New Generation of Cases?

mikeb55121 writes "In my never ending quest to build a bigger and better computer i have come across this new design of computer case that is prety intresting to me and possibly any one else out there who build their own computers. This case is very unique because it is shaped as a "T" and the manufacture says that it ends cable clutter and has very good airflow." The aesthetics aren't bad, and the concept is solid. It'll be interesting to see if this catches on. I kind of doubt it.

Comments

An old lesson from Apple

[browser_war_pow]

I just had to cart a PC up 3 flights of stairs and down the hall to my dorm room. Moving my PowerMac was a lot easier because of the handles. PC makers still have a lot to learn from Apple IMO

Re:An old lesson from Apple

[maverick41]

Agreed....not only does the current generation of PowerMac have handles on the exterior, but also utilizes "hubbable" interfaces such as USB and Firewire to at least move the cable clutter. They also allow easy motherboard access via the "drop-down" case design.

Re:An old lesson from Apple

[sql*kitten]

I just had to cart a PC up 3 flights of stairs and down the hall to my dorm room. Moving my PowerMac was a lot easier because of the handles. PC makers still have a lot to learn from Apple IMO

If you can afford both a Mac and PC, surely you can afford a butler to do all that lifting and carrying for you?

Re:An old lesson from Apple

[Steve Franklin]

Might I suggest an aluminum case? And perhaps a flat panel display? After all, a CRT monitor is the heaviest part of the average PC, and those steel cases are a bit on the heavy side too, not to mention less able to radiate excess heat.

Re:An old lesson from Apple

[AKnightCowboy]

not only does the current generation of PowerMac have handles on the exterior, but also utilizes "hubbable" interfaces such as USB and Firewire to at least move the cable clutter.

PCs have had USB and Firewire for over 5 years now. What on earth are you talking about? Macs are cool and all, but USB is obviously not unique to them. Hell, my brand new iBook I bought in October doesn't even support USB 2.0 yet!

Re:An old lesson from Apple

[ozmodier]

True that. but if you have a mac, can't ya just have your boyfriend carry it around for you.

Re:An old lesson from Apple

[shepd]

>PC makers still have a lot to learn from Apple IMO

You mean Apple learned from PC makers, right? Apples loves to bring back really OLD ideas and pretend they're new and cool...

Re:An old lesson from Apple

[Rolo Tomasi]

[...] those steel cases are [...] less able to radiate excess heat.

A commonly held misconception. The truth is, however, that unless the hot components are in direct contact with the aluminum, the air will act as a thermal insulator, and given the fact that air is one of the best thermal insulators out there, the cooling advantage over a steel case is somewhere between jack and shit.

Re:An old lesson from Apple

[silvaran]

Hahaha that's awesome. It looks like they're on a turbolift or something. "Hey baby, want to touch my mobile blazing 1 million Hz minicomputer?" ... "Uh, no, I get off here."

Re:An old lesson from Apple

[Vlad_the_Inhaler]

Apple invented Firewire. What slowed it's adoption by the PC world for a long time was their Royalty demands, something like $5 per system if I remember correctly.
Given that Firewire is as old as USB 1 and is still better (faster, simpler) than USB 2, not paying that price is a decision based purely on principles and one that costs users extra.

Re:An old lesson from Apple

[arivanov]

Are you stoned or something?

4.77, not 1. And it predates all laptops and the Imac by far. I have worked on one of these beasts once upon a time. It was a bit heavy to move arond but it was definitely the first ever portable PC. Long before Zenith did the first laptop.

Also, the thing here is the design idea, not the Mhz. Assuming the author of the original post referred to the Imac, this monster has seen the market after Mac classic so I guess Apple still holds the seniority here. And the Imac is nothing but Mac classic redux. Taking the idea that shot Apple into orbit and giving it another roll... And trying to make us all think that it is original. And different... B.Sh...

Re:An old lesson from Apple

[AME]

Try reading the whole sentence. He wasn't comparing USB-1 and USB-2.

Re:An old lesson from Apple

[Jeremiah Cornelius]

Firewire: Per-Port Royalty = $1.00 USD

Re:An old lesson from Apple

[operagost]

The original Compaq was released in 1982. That predates the Mac by two years.

Zenith might have made the first clamshell laptop, but Tandy made a surprisingly nice Model 100 that had a small text LCD screen, several built in programs and ran on AA batteries.

Re:An old lesson from Apple

[woogieoogieboogie]

The Osborne was the first followed by the Kaypro II.

Re:An old lesson from Apple

[dissy]

Even not looking at the speed of things, firewire is a much better protocol than USB.

Firewire is pretty close to SCSI when it comes to its protocols, where as USB is best compared to RS-422.

With USB there is a host (computer) and devices (everything else)

With firewire, everything is a device, and they can all talk to eachother.

If USB HD 1 wants to send data to USB HD 2, the host computer must read one drive and write to the other. There is no other way.

With firewire, *A* computer (Yes there can be more than one on the bus) can instruct HD 1 to send data to HD 2 in large chunks, so there is very little overhead going through the computer.

Two firewire drives will be able to have the full 400mbit between them, where as two USB2 drives will only beable to send at a theoretical speed of 240mbit/sec because half of its 480mbit bandwidth is from one drive to the PC, then the other half is from the pc to the other drive.

Also having say 5 PCs and a number of firewire devices (generally not harddrives as they are a special case) each PC will see the same hardware and they can all use it in a shared fasion.
The PCs also can run IP over firewire and use it for networking as well.
harddrives will be seen by all the machines as well, its just typical computers assume a disk will be seen by itself only, so do not plan ahead for what to do when that data is changed unexpectantly.

