CASELABS Resurrected

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[H]ard|Gawd
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The new owner told us the following: “The most important thing to me is that the spirit of CaseLabs is maintained no matter what new products I release. I want to keep the same level of quality and craftmanship and, where it is possible, modularity as before CaseLabs went bankrupt. I'm a firm believer in the right to repair and keeping it simple for the end user. Existing and future products from CaseLabs shall reflect that.” -Gamers Nexus

 
Because multi gpu system are no longer a thing, I don't know how they can revive certain models.
Cases will need to be smaller but they can make server/mining racks.

I hope they don't get distracted with legacy designs.
 
Because multi gpu system are no longer a thing, I don't know how they can revive certain models.
Cases will need to be smaller but they can make server/mining racks.

I hope they don't get distracted with legacy designs.
Larger cases can still be useful for cooling purposes. Not everyone is into the whole "cram everything into every square inch possible" fad. Nothing beats a well built full tower.
 
Larger cases can still be useful for cooling purposes. Not everyone is into the whole "cram everything into every square inch possible" fad. Nothing beats a well built full tower.
This describes me in a nutshell. I don't like to work on cramped tiny ass cases. I'm running a Thermaltake clone (Thermalfake) of a Caselabs design as I bought it right about the time Caselabs went under.
 
This describes me in a nutshell. I don't like to work on cramped tiny ass cases. I'm running a Thermaltake clone (Thermalfake) of a Caselabs design as I bought it right about the time Caselabs went under.
Yup. Case designers sometimes forget to factor in "tool/hand space" in their everlasting quest of chasing space efficiency. Same thought process plagues car designs.
 
that SMA8 Gamers Nexus shows in that video with the blue interior is really fucking nice looking. perfect color contrast
 
M-oll is the new owner and was posting about it on the caselabs thread on overclock.net they may post more updates there.
 
Larger cases can still be useful for cooling purposes. Not everyone is into the whole "cram everything into every square inch possible" fad. Nothing beats a well built full tower.
Caselabs made cases beyond full tower. They made modular water cooling cases that needed more internal volume than normal.
That was the reason why they began to make the S-line, which was still large compared to similar ITX and mATX cases on the market.

I owned CL cases. Lack of a filter system and the need to buy pricey fan brackets made it cost prohibitive for air cooling. The FT02 and my current FT04 are complete cases out of the box for air-cooling.
CL went out of business for a reason (client and material cost issues) and a subsect of enthusiasts will not revive the brand if they aim to make legacy designs.

In the long run, the new Caselabs will begin to make cheaper/smaller cases like Lian Li and Corsair. The market just isn't the same as 7 years ago.
But you're welcome to convince yourself those legacy designs will keep them afloat.
 
Steve said they didn't know what bends to make as they only had the flats from the original Caselabs. Of course, they could always just ask Thermaltake.. lol
 
Caselabs made cases beyond full tower. They made modular water cooling cases that needed more internal volume than normal.
That was the reason why they began to make the S-line, which was still large compared to similar ITX and mATX cases on the market.

I owned CL cases. Lack of a filter system and the need to buy pricey fan brackets made it cost prohibitive for air cooling. The FT02 and my current FT04 are complete cases out of the box for air-cooling.
CL went out of business for a reason (client and material cost issues) and a subsect of enthusiasts will not revive the brand if they aim to make legacy designs.

In the long run, the new Caselabs will begin to make cheaper/smaller cases like Lian Li and Corsair. The market just isn't the same as 7 years ago.
But you're welcome to convince yourself those legacy designs will keep them afloat.
Oh boy, more poorly made ill fitting LL and Corsair cases. If they want to sell out on the CaseLabs name and go that route well that's their business. But hey, that's the market. Everyone seems to want to spend $3000 on parts and bling to toss into the cheapest case possible. Mashing radiators wherever and starving fans behind hideaway panels and whatnot.
 
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Larger cases can still be useful for cooling purposes. Not everyone is into the whole "cram everything into every square inch possible" fad. Nothing beats a well built full tower.
Hell yes. I tried the sff thing years ago. The memories will persist long time. Mid towers can slide at times, but full tower ftw.
 
