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New case, need recomendations

F

FreiDOg

Supreme [H]ardness
Joined
Jul 7, 2001
Messages
4,456
Needs: a new case for a full ATX motherboard. $100 (to my door) maybe $110 price limit. No power supply needed.

I'd like:
120mm rear fan.
Side fan, if it comes with a side window. I have no trouble cutting a fan hole in metal, but me, saws and plexi don't mix well.
Some sort of noise dapening system for drives, particularly hard drives.
a clean simple look.
Silver or black in color
The existance of, or the ability to create, a top mounted exhuast fan.

I only have 1 optical drive, no floppy drive, two hard disks and no real reason to expect an increase there. So bays are not likley to be a concern.

Thanks to anyone pointing me in the right direction.
 
TT armor would be your best bet, just buy the one without the side panel window and you'll save $50...
 
Your best bet is to head over to Newegg.com . They have many many cases. You can limit your searches based an many parameters (fans, cost, mobo size etc). Let us know what you have it narrowed down to, and let your fellow "H"ers decide.

Steven
 
Well, I'm sort of flying blind to start with. The last case I bought was a junk $30 Raidmax and that's the only case I've ever had that doesn't suffer from plain beigh box syndrome.
I know Lian Li and Antec Performance lines are very nice, but getting beyond that I haven't got much of an idea on quality of construction.


Anyway, I put together a public wishlist at Newegg, 5 cases I like the look of and are in my price range.
Newegg wish list

edit
hmm, seem to be having trouble bringing that up if I'm not logged in as me.
The candidated
Lian Li PC-7
Antec Performance TX635
Themaltake VA4000BWS
Sunbeam Trio
Tuniq IC-SYMI
 
The Trio looks good, I don't know how structurally sound it is. Just another case I have to add to my list of "Must Review." Personally, for under $100, I'd get either a Thermaltake Soprano, Tt Swing, or a NZXT Nemisis. Have fun!
 
I like this one.


LINK

11-196-011-03.JPG


NEWEGG
 
not seen that one before. but i love my coolermaster centurion. the windowless version has a blowhole for mounting a fan over the video card area.

i got the windowed version , no psu for like $70 shipped, you can get the blue metal front with psu for $85 i think.


has a 120mm rear fan already installed, same with the front but i think its a 80mm.

other then the mobo mounting you dont need any tools. cept a screwdriver for psu. and a screw if you decide on a floppy for it. other wise for me the tooless rails hold my drives very snug. other people say they are loose. so i guess it depends on individual hardware.

and some say these cases are noisy. but with the stock fans in the case, and a stock amd heatsink at the moment its the quietest system i ever owned. once in awhile youll hear the hard drives but not to often. i guess if noise was to loud from your drives. you could mount foam in the front.

i was sick of having a stupid door in the front of my case. although i use the door to hold my headphones its not necesarry. there is a ton of coolermaster pics in the coolermaster gallery. i was very impressed with it, for the low cost compared to some of the thermaltakes. although i would not try to sit on it.

only thing it really misses is a mobo tray. you could cut a top blowhole if you really wanted. some people mount 120mm fan in the front bays behind the mesh grill. youll see in the pics. but lots of other options out there. ive bought antecs my last 2 builds and decided to try something else. and love this case.
 
malicious said:
I like this one.


LINK

NEWEGG
Click to expand...

Hmm, I like that case. With the open mesh front I would've been worried about drive noise, but the hard disk bays in the bottom back seem like a nice way to combat that.
A bit more than I was originally hoping to spend, but it looks to have some extras to make it more than worth while.

Seems like I have a good list to go mull over, thanks everyone.
 
I have the sunbeam trio.. its a pretty solid little case. The quality isn't *top* notch, but its not bad either. The case temps stay really cool.. I put the 120mm fan in the front so it passes air over the hard drives.. then I have my 80mm fan on the side, and (2) 80mm fans in the back. It moves quite a bit of air. The racks you put the HDD's and drives in are great with quick remove twist holder type things. Oh, the gauges on the front work perfect and light up an awesome blue color. The front is like a mesh metal screen--really good quality and doen't bend and dent. It also has firewire/usb/headphones/fan ctrl/vol control on the right side if you didn't know.
About being quiet.. I'm sure you could make it quieter by putting those little rubber gromits on stuff when you mount it in there.. but I have a really loud cpu cooler and graphics card cooler.. lol. Thats pretty much the only thing I hear in mine though. (no vibrations)
 
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