None of that is possible with USB, and without special hardware you cant attach two or more PCs with USB (no a hub is not special) as each computer needs an adaptor to make it a 'device' instead of a 'host', and then the device computers cant see the rest of the USB chain.

USB was designed and made to replace serial.
Firewire was designed and made to be generic and have anything/everything run over it, including IP, video signal, serial, disk protocols, etc.

If you only need basic serial operation and very little over head, yes USB may be concidered better. But thats the only case it would be true.

Re:An old lesson from Apple

[syrinx]

You're talking about Castle Adventure, I'm pretty sure. That game rocked.

You needed to wear the magic necklace to get past the flood. After you get past the flood, *then* you wave the magic wand. :P

Re:An old lesson from Apple

[zeno_2]

Actually USB was invented by Intel, I really don't think Microsoft has ever invented anything =)

Re:An old lesson from Apple

[Steve Franklin]

"The air gets hot"

If it's an insulator, why does it get hot?

The fact is that trapped air is a good insulator relative to flowing air and to solid objects like lumber. If it's allowed to flow, it aids the transfer of heat as in your fan example. Hence the fans in the aluminum case transfer the heat carried by the air to the aluminum as well as to the outside of the case. Hence the parts of the computer do not have to be connected to the case, though, in fact, they are.

Why is there always somebody who has to argue with the obvious?

Re:An old lesson from Apple

[fenix down]

Air isn't a good insulator? Why the hell do they make winter coats puffy? Try wearing a wetsuit and a good winter coat outside. They both have the same ammount of material, why are you freezing in the wetsuit? Because the jacket's padding traps air.

The fans are necessary BECAUSE air is an insulator. Your processor has a heatsink in order to conduct the heat to the air, which will absorb it. The fan blows the hot air away from the heatsink so that it will keep working. If air were a conductor, you wouldn't need a fan, because the heat would be conducted through the air.

Air isn't an electrical conductor either. Lightning is not only not a "relatively low voltage", it's a fucking astronomical voltage. It jumps through the air because it's got enough energy to power your house for a month. Thunder, man! Air is not a conductor, that means it heats up resisting the current, causing it to expand explosively in an audible shockwave. Lightning only happens because air is an insulator seperating the clouds and the ground, which are both way better conductors than the air.

High School physics man. Try and retain your education a little. This is why people think the highest point on earth is Pluto.

Re:An old lesson from Apple

[Rolo Tomasi]

Forgive me if I'm missing something here, but the entire case is aluminum (Lian Li PC-68), inside and out. Everything is connected to part of that case and thus to the aluminum.

So your CPU, your graphics chip and all the chips on your mainboard are in full contact with your case, with no air in between, i.e. using thermal grease? Uhh huh, yup ... must have been one hell of a soldering job, connecting microscopic wires to all those 500+-ball BGAs ...

It also has three fans plus the one on the power supply. Now you're going to tell me fans are a misconception too?

Take some reading lessons. I didn't say that. Or are you trying to divert attention by making ridiculous comparisons on purpose?

Say what? Air is an electrical insulator, and only to relatively low voltages. Vide, e.g., lightning.

What are you, some kind of troll? Nobody was talking about electrical conductivity. But since you brought this up, it shows your lack of general knowledge. Relatively low voltages, yeah, about 25 kV/cm. Air is coincidentally also one of the best electrical insulators.

It is most assuredly not a thermal insulator. Put your hand near a cold window in Winter and see how much insulation you get.

Ok, you're definitely a troll. A simple experiment: put your hand in 212 degree hot air. Then put your hand in 212 degree hot (i.e. boiling) water. After that, hold a 212 degree hot metal bar in your hand. Then tell me which material has better thermal conductivity.

Re:An old lesson from Apple

[coolgeek]

Yes, but only if you wanted to call it a FireWire port, and that was before Apple came around a couple of monnths ago and realized they should "do the right thing" and give the name to the IEEE. BTW the royalty-free option to equip with FireWire was to call it an IEEE-1394 instead. And I believe they could not say "FireWire" in a Beavis and Butthead episode no matter how much paid in royalties. K mebbe that last line is a troll, however it may bring a smile to your face if you get it.

Re:An old lesson from Apple

[coolgeek]

Sure they did, it was the "Unrecoverable Application Error", which they promised would never happen again after Windows 3.1. To make good on that promise, the exception handlers now give us the Blue Screen of Death instead, so I guess they also invented the "Solution to the Unrecoverable Application Error".

Re:An old lesson from Apple

[HardCase]

"Say what? Air is an electrical insulator, and only to relatively low voltages. Vide, e.g., lightning. It is most assuredly not a thermal insulator. Put your hand near a cold window in Winter and see how much insulation you get."
...

"If it's an insulator, why does it get hot?"
...

"The fact is that trapped air is a good insulator relative to flowing air and to solid objects like lumber."

Good grief, make up your mind! The fact is that air is a very good thermal insulator, one of the best, because, like almost all gases, it has a very low coefficient of thermal inertia. That means that for a given volume of air, it will conduct less heat (energy) over a given period of time. One of the reasons is that the molecules of air are less dense than, say, a given volume of steel.

Why does the air get hot? Simple...you've got a limited volume inside the case and a number of components that are emitting a (relatively) stupendous amount of heat. The small volume of air in the case will most definitely heat up.

Although the fans in the aluminum case will transfer some small amount of the heat to the case, you'll actually find that because the coefficients of thermal inertia are so mismatched between air and metal that very little thermal transfer is taking place between, say, the CPU and the case. That's because the metal can conduct the heat much faster than the air can deliver it.

