like, can you type?

This is aging me. This is, yeah. There you go. See, some people know what I'm talking about. Yeah, some people are saying that, you know, this guy's old. What game is that from? I am. I think someone who's how old am.

I'm 40. I'm old. I'm old. I'm old game right now. Oh, it's Monkey Island. Wow. Yeah, it's Monkey Island. It's Monkey Island. Okay. Let me go ahead and get that thing. I mean, can you send me the code and I don't want to screw up the screen? I don't even know what Johnny said. Can you type that to us, Johnny? Guy brush, what do you think?

Guybrush. What? Three wood. Yeah. There you go. Guy brush. There you go. Someone in the chat's got it.

Okay. Okay. I will change that to it. So what is, what is this code? It's the name of the main character, Monkey Island. Oh. Okay.

Yes. Back of the day window. If it's too long to end, you guys use Guy brush or use Monkey Island. We'll do Guy brush, Dreepewood. That is the code. Make sure to refresh your gleams.

I'll make sure to you have to refresh. You have to refresh your gleams real quick. Guy brush Dripwood. I love that code. That's definitely the most confusing secret wordy-burby is so thank you for that. Part of the charm with Monkey Island. All right. Well, Johnny, do you have any last words before we go in and end the podcast?

No. Thanks for everyone for chiming in. I saw, obviously, I saw a lot of good deposit comments. Thanks for everyone for supporting us. now 20 years in. If you're a recent support, that's fine too. And coming on this journey with us, yeah.

It's been a good ride and hopefully it will continue to be. All righty. Thanks to Ivan and Mike for putting this on. I promise it won't be another 170-something episode before I come on. I was not intentional. You guys making me sound like I've been saying no. I think anyway. No, you heard it here, folks.

Johnny's been actively avoiding us the entire time. We had to drag him. Yeah, but I'm all serious, Johnny, thank you so much for for joining us on the podcast. It was a pleasure having you on here, and it was super cool hearing you answer all the community's questions. I'm sure they also enjoy hearing your answer. So thank you for doing it, and I can't wait for you to do it again. Cool.

Yeah, thank you. Thank you guys for joining us. Remember, tune in live every Friday at 10 a.m. Pacific Standard Time on the official NCC Twitch. And don't forget to listen to previous episodes at Opelpawak. Google Podcasts, Spotify, and SoundCloud. Please leave us a positive review if you like what you hear or if you didn't. Guady question for us, send an email to podcast at nzxx.com or tag at NZXT on all social media platforms.

Thank you, Johnny, for coming on to the podcast, the big boss right here. Thank you guys for joining us live. Good luck to everyone on the H6 Flow giveaway. And we'll see you guys next time. Goodbye, everyone.