Steve said they didn't know what bends to make as they only had the flats from the original Caselabs. Of course, they could always just ask Thermaltake.. lol
Or hire a competent engineering tech. Sheet metal is gravy if you have the flats worked out. That is literally the hard part
 
Ive got my Lian Li PC-A05b still, mid tower with the 180⁰ Mobo rotated on the opposite side, build quality is better than most of the shit LL makes these days, I would still prefer my old CASELABS M8 though but it was basically a piece of furniture
 
Oh boy, more poorly made ill fitting LL and Corsair cases. If they want to sell out on the CaseLabs name and go that route well that's their business. But hey, that's the market. Everyone seems to want to spend $3000 on parts and bling to toss into the cheapest case possible. Mashing radiators wherever and starving fans behind hideaway panels and whatnot.
Caselabs never made sense to me from a business perspective. I had nothing against having ultra-high end offerings. However, I always wondered how the company survived when all of their cases started at "really fucking expensive" and only went up from there. If you want to have a successful business, top tier items you sell only a few units of is hard to sustain a business on. Back in the day, the brushed Aluminum Lian-Li's and Caselabs type cases were several hundred dollars, but how many units did they really move? Lian-Li was smart enough to have more diverse offerings, Caselabs wasn't. I'm not sure what their sales numbers were, but Caselabs obviously didn't move enough units to sustain them.

I expect Caselabs will have some "bread and butter" models that will be affordable alternatives to things like the Lian-Li PC-O11 Dynamic which has proliferated the market like a damn Glock 19. My hope is that this will allow them to continue to offer higher end options to those who want them. But there is no way that a resurrected Caselabs can sustain itself for very long selling only expensive models in a market where sub-$200 Lian-Li and Corsair case models exists. I'm sorry, but that's just not realistic.
Ive got my Lian Li PC-A05b still, mid tower with the 180⁰ Mobo rotated on the opposite side, build quality is better than most of the shit LL makes these days, I would still prefer my old CASELABS M8 though but it was basically a piece of furniture
There is nothing wrong with the Lian-Li PC-O11 Dynamic. It's a great case for the price. If you think that's a bad quality case, you haven't done enough budget builds. I've built systems in abhorrent cases that would have you begging a customer to spend just a few dollars more on their case. Cases so bad that it would make you debate about kicking a few bucks in yourself just so you wouldn't have to cut your fingers to the bone on cases with razor thin walls that cut deep like a scalpel with all the precision of a rusty steak knife. Cases with wire management so bad, you are pretty sure that it was designed by someone who never tested the case with actual computer hardware in it during its development. Or even cases so bad, you can't believe the people who designed it ever actually built computers before.
 
Eh, idk. I base my quality comments off my 900D. Proof that I can't spend my way to high quality when it comes to PC cases. I'm not knocking people for wanting cheap cases, but it would be nice to actually have an "end all be all" option (which I was hoping the 900D would deliver on).

I remember reading someone's water cooling journey in the 1000D in the cooling subfourm. Same story. You spend all this money on a Corsair case expecting a dream case....and it just doesn't do it.

So yeah, if they have to churn out some crap like that to keep the lights on while still offering some higher end offerings then that would be great. If not, I planned on going back to building my own in wood once I get the workshop put together.
 
Eh, idk. I base my quality comments off my 900D. Proof that I can't spend my way to high quality when it comes to PC cases. I'm not knocking people for wanting cheap cases, but it would be nice to actually have an "end all be all" option (which I was hoping the 900D would deliver on).

I remember reading someone's water cooling journey in the 1000D in the cooling subfourm. Same story. You spend all this money on a Corsair case expecting a dream case....and it just doesn't do it.

So yeah, if they have to churn out some crap like that to keep the lights on while still offering some higher end offerings then that would be great. If not, I planned on going back to building my own in wood once I get the workshop put together.
I liked the 900D, but the fact is that Corsair has gotten better at its case game over the years. That being said, no one case has ever been 100% perfect. Yes, a Lian-Li O11-Dynamic or Dynamic XL isn't perfect either, but they are popular because they are better than the vast majority of what's out there. The quality is what you'd expect for the money. However, the actual design of the Lian-Li cases is pretty good. I've built a number of machines in those cases and have very few complaints about them. That's both for air cooled and water cooled builds. Soft tubing, hard, AIO,etc. I've done it all in the Lian-Li PC-O11 Dynamic/XL. I've also built a number of machines in the Corsair Crystal cases. I like those less, but you can certainly do worse.