The real problem is getting the hot air inside the case out of the case. I design memory modules, and part of the work is doing thermal analyses of them. Our models (which reflect reality pretty closely) show that the material of the case is not particularly important when it comes to managing thermal issues within the case. What is far more important is getting the hot air out of the case as quickly as possible...and that's because the air itself simply will not conduct the heat to another location effectively. Why? Because it's an insulator!

Incidentally, air is quite a good electrical insulator, too, unless it is ionized by a fairly high voltage.

"Why is there always somebody who has to argue with the obvious?"

Indeed!

-h-

Re:An old lesson from Apple

[Randolpho]

The original sentence:

Given that Firewire is as old as USB 1 and is still better (faster, simpler) than USB 2, not paying that price is a decision based purely on principles and one that costs users extra.

This translates to:

Firewire is as old as USB1. Firewire is still better (faster, simpler) than USB2.

He left out the subject (firewire) in the second half of the sentence; it (the subject, firewire) is clearly implied, however.

Re:An old lesson from Apple

[silvaran]

Absolutely.

I agree.

Re:An old lesson from Apple

[MillionthMonkey]

Say what? Air is an electrical insulator, and only to relatively low voltages. Vide, e.g., lightning. It is most assuredly not a thermal insulator.

Most electrical insulators are also thermal insulators and vice versa. Most thermal conductors are also electrical conductors and vice versa. Air is an excellent thermal insulator which is why a sweater makes you feel warmer.

Air's dielectric strength is pretty high, something like 300kV/m. Lightning is a ridiculous example.

Put your hand near a cold window in Winter and see how much insulation you get.

Then put your hand on the metal window frame. Feels much colder than the air, doesn't it?

Re:An old lesson from Apple

[kesuki]

you're missing the point Aluminum is 1/3 the weight of steel. I've got a tiny little steel case that like steel automobiles weigs a ton... I've also got a giant Lian-li aluminum server case. Guess which weighs less? the lian-li.

Despite having room for 2x as many 5 1/4 and 3 1/2 drives.
Aluminum can be fabed into a lighter case than steel. of course alloys are the best route for light-weight strong cases, as aluminum is relatively soft (easy to scratch). a magnesium based alloy should be about as light as plastic yet nearly as strong as steel.

Re:An old lesson from Apple

[MillionthMonkey]

Just looking at the physical connectors and sockets, you can tell Firewire is more intelligently designed than USB. I always get the plug orientation wrong when connecting a USB cable.

I had four USB devices (a camera, a TV tuner, an external drive, and a mouse) that worked with 98. Not with XP. The camera is too old (1999) and Logitech isn't writing XP drivers for it. The Hauppauge TV tuner only has a buggy XP driver available that doesn't work. The external drive is plug and play, but XP is confused by it and reports "errors installing your new hardware" (although it does work on another XP system that I tested).
But the Microsoft mouse does work with XP! So that's a 75% fatality rate for an OS upgrade. Not bad.

Re:An old lesson from Apple

[coolgeek]

what an idiot i am! (smacks head really hard) how did i forget? how about BOB II (that's what i call the tablet pc -- think about it and what BOB was supposed to do).

Re:An old lesson from Apple

[Jeremiah Cornelius]

>And I believe they could not say "FireWire" in a Beavis and Butthead episode no matter how much paid in royalties. K mebbe that last line is a troll, however it may bring a smile to your face if you get it.

Huh huh... He said "Get it." Hey, Beavis. Does your FireWire get it?

Re:An old lesson from Apple

[kubrick]

Anyone griping about how heavy their PC is needs to spend an afternoon putting 22" CRT's on CAD users desks. Do twenty or so of those babys and then bitch.

I carried my late-1980s-vintage 21" greyscale monitor up and down two flights of stairs the last time I moved, nearly two years ago now, and pulled a muscle in my back that still twinges occasionally. Damn, that thing is heavy. I really should get rid of it...

Re:An old lesson from Apple

[zeno_2]

I guess you guys are right, how could I forget about the mighty BSOD, our favorite friend Clippy, and.. of course BOB!

In fact their laywers may have invented a way to run a Monopoly and only get a smack on the wrist...

Re:An old lesson from Apple

[ncc74656]

The key word was *utilizes*. Order a Dell today, and they keyboard will come with a PS/2 keyboard and mouse. Order a Mac 3 years ago and you got a USB keyboard.

Given the problems I run into with USB devices even today, I'm not sure that "one interface to rule them all" is a hot idea. IIRC, Mac users threw a sh*tfit when Steve Jobs made them throw out all their ADB/serial/LocalTalk/SCSI devices.

How long was it before USB became the default way to plug in printers (is it yet?)

It isn't. In my case at least, my printers are going from parallel to Ethernet. Print servers that let any computer print without being dependent on any other computer are a Good Thing (TM). :-)

(My comment about USB isn't trollish. On two occasions (once with a webcam and once with a flash reader), I've had USB devices refuse to properly install if they were plugged in before the driver had been installed. If a device is plugged in and the driver isn't present, the system should prompt for a driver disk. It did, but then in each case the driver failed to install. Subsequent attempts to install the driver failed, too...the only way to get the devices to work was to nuke the system, install the driver, and then plug in the device. That is just plain bad design. Maybe it's more a function of sh*tty drivers than anything else, but I've only seen it happen with USB devices...never with ISA, PCI, PC Card/CardBus, serial, parallel, SCSI, or FireWire.)

Re:An old lesson from Apple

[revery]

No, PC manufacturers learned from luggage
manufacturers who learned from sack makers, who
learned from Thog, the first caveman to make his wife
grow her hair long and therefore, portable ;)

noise

[smokin_juan]

blah. it's all lights and cooling and cable clutter and poppy cock. let me know when they design a QUIET computer case. noise cancelation tech, built in sound dampening materials, baffles on the outside fans... hell i dunno, but my heap is LOUD and i'm doubting that a "T" does much for noise.

