I really wonder however, how you manage to have THIS many hardware failures?!
Sounds like someone is buying old used parts off eBay and charging the investors for new parts. Is there any auditing of invoices, or is everyone just expected to have faith?
Dear lord, how many conspiracy theories do we have to come up with?
No, it does not sound like someone is buying old used parts. It sounds like someone is buying new parts that have a pretty standard DOA rate of 2-4%. I buy a decent amount of computer hardware myself, and I'd guess DOA rates to be around 5% for the stuff I've bought. So he's ahead of the game compared to my personal data.