The problem is that cases are somewhat like houses. Even when you think you've found the perfect one, actually living with it day to day teaches you that something could always better even if you didn't see it initially.
 
If they can focus on getting all the current customers happy with spare parts, accessories, expansions, and then focus on new cases while still keeping some of the classics, I think they can be a success. IDK if he is going to eventually build them in the US or just ship from Sweden but I'm curious what he can come up with.
 
Horizontal boards FTW. Especially with graphics cards weighing more than entire computers these days. And compartmentalized cooling whether its for quad MORA Pro 3s or cascaded phase change. Everything enclosed in what amounts to a small fridge on wheels has a certain professional appeal to it. For nerds with more money than common sense you say? Some of us have strange things stuffed in those boxes that the usual suspects in box stores cannot accommodate! ;-)
 
Good news! I think though they'll have an even harder time at it, so much quality competition out there. Most people want a affordable mid-tower, and the high end has a lot more out there then what was available in Caselabs prime.
 
ecause multi gpu system are no longer a thing, I don't know how they can revive certain models.
Cases will need to be smaller but they can make server/mining racks.

I hope they don't get distracted with legacy designs.
Multi-GPUs may be out, but GPUs are by far the hottest part of a system these days so single GPUs being 3+ slots are in. Even if you go for water cooling, GPUs are requiring some serious radiator consideration to keep em cool. More room is always welcome, says the guy with an air cooled Fractal Define 7 XL.
 
Multi-GPUs may be out, but GPUs are by far the hottest part of a system these days so single GPUs being 3+ slots are in. Even if you go for water cooling, GPUs are requiring some serious radiator consideration to keep em cool. More room is always welcome, says the guy with an air cooled Fractal Define 7 XL.
Increased case volume can have a negative effect with air-cooling. Positive or negative pressure inside of a case has an effect on performance.
Too much volume and the pressure within the case drops, decreasing cooling performance. Fans mounted too far from the components also decreases performance.

You will need to add a lot of fans running at elevated rpms to increase pressure levels as most CL users attempted to do. The vast majority of them went with water-cooling as intended.

My FT04 is a wind tunnel. High positive pressure case. Keeps any GPU cool.
 
Never saw the value personally. Never owned one either, so what do I know.
I've only heard people mention how well built and sturdy they are. Now would one fit together the same way it did on day one vs 20 years down the road? Who knows, but if it did I could totally see the value in that. Whereas with my 900D I swear, 5 years down the road and nothing quite fits smoothly.
 
If they can focus on getting all the current customers happy with spare parts, accessories, expansions, and then focus on new cases while still keeping some of the classics, I think they can be a success. IDK if he is going to eventually build them in the US or just ship from Sweden but I'm curious what he can come up with.
I agree with this approach. But the finishes and tolerances may not be the same to support legacy users.
I think they will try in the beginning, but it will eventually not be cost effective. Case customizing isn't a sustainable model for growth.
 
Caselabs never made sense to me from a business perspective. I had nothing against having ultra-high end offerings. However, I always wondered how the company survived when all of their cases started at "really fucking expensive" and only went up from there. If you want to have a successful business, top tier items you sell only a few units of is hard to sustain a business on. Back in the day, the brushed Aluminum Lian-Li's and Caselabs type cases were several hundred dollars, but how many units did they really move? Lian-Li was smart enough to have more diverse offerings, Caselabs wasn't. I'm not sure what their sales numbers were, but Caselabs obviously didn't move enough units to sustain them.
I spoke to CL directly and said they needed to branch off and start doing steel cases. They decided to make the larger than needed S-line of cases, S3, S5 and S8. The people in the Overclock.net forum roasted me for tell them that. CL told me that's something they will never do, listening to the hype of their customer base. Then Thermaltake copied using steel cases, Trump tariffs increased the price of aluminum "to them" almost 50% and they lost a major government contract.....boom out of business.

CL was a hobby business attached to their government supplier business.
What was the value of buying the IP from CL is beyond me. But I'm sure CL was happy to sell it.
 