Re:noise

[archen]

I keep thinking that more and more. I finally got to the point where I had to add another fan to keep the hard drives cool and thought to myself "yay, another fan". PC's are starting to get rediculas with the ammount of heat and noise they make.

If I were going to make a case I'd do it like something like these guys. Only I would have no little fans (except maybe on the processor), just one large 15 inch fan mounted on the top of a cube blowing in at a low RPM. I'm so tired of the noise from my PC right now, that my next (and only) case mod might be doing something similar by mounting a fan on the side of my case.

Re:noise

[jcoy42]

Go do your research. There is quite a bit of information on quieting your PC out there, and quite a bit of specialized hardware out there to do this.

Go to google and search for "quiet PC" or click here.

There are plenty of cases/fans/and everything else out there to silence a PC. You just have to look.

Re:noise

[arivanov]

This one will be quieter then the usual. Smaller and less powerful fans becayue there is less cable clutter and less resistance to air. At the end it will depend what fans it uses but it has a better chance to be quiet then a normal spagetty case,

It wont work...

[Xerithane]

Ok, it looks like two G4 towers that ran into each other at high speeds. Without handles. So what's the point? Yay, it has a folding down chasis design, but how the hell are you going to find the room in the back of the computer to do this? The reason why the Apple towers were so great, is they folded outward, not backward.

It seems to me to be another "We're trying to clone Apple and not get sued by mimicing their design so we're just making it stupid" case.

new cases? gotta change the fundamentals, first.

[herrd0kt0r]

a good case is:
- rock-solid
- transportable
- space-saving
- cheap
- attractive

it's time to wipe the slate clean on case design. go back to the basics. back in time. to an era where puup and piles of puup were the pinnacles of architecture.

you can start here: http://www.g-news.ch/articles/nhp200nc/

Wow, no pictures.

[foolip]

For those of you who don't much like macromedia stuff, you can see small pictures of these things on another page on the same site.

Nice idea, but...

[loply]

For reference, you can buy the cases from Ebuyer.co.uk for £80, and they are both deeper and wider than most ATX cases (thus, less space efficient).

They will not fit into the "case" compartment of most PC benches, if thats the kind you have.

Good idea, but Im pretty sure theyre a passing fad since the dimensions are so inefficient.

Re:Nice idea, but...

[GeorgeH]

Good idea, but Im pretty sure theyre a passing fad since the dimensions are so inefficient.

Just like space inefficient desktop systems died after the advent of the notebook.

What?!? I can't hear you.....

[Anonymous Coward]

Let me shut off my wind tunnel so that I can hear you.

Huh?

[Idarubicin]

The aesthetics aren't bad, and the concept is solid. It'll be interesting to see if this catches on. I kind of doubt it.

Well, that's pessimistic. "It's good, but nobody will buy it."

If the airflow is as good as they claim, then that's excellent. I've had a number of problems over the years with poor cooling, and I'm certainly not a hardcore gamer or 3D renderer.

Easy access to everything in the case is also a big plus. It just looks so elegant. No more fumbling with lots of little screws and trying to get Tab A into Slot B reassembling my case.

There are a few potential problems: the manufacture of this case will be more costly--it's not just a box. So bargain hunters won't buy it. The shape of the case won't fit into a narrow slot that some desks leave; it wouldn't be a problem at my desk, but I can see trouble in cramped environments. Aesthetically, the shape is novel, but I don't know if it's as attractive as the poster makes out. Finally, are drive cables long enough to reach all the drive bays, or are we limited to technologies that permit longer cable runs (serial ATA, for example)?

My two cents.

Re:Huh?

[Dun Malg]

The shape of the case won't fit into a narrow slot that some desks leave; it wouldn't be a problem at my desk, but I can see trouble in cramped environments

Yeah, this is what would cause me the most problems. Since the cabling essentially comes out one side and the airflow comes in/out the other, you can't really put anything next to it. My setup consists of five tower cases next to one another, so this case wouldnt cut it. It's a great idea, by only works if you don't have any other comp[uters near it.

Re:Huh?

[MImeKillEr]

Another thing you can do to help cooling is use round IDE cables

Or, do what I did: I took the IDE cables out, slit them between the wires (every 5 or so) and stuck them in looms and used electrical tape at the ends to keep them closed.

And not the looms like you see with the corkscrew cut. Rather the A/V type looms you see at Radio Shack. These are just to tide me over until I find round IDEs in my pricerange (that is, CHEAP).

Re:Huh?

[Bastian]

If you're cramming your computer into a narrow slot provided by your desk, I think I might have found the solution to your cooling problems.

Re:Huh?

[kesuki]

although they 'claim' it has great thermal properties they're not exactly doing it right.
they vent heat from the top -- this is the right way to vent a case. they put the power supply at the bottom of the case... so that the hot air has to run past everything to the vent at the top. this is not a good practice... on the plus side -- because the heat expands inside the case the internal pressure rises as the gasses expannd causing higher internal pressure than your elevation. this lowers the boiling point of the various components inside. However the same effect can be replicated, and with cold air by having 3 air intake fans to a single air exhaist fan air pressure inside the case will rise (sliglty) as the system boots up, lowering the melting and boiling point, while also providing vast amounts of cold air. as long as the exhaust fans are at the top the hottest air is expelled keeping the temperature inside as cool as can be.

since the power supply can cause more heat than any other component thier design is flawed. but as long as the exhaust fan is pointing up on the power supply the heat shouldn't effect anything except the data cables. especially if the two side fans are intakes.
So the design isn't perfect, but it should maintain an acceptable airflow. Also, since many power supplies have dual fans, the case could even use the secondary fan as a bottom air inlet, which would mean it was keeping the power supply cooler than any other case on the market -- If it has an air inlet at the bottom.

