The retail price for the er9 is under 500 USD without shipping. They will start selling them in the coming weeks I'm told. Should mean 600 shipped to most jurisdictions at most. I plan to buy several in the coming weeks.

As if BB standards weren't complex enough, now they're doing asymmetric BBs.
It's amazing.

I initially ordered the alloy versions, but was forced to upgrade to carbon because of stock issues. It didn't even cross my mind that there could be any difference other than weight from the paddles and derailleur cage.
I think if they had different internals, they would communicate about it.
I suspect you got different iterations of the shifters, Trace Velo himself got them to change their design, these chinese groupsets makers are quite notorious for using customers as beta testers and iterating versions on the back of the feedback. At least they iterate fast.

buye protection does not work. I bouhgt 2 ultegra chain, and found out that they are fake.
Aliexpress did not  give my money back , Ali express protect its seller.

It usually works for me, I've had refunds on a lot of things.

Not sure if it is older version or something, but here's one https://www.bike24.com/p2313768.html?menu=1000,1868,1969. Granted, it doesn't include crankset, cassette and chain, but upgrade kits are pretty barebone.

Thanks! Not bad at all indeed!

FWIW, i ghetto painted a velobuild frame that i got at "primer" stage. It was primer with high spots sanded. I ended up re-priming so that the primer would be a solid coat, because i was getting bleed through otherwise. Paint is finicky. Cost me less than 30 eur for primer, 2 colours (the black is metallic, it's quite nice) and a cheap top coat (couldn't find 2K locally).
Given the effort involved, i'm happy with the result. Barely any sanding needed, because i got the frame at primer stage.

Before, after, and the bike i wanted to emulate.

Any recommendations for wheels for gravel size tire widths?

In 31-32mm wide wheels:
Farsports 32.33mm wide rims (wave series). Pretty light, pretty affordable if you ask nicely.
EIE, Light Bicycle, BTLOS have heavier rims that are not cheaper. Light bicycle makes lighter versions of their rims but the weight limit is 90kg which i find a tad scary.
Nextie: still waiting for a quote. EDIT: Nextie is EXPENSIVE. Even after haggling, they're higher than Farsports, yet their rims are either same weight or heavier, they use their own brand of hubs so it's hard to tell what you're getting, and their rims look V shaped more than U shaped, which as far as i know is a big no-no for crosswinds.
Winow quoted me a cheap price but it's really a 28mm wide rim, not 31 (21mm internal when the others are c.25mm)

I'm buying sets now, I plan to go with Farsports (have ordered several times from them over the years, can't really fault them).