Aircooled Core2Quad Case recommendations?

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Domje

n00b
Joined
Jan 5, 2008
Messages
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Hey, basically, i've just bought some new parts:

Asus Maximus Formula SE
Core2Quad Q6600 G0 Stepping. @ 2.40Ghz - Stock Cooler (for now)
2GB (2x1GB) Corsair Dominator PC2-8500 C5 (1066Mhz)
BFG 8800 GT OC2 512MB.

the next thing I'll be buying would be Thermalright Ultra120 eXtreme CPU Heatsink/fan & a new case, could you recommend any cases that give good value for money, nice cooling and are fairly quiet, I'm not really on a budget, but I don't really want to spend hundreds on a case. The computer is in my bedroom so I would like something fairly quiet that would fit a decent sized cpu heatsink/fan (as above) and is well cooled. (I understand that I should normally choose either cool or quiet) I am looking for kind of the "best of both",

Thanks in advance for your replies.

- Dom
 
well, i hate to say this but.. Antec P182 ... i dont really like the case but so far its the best for cooling/noise/price ... I sold my lian-li v2000 that i paid 300$ for this... my temps are better, the noise is 10x better...
 
Thanks I'll check it out now..

*2mins later*

that was actually one of the cases I was checking out when I was searching by price, the P900 as well, any other ideas? come on people!
 
Cooler Master Stacker 830 Evo

newegg.com has a deal on it for 99.99 after rebate right now
 
Stacker 810 can fit more fans, but what's really important is how big you want, and how many hard drives/optical drives you're putting in it.
 
The Lian Li A70 is also an excellent case. It have 6 120mm Fans and even with that many fans, it was quite quiet. A great case if you don't mind the height, it a little higher then most of the full tower out there.
 
Domje said:
Eventually I'll have about 4-5 Hard drives, 1 DVDRW drive and a Sound Blaster X-Fi Xtreme Fatality Platinum front panel (http://images.tigerdirect.com/SkuImages/gallery/large/C44-3428-e.JPG)..
Click to expand...

You can mount one hard drive in a sinlge 5.25 inch bay, 4 more in the included adpater, your dvd drive and the X-fi panel, and still have room for another intake fan or 2 with the 810, as well as 2 120mm exhausts, but that's only if you want a large case. The 690 is a smaller option, but I prefer the centruion 534 to it.
 
vtx_ said:
Coolermaster 690
Click to expand...
FTW!

Great case, good airflow, doesn't require spending over $100 on just a case. Tons of fan mounting places, good cable management, only down side is the power button is a bit hard to click(meh don't turn your computer off just make it go to S3 sleep mode).
 
Granted these are in US Prices and from US sites, I'm pretty sure you can find most of these cases somewhere in a British store. Anyway I recommend these cases:
Cooler Master RC-690-KKN1-GP ATX Case - $60
Lian Li PC-7B Plus II Silver ATX Case - $90
Antec P180 ATX Case - $106
Antec P180B ATX Case - $109
Antec P182 ATX Case - $109
Gigabyte Aurora GZ-FSCA1-ATB ATX Case - $110
Thermaltake Armor VA8000BWS Full Tower ATX Case - $130
Lian Li PC-A16A ATX Case - $150
Thermaltake Armor VA8003BWS Full Tower ATX Case - $150
Coolermaster Cosmos 1000 RC-1000-KSN1-GP Full Tower ATX Case - $150
Cooler Master Stacker RC-830-SSN2-GP Full Tower ATX Case - $150
Cooler Master Stacker RC-832-KKN1-GP Full Tower ATX Case - $150
Lian-Li V1000A Plus II ATX Case - $180
Lian Li PC-V1200 ATX Case (Silver) - $210
Lian Li PC-V1200 ATX Case (Black) - $214
Lian-Li PC-V1100A PLUS II ATX Case - $220
Lian Li PC-V1200B Plus II ATX Case - $240
 
Antec 900 is the best I've seen for air-cooling.

If that's all you care about...

It's heavy/fans got loud/mediocre build quality/mediocre cable management.

But damn it cooled well :D

I don't think the 690 is better for air-cooling, but it's got a lot of features for $35 (AR), I'd never spend $80 on it like the MSRP is...
 
If youre using the antec 1200 stock, you should look into replacing the fans. They may come with quiet low rpm fans, but it is a much better idea to get high performance replacement fans. Lots of people recommend the Yateloon, Noctua and SilenX fans, but if you want real power get EBM Papst. One 80mm S-force can cool the entire system better than all of the stock fans.

My brother and I ran our AMD Dual core cpu without a heatsink for a few hours. It just had a Papst blowing on it, and it didnt really get that hot. With a heatsink installed, the cpu barely broke more than 10F above room temp.

K-TRON
 
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