Re:Huh?

[MImeKillEr]

Actually, those corrugated side-split looms are available for far less money (and in various diameters) from your local auto parts store - that's where I got mine :)

Thanks for the info. I guess I should've checked my local NAPA or other auto parts store. They were a little pricier than I would've hoped for at Rat Shack, but oh well!

Ends Cable Clutter How?

[nurb432]

Its just a motherboard on it side with a couple of nicely placed fans..

Still have the same cable issues, only now they are visable from your seat, and not 'hidden' behind the machine..

Quick install of drives is nice, but other then that.. who cares?

not new: Apple, Compaq, IBM

[axxackall]

The way to open/close the case is like G3/4 Towers do.

Some similar ideas I remember from my experience also with Compaq and IBM.

quick, to the bat-cave!

[carpe_noctem]

It's another slashvertisement!

About time

[TerryAtWork]

I've opened many a case in my time and I figure some of these case designers missed their calling, which was to design traps that guard Pharaoh's tombs.

Re:About time

[Skjellifetti]

Good One! I sliced the bejesus out of my thumb this afternoon while removing the motherboard from an old case. I'm starting to wonder why PCs require blood sacrifices as part of their maintenance cycle.

Re:About time

[TerryAtWork]

Actually I remember when a friend of mine down the street talked to me furious on ICQ that he was trying to change a card in his computer and the store had heat-glued all the boards in and he was so pissed he was going to have a stroke...

I got his butt to a local bar and got a beer in him... may have saved his life....

Re:About time

[Reziac]

I once bought an otherwise-nice AT midtower that had apparently been designed by the high priest of some ancient god of war. Despite otherwise-excellent design, there is no edge inside that isn't both razor-sharp and angled so as to best rend passing flesh.

I covered every interior edge in that case with duct tape. Then sold it to a cheapskate client when he upgraded from a 386 to a 486. Figured that'd be the last I'd see of it. *BEEP*!!

Anyone care to guess how many times I've had my hands inside that deadly case since then??
Lessee... upgraded motherboard (2x), HD, modem; removed sound card; replaced fans (3x) ... that's 8 trips to the dungeon in all. And when I next upgrade that client's system, it'll be to a new ATX system... so the bloodthirsty case will, alas, follow me home, in the usual manner of used components.

The moral is, if a computer or any part thereof requires a blood sacrifice, there is no getting rid of the curse. It WILL come back to haunt you.

Re:About time

[Reziac]

Tee hee ... yeah, the vampire case was the one that taught me to look more closely at the innards... I'd never before encountered one filled with razors!! Tho that was about the time that AT cases took a general nose-dive in quality, and everyone was cutting corners. Some cut them more literally than others ;)

Fast Mirror

[gulfan]

Here's a fast mirror incase the website goes down.

Re: Computer cases?

[JohnG]

I agree, think of it this way, when the slashdotting goes down they are going to REALLY regret have a huge flash thingie. It STILL isn't as bad as flash intros though. Flash can be used to improve a website, but a flash intro can never be anything but wasted bandwidth on their part and time on my part.

one perfect shape

[g4dget]

Oh, come on, everybody knows that the one perfect shape for a PC case is this.

Besides, it goes so well with the one perfect shape for furniture.

Re:one perfect shape

[jez_f]

I think there is a lot of scope for cases to get more interesing. Case modding was never going to get into the mainstream cause it was a little (well a lot) too geekey.
But with power becoming less relivant for the average user, price and looks are going to start becoming selling points
I know mac clued up to this ages ago but PC makers arn't there yet.
Mini ITX has a lot of potential, even if it is a bit under powered at the moment.My fave case for this is the netbox cubit. It looks very nice but it is a little pricy for my liking.
There are a few more cases over at mini itx
I have been carting round my tower for too long so now I want to go to the other extreme.

Re:one perfect shape

[demi]

I have to get one of those chairs just so I can sit in it and cry "I am not a number! I am a free man!"

Here is a mirror...

[Anonymous Coward]

...in case it gets /.ed.

This is all well and good...

[Cyno01]

It looks interesting enuf, but where do you put the window and the CCFT?!?

Excellent Coolermaster Case

[Jubii]

This case would look at home in any AV setup.

Cooler Master 610-GX1

A bit pricey though

A few more pictures.

Two Observations

[idiotnot]

1. The cooling for the drives looks to be less-than-optimal. I tend to run SCSI drives in my systems, and many of them get hot. The intake for the fans would also pull air right off my nice cool 19" monitor, seeing as how my monitor is to the right of the tower.

2. There's a reason cables come out of the *back* of a computer -- you can route them to wherever you want them. Looking at this case, all the cables come out of the left side of the case. Looking at my desk, my tower is on the left side (which is by the wall). So with this, I'd have to route the cables *around* the back of the case....

Ob/.CaseMod: Where would you put the window and the neon lights?

Re:Two Observations

[jdonnici]

Looking at my desk, my tower is on the left side (which is by the wall). So with this, I'd have to route the cables *around* the back of the case....

While I generally like the case and the accessibility is nice, I agree with you. Having the cables come out the side could be a pain. Looking at my desk, my tower is on the right side of my legs. Given that the case doesn't look very deep, that means I'd be knocking cables around (and out) with my feet/legs.

I actually kinda like the current Dell Dimension case. It still has problems as far as cable-spaghetti goes, but the PS and motherboard are on one side, with drive bays on the other. You can open it easily without tools and without having to lay it down, and the drive bays are easily accessible.