Caselabs never made sense to me from a business perspective. I had nothing against having ultra-high end offerings. However, I always wondered how the company survived when all of their cases started at "really fucking expensive" and only went up from there. If you want to have a successful business, top tier items you sell only a few units of is hard to sustain a business on. Back in the day, the brushed Aluminum Lian-Li's and Caselabs type cases were several hundred dollars, but how many units did they really move? Lian-Li was smart enough to have more diverse offerings, Caselabs wasn't. I'm not sure what their sales numbers were, but Caselabs obviously didn't move enough units to sustain them.

I expect Caselabs will have some "bread and butter" models that will be affordable alternatives to things like the Lian-Li PC-O11 Dynamic which has proliferated the market like a damn Glock 19. My hope is that this will allow them to continue to offer higher end options to those who want them. But there is no way that a resurrected Caselabs can sustain itself for very long selling only expensive models in a market where sub-$200 Lian-Li and Corsair case models exists. I'm sorry, but that's just not realistic.

There is nothing wrong with the Lian-Li PC-O11 Dynamic. It's a great case for the price. If you think that's a bad quality case, you haven't done enough budget builds. I've built systems in abhorrent cases that would have you begging a customer to spend just a few dollars more on their case. Cases so bad that it would make you debate about kicking a few bucks in yourself just so you wouldn't have to cut your fingers to the bone on cases with razor thin walls that cut deep like a scalpel with all the precision of a rusty steak knife. Cases with wire management so bad, you are pretty sure that it was designed by someone who never tested the case with actual computer hardware in it during its development. Or even cases so bad, you can't believe the people who designed it ever actually built computers before.

AFAIK Caselabs was something of a side project for the a larger manufacturing company; and got dragged down when it's corporate overlord failed. I half-suspect it was a gap-filler for when their machines weren't busy making higher priority stuff as much as anything else.

Even if the new owner does end up focusing on some more mainstream designs I'm hoping they at least are able to offer parts for the existing models again. With CPU/GPU power levels climbing I'd like to add a second radiator to my existing setup when I refresh my build, at some point a drivebay cover would be nice if my ODD dies and I decide to replace it with a USB model for the rare occasions I need one, and a USB A/C front panel adapter would also be nice as part of the refresh. The latter's less critical since they'd presumablyt just be providing an aftermarket faceplate for an existing bay adapter again; but I'd like something that matches the aethetics of my case better than generic black plastic would.
 
I've only heard people mention how well built and sturdy they are. Now would one fit together the same way it did on day one vs 20 years down the road? Who knows, but if it did I could totally see the value in that. Whereas with my 900D I swear, 5 years down the road and nothing quite fits smoothly.
Mine SMA8 case's build quality is still rock solid after 7 years. Only complaint I've ever had is that the way the door hinges work they're a pain to attach from the side/front because you can't really see what you're doing. From the rear would be fine, but that's not really an option for me unless I unplug everything and roll it away from the wall. It's only really an issue after I've been working on something since I like to leave things open until I'm sure they're working well.

Otherwise, assembly is either via screws and rock solid, or via stud/holder connections. The holders are thin sheet metal, and if you're not sure what you're doing you can damage them; but since they come with some spares that shouldn't be an issue unless possibly you're taking it apart all the time.
 
Someone's reverse engineered the Caselabs 540/480mm SMA8 style radiator brackets and is selling them in small quantities on ebay.

At $230 + $38 shipping (USA to Canada), I'm split between being outraged at a price far above the $30 I paid for one in 2014; and that for the amount of time needed to replicate the design and presumably hand fabricate them (presumably without any of the jigs/etc that even a small conventional manufacturing run would use to save time) that seller isn't asking an excessively high amount. Especially since used parts are nearly impossible to find at present and massively marked up as well.

Lastly is the fact that I've been trying to get a second bracket on/off for the last year because with CPU/GPU power levels steadily increasing I'd like to be able to cram some extra cooling capacity into my next build by adding a second rad. As eye-watering as the price is I'm tempted to go for it. 💸

https://www.ebay.com/itm/125134736041 - black
https://www.ebay.com/itm/125134752413 - white
https://www.ebay.com/itm/125136162147 - gun metal gray
 
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Anybody still following this thread have any updates on this? Is the guy still planning on bringing back the manufacturing?
 
