Custom electronics

I've recently taken an interest in electronics, it started as part of my efforts to build my media box. Last summer I wanted to use a better, higher quality interface to my TV than a standard S-video connection as TV out via S-video was a bit blurry and the colours weren't very clear. To fix this I built a VGA to RGB SCART cable which maps the pin out of a VGA cable to a SCART cable directly. Since the success of that project I've been considering a few others, one of which interested me is building an alphanumeric LCD display for displaying information such as CPU stats or track details while using Winamp. The device itself seems simple enough to build but what surprised me is the cost of the components. In the case of the LCD module it isn't hard to see how quickly the price shoots up when you're only buying one. Graphic LCD modules (where you control each pixel) are even worse, some of ones I found listed cost even more than a Gameboy! It seems the economies of scale play a large role in electronics where as an individual buyer one component will cost me more than what it costs for me to buy a complex electronics device from a retail store. If you don't believe me, take a look at the cost of a TFT panel or this small 320x64 graphic panel from RS Components!