Re:Two Observations

[ctr2sprt]

Ob/.CaseMod: Where would you put the window and the neon lights?

In the trash, where they belong.

(I have too much karma!)

Re:Two Observations

[Lumpy]

NO case cooling system other than an ANTEC server case or other case designed for SCSI is worth a damn for drive cooling..

If you are a SCSI lover... then you MUST use antec server cases, or another case that is specifically made for SCSI drives by mounting fans that blow directly across the drives and mount them so the drives have at least 1/2 inch of space inbetween them.

Actually, any hard drive should have this.. I have had 4 of those "doomed" IBM drives that many people had gobs of trouble with... mounted in a correctly designed cooling location like above they tent to run flawlessly.

Next generation of cases

[papasui]

I think the next generation of cases will be those made by companies that try to use as little space as possible, (yes they do need to ensure that there are no heat problems.). I've grown tired of having a tower case that doesn't tuck away under anything, and make so much noise I can hear the fans in the nearby room. My next computer will probably use a shuttle case/motherboard for these exact reasons.

Re:Next generation of cases

[MillionthMonkey]

I have a little Shuttle SS40G and it came with a good cooling system (nothing even gets very warm) but the FANS ARE LOUD. You do hear them in the next room. A big case doesn't necessarily mean louder fans- in fact you would expect the opposite because now there is more heat in less space.

Something happened to it the other night, right in the middle of reading Slashdot- the video signal suddenly went away and it doesn't reboot anymore. No BIOS screen, nothing. The only things that work anymore are the NumLock light on the keyboard and the noisy fans. Except for one restart attempt when it worked normally for 30 seconds and died again. :( It's only 4 months old, so I'm waiting for a response from Shuttle.

Re:Next generation of cases

[krokodil]

I observe that more and more my friends who
use computers not for games switch to laptops.

I guess maybe non-laptop computers will be used
for servers only in future.

Re:Next generation of cases

[nicedream]

I had the same problem with my SS40G. I search the net and found that the heatpipe/heatsink device pulls on the CPU and it no longer makes good contact. You have to unseat the CPU and then reseat it after you slightly bend the heatpipes. I was skeptial at first but it solved my problem.

Re:But the price . . .

[Anonymous Coward]

Looks like it costs ~$122USD. At least on the only site that seems to carry it . . .

http://www.home-pc.co.uk/browse.asp?cat=cases

I don't normally care about case mods

[scumdamn]

but I want that case!
That thing is beautiful. For some reason it just caught my eye and that was it. If you have more money than sense, I appeal to you: Purchase me this case! I am not strictly opposed to giving sexual favors for it!
HEAR MY PLEA! I WANT THIS CASE!
Thank you

Re:I don't normally care about case mods

[droleary]

If you have more money than sense, I appeal to you: Purchase me this case!

And if you do have as much sense as you have money, buy him a PowerMac, which still wipes the floor with every PC case I've ever seen.

Re:I don't normally care about case mods

[belroth]

It's no use to me as you can't stack them.
As other posts have said this 'T' case is dumb as you can't put them side by side. As I put my towers side by side and occasionally stacked (2x2) the 'T' and Powermac are both useless. My choice (if I had the cash) would be Lian-Li PC60 - I have one and would like to re-house the rest. I know it has an exhaust on top but I can space them vertically with a few wood blocks, and they are very well designed and easy to work on.

non-space-saving is better!?

[SHEENmaster]

I want 11 5.25" bays and 3 3.5" bays.

If you are counting, that's enough for 7 SCSI drives, 3 IDE + 1 IDE hd, and 1 bay for a floppy tape drive.

I'm nearly to the breaking point with my damn mid-tower. Maybe I could mod a VAX server case if my local college will make a donation.

I don't know

[sielwolf]

For my current machine: I just pop of the side and I have access to everything. And then I don't need to close it to test my machine.

I guess that is the crux of the problem for this case. To actually get it up and running it must be closed, which means closing it part way, connecting the ribbon cables up, and then snapping it shut (since I doubt you want to run it with the tension of the mainboard + CPU on the IDE cables).

Now I have to say that it does seem to fix the mobo access issue. But it does this by making the case more of a hassle to get running. And that's too heavy of a black mark to ignore.

This reminds me of the crappy CompUSA case..

[SensitiveMale]

that has the motherboard mounted on a fold down door.

While it looked cool and functional on my mac the PC case sucked because the IDE and floppy cables were too short to reach when the door was all the way open.

So every time I had to open the case i had to disconnect my hard drives and floppy.

Just another instance of the PC makers half-ass following Apple's lead and getting it all wrong.

Re:This reminds me of the crappy CompUSA case..

[Dynedain]

apples first attempt at it screwed up too

on the beige G3 towers the IDE cables weren't long enough to get to the lower bays, and running/replacing IDE cables was a complete bitch and a half - and this case didn't have the motherboard on a door, just the door and power supply easily folded out. the second major problem w/ the case was that you had to unplug stuff to open it. So youd pop in that new component, test it, and then have to shut down so you could unplug the power again and close the case back up

Very interesting.

[Ironica]

Wouldn't fit in my current desk; this thing is 15" wide, and the computer shelf under my desk is only 10". But, my current case is taller and longer than this guy.

The "easy access" isn't quite so easy, though, when you realize you'll have to pull the computer all the way out from the wall every time you want to open it. Or you could just turn it, but that requires more maneuvering room.

I like the idea of the cables plugging into the side, though. I can't count the number of times I have wished I had one of those dentist mirror-thingies when figuring out which plug goes in which jack. It won't reduce cable clutter in the slightest, but it will make them more accessible. (The only real way to reduce cable clutter, I've decided, is the liberal application of zip ties.)