The new owners informational survey is still live. But nothing new public.

That could mean the project's on hold/dead, or that the new owner is still working through turning the blueprints they got into manufacturing instructions and arranging production facilities and is just keeping quiet until they have something to show.

Presumably the press who broke the story about the brand being bought with the intent to revive it have some contact information. You might try contacting them and asking if they could reach out to see if the owner has anything to say.
 
The new owner has been moving forward (after illness and other issues apparently; hope he feels better) and I'm pleased that the new website is UP, appropriately listed as - https://caselabs.se/ ! Get on their mail list and they have some other social media connections too, plus a chat room on Discord. Seems the plan is to first start making replacement parts and upgrades for existing CL cases, then to make existing CL designs and upgrades to them (like the SMA8-A, the most "modern", final release before CaseLabs California closed - with features like vertical GPU mounting kits, tempered glass options, some really excellent luminous panels that I can only hope will return etc), and finally to make entirely new designs! They're still not up and rolling yet but things are progressing and its great to see
 
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Worried about prices. Will this basically be CaseLABS prices but with much higher shipping costs? :/
 
Worried about prices. Will this basically be CaseLABS prices but with much higher shipping costs? :/
The new owner seems really conscious of this. As far as baseline prices, back in 2019 they got quotes from a local fab in Sweden that basically said they'd be able to keep to the same prices as CaseLabs Cali, but of course a lot has happened with supply lines since then so they're going to keep looking. If things are entirely fabbed in Sweden, then the owner admitted that yeah it would probably be a higher price to have everything shipped to the US, similar to how buying in Europe would have been shipped from here. However, he's also looking into partnership with a variety of other local resellers and even fabricators so that, if up to quality, would be able to have US orders fabbed in the US, EU orders fabbed in Sweden etc. I saw a post dated 2 months back on a watercooling subreddit where someone suggested that Sliger, the US based manufacturer known for the CerberusX and other boutique smaller cases, may be suitable and a rep from Sliger was in the thread interested to talk! Not sure if anything will come of this of course. I also have another suggestion with whom they could partner and as soon as I can talk to the owner I'll let you know if its amenable.

So ultimately we don't know as of yet, but clearly the owner has been looking at ways to minimize issues such as shipping/import costs.
 
Glad to see things are continuing to move forward.

Prices I'm certain will remain expensive. Old Case Labs was expensive because it was low volume production, in the west, and with thicker than normal metal.

Low volume won't change.

Thinner more wobbly panels would make it not Caselabs anymore.

Switching manufacturing to Sweden won't change any of that. Trying to outsource work to a low cost country would be high risk. Especially at low volumes you'd probably end up with a partner who doesn't give a 💩 about anything but how fast they can crank the parts out. Which would be bad for quality.

There're a few parts I'd like to get for my old case ahead of a long overdue full system refresh.
 
https://www.reddit.com/r/caselabs/c...umber_one_part_or_accessory_you_need/iy08fh5/
Updated front I/O will be avaliable after we've hard-launched our webshhop. We're looking at Q1, possible Q2 2023 date for the hard-launch where we will be offering all spare parts, cases and accesories again. After that we'll update our existing models with front I/O, tempered glass, vertical GPU mounts (where possible) etc.

Assuming nothing else goes wrong, the old models should all be available again sometime in the first half of the year.
 
A few updates via their first news letter and discord:

  • Caselabs is planning on sending a survey out to newsletter subscribers in the next two weeks asking about which parts to prioritize for the soft launch. The survey will only ask about parts for the case you own to keep the number of options reasonable (this might be over engineering since I'd be shocked if shared parts don't end up at at the top of the list); the delay's mostly them wanting to be sure they've got it fully QAed first.
  • Manufacturing timelines have (unsurprisingly) slipped, but they're still hoping to have all cases available in Q2.
  • They are talking with Sliger as potential manufacturer for the North American market (everywhere else would be served from Europe), until/unless that happens they may end up offering a discount in NA to partially offset the shipping cost.
  • The plan is to include all cases including discontinued models in the hard launch.
  • A SFF case in the 7-10L or 15L form factor is being considered.
 
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