Ugly, and not that different

[core plexus]

Forgive my bluntness, but I find it quite ugly. Also, I don't find a compelling reason to open up my case every day, nor even once a week.

And I'll repeat my complaint: while there are a couple of alterations or perhaps innovations to this case, really it is just more of the same. Do I have something better? Maybe, but I'm still testing it.

Computer geek peddles bootleg porn from city hall

us retailer?

[(startx)]

After googling for a bit, I can only find UK retailers. Does anyone know of a place to purchase one of these in the US?

Re:Does the orange-colored case remind anyone else

[JonathanF]

Someone mod up this comment as "funny!" It's so true. :)

Looks like an Harkonen craft from Lynch's DUNE.

[Viewsonic]

Thats the first thing I thought when I saw it.

Once again this begs the question

[drinkypoo]

Where can one get one's hands on G3 or G4 cases (with handles, bondi blue or platinum or whatever color, there's a market) for less than a hundred bucks? They don't have to have a power supply, and we already know they're not ATX but one can hack that easily enough.

Re:Once again this begs the question

[MImeKillEr]

You and me both. I'd love to get my hands on a G4 case.

I just don't want to pay an arm and a leg for it.

And they won't see you just the case. The bastards!

Eeeewwwww.....

[dbc]

Ugly. Yuck. 'Nuff said.

Stupidly wide. I have 3 towers side by side under my table right now. Side warts kills that. Side cables kill it worse.

Noise?? I didn't see where they mentioned fan noise. The next time I buy a case, it will be the most quiet one I can find.

Bzzzt! Thank you for playing.

Re: Computer cases?

[Rolo Tomasi]

I renamed the flash plugin (C:\phoenix\plugins\NPSWF32.dll) to NPSWF32.dll.fuckthis. When there's a page that I'd like to see flash on (about once a week), I just rename it back. You don't even have to restart Phoenix, just reload the page. The procedure should be the same for all Mozilla based browsers.

Re:Ok, where's the power supply ?

[Anonymous Coward]

The animation _does_ show the power supply. It is under the drive bays as you guessed. Look again, and look closely.

Re:air flow?

[EvanED]

This could be easily fixed... just add exhaust fans. The theory could be okay while the execution isn't.

Furniture at MacWorld

[billstewart]

Macworld was in SF this week, so I went there for an hour or so, which was enough :-) There was a surprising amount of furniture. I don't remember the name of it, but somebody had a line of white and chrome stuff that went with the half-sphere iMacs, which provided a bottom half sphere and some bent chrome tubes and a keyboard/mouse holder on another extension arm, kind of like having your desk replaced with a white spider.

accessibilty is good; looks Harkonen

[Wansu]

Looks like it's easy to get to everything.

It reminds me of the Harkonen ships in the 1984 Dune.

"It is by will alone I set my mind in motion.
The thoughts acquire speed.
The lips acquire stain.
The stain becomes a warning.
It is by will alone I set my mind in motion."

Re:accessibilty is good; looks Harkonen

[Bake]

Wasn't it more like:

It is by will alone I set my mind in motion
it is by the juice of saphu
that thoughts acquire speed
that lips acquire stains
that stains become a warning
It is by will alone I set my mind in motion.

No, no we want smaller

[ToasterTester]

This case is TOO big! What self respecting geek only has one computer and soon as you do space becomes an issue. The Shuttle with their SFF are the direction I like to see. I just wish they would make a server model Shuttle. Don't need the multimedeia stuff, need dual NICs, room for two hard drives, no floppy, thin CD-ROM. two PCI slots no floppy, serial ports front and back RJ45 serial would be fine, BIO option to redirect video to serial is no keyboard attached.

That's what I'd like to see.

Re:No, no we want smaller

[pogle]

Yeah, I just saw the new reviews on the Shuttle XPC SN41G2 today on tech report...those things look sweet. A server model would be pretty nice too...hard to put a RAID into the current XPCs.

Avoiding the problem

[prototype]

I think the biggest problem with cases is the fact that everything you want to attach to the system spouts from connections on the mainboard. These cables (IDE, power, fan, etc.) are always either too short, too long or otherwise impossible to wrap around the other components in the system without slicing, dicing, twisting, bending and otherwise really mungling the cables.

There have been a few incentives I've seen to remedy this like taking the ribbon cables and turning them into wrapped cables so they don't take up as much space, however that still really doesn't fix the inherent problem. Connectivity from mainboard to peripheral.

What I would like to see is a case where the mainboard connections plug into a central unit (perhaps behind the mainboard itself) and each add-on (hard drive, CD-ROM, floppy, fan, etc.) would plug into their own connectors. If a case designer really wants to make something inventive, they would make an IDE plugin built into the case. Snap in the hard drive and poof. Its connected. Snap in the CD-ROM. Poof. Connected. No more wires and cables. Now THAT would be innovative!

I'm cluster biased

[AssFace]

People are saying that it won't fit in the slots of their desks... I suppose I'm not the typical user - I would never ever ever ever ever ever get a desk that had a slot for me to put my computer in.
It insulates the machine too much and regardless of how hard you work to cool it, you are exacerbating the issue if you have it in a slot in your desk.

That said, I'm not sure the shape is all that great for my uses because I basically only ever really want either a laptop, or a bunch of small and compact machines to cluster. Something that shape on its own and under an open desk is just dandy - but trying to put that in an area with others just like it takes up more space than just the traditional "brick o' computer"

The main things I want from a case are compactness,quietness, and cheapness.
None of those seem to help keep it cool, but when you have multiple white noise sources going, they seem to amplify each other, and it SUCKS on hardwood floors.

I want a case that is quiet and clamshells, but is just a normal shape that is easy to cram a bunch of them in a small place.
basically I want a rackmount, but for way less money :)

BTW, The Shuttle NVidia box is out.

[jonr]

Check it out.
J.

Dell cases

[kEnder242]

First time I opened a dell amazed me.
1)Take out the power cord
2)Pull a tab
3)Everything falls apart in a nice neat pile.

Re:Dell cases

[NeuroManson]

Unlike the standard Packard Bell:

1) Power Cord falls off on its own
2) Came with a can of Tab spilled inside
3) Falls apart in a nice neat pile on boot.

You can't beat some lego

[nrublimk]

The I-Tee is alright.. But I still prefer this one...

The Awesome 1337 Lego LAN Case!

All I need now is some lego :-)

Re:Ok, where's the power supply ?

[l810c]

It's in the bottom of the front part. It looks like it exhausts Inside the Case right under the cpu. Logical place;)

man!

[TygerFish]

Christ, that's ugly.

OT: Thermal management: PC design sucks...

[wowbagger]

The design of the PC system SUCKS from a thermal management standpoint.

Look at the old VME systems (e.g. what is in use at a telephone switching office).

The backplane board is vertically mounted along the back of the enclosure, and the cards are ALSO vertically mounted into the backplane. Any plugs on each card are on the front of the card. One whole section of the bus is reserved for I/O connections, so standard connections are on the backplane.

As a result, natural convection can move air over the system. If you need forced air, you put a fan at the bottom of the system, pressurizing the cabinet - that way you are moving denser, cold air with the fan.

When the S100 systems came out, they almost got this right, but they put the backplane on the bottom, and mounted the cards vertically. As a result, you now have the backplane blocking natural convection. Plus, with the connectors on the BACK of the card, you have yet another impediment to air flow.

When the first PC was designed, they stole the design of the S100 bus systems in that regard.

Now, you have one of two options - the tower approach, with the main board vertical and the cards horizontal - so your GPU cooks in its own heat, and the cards block the natural airflow over the main board, or the desktop approach - where your cards are vertical, but your main board cooks.

All case designs for the PC are work-arounds for this rather BAD design.

And until the PC industry starts making a change, no case tricks will completely ease this.

That said, I must say these things:

1) That was possibly the BEST use of a Flash animation for a site I've seen in a long time. Rather than wasting my time with BS, they show me the case in operation. Bravo to the webmaster!

2) The case actually would solve one problem I have in my setup - with all the cables exiting out the back of the tower case, and the tower being in the bay in my desk, it is a bitch to get to them, and they tend to get nibbled on by the fans I've put at the back of the desk. This case, with the cards exiting from the side would avoid that.

Re:OT: Thermal management: PC design sucks...

[rossz]

I agree about the flash. I think it's the first time I have ever seen flash being useful. It's also the first time I didn't ignore the flash. I watched it loop through several times because I was actually learning about the product. Marketing droids, you might wish to make a note of this.

Too bad the case is way out of my budget. I'm a tech worker in Northern California. Want to guess if I have a job or not?

Re:OT: Thermal management: PC design sucks...

[virtual_mps]

The backplane board is vertically mounted along the back of the enclosure, and the cards are ALSO vertically mounted into the backplane. Any plugs on each card are on the front of the card. One whole section of the bus is reserved for I/O connections, so standard connections are on the backplane.

As a result, natural convection can move air over the system. If you need forced air, you put a fan at the bottom of the system, pressurizing the cabinet - that way you are moving denser, cold air with the fan.

This is, of course, a silly idea when using modern equipment that's pumping out a few hundred watts per unit. Newfangled rackmount equipment flows front-to-back for a reason--if it flowed bottom-to-top the uppermost units would quickly melt from the combined heat of the lower units. It's not hard to pack 8 or 16 thousand watts into a rack these days, and funneling that much heat through the machine on top is simply not a good idea. Remember, just because somebody did something different 30 years ago doesn't mean the modern engineers are clueless.

Re:OT: Thermal management: PC design sucks...

[wowbagger]

No, because in a modern rack you have a plenum between sections, removing the air from the stack.

And rack mounted systems are different from home computer layouts.

AND the modern PC design still makes getting good airflow over all components difficult since there are almost no unobstructed straight line paths through the case.

AND you still benefit from convection, even in a forced air situation, as components in dead air (see point above) get convective cooling.

I work on equipment that pumps out the watts. Do you?

Re:OT: Thermal management: PC design sucks...

[virtual_mps]

No, because in a modern rack you have a plenum between sections, removing the air from the stack.

I'm not sure what you're getting at here. First you talked about passive convection cooling, now something else. Make up your mind about what PC's need to copy. If you look at something like a sun 10k or 15k you'll find a midpoint-to-top airflow but that's got much less to do with convection cooling than with the ability to pull a board out without removing the fans. Once you force enough air through the system the orientation is pretty much irrelevant, and driven by concerns other than cooling.

And rack mounted systems are different from home computer layouts.

As opposed to VME-based telecom equipment?

AND the modern PC design still makes getting good airflow over all components difficult since there are almost no unobstructed straight line paths through the case.

Now that's a relevent argument, and definately a problem in most low-end/home pc's. Rackmount and high-end machines tend to have better airflow due to improved cable management and integrated design.

AND you still benefit from convection, even in a forced air situation, as components in dead air (see point above) get convective cooling.

For which components is this even relevant? Convection cooling is totally inadequate for the hottest part of a modern system. (CPU and HD now, and increasingly other components.) Moving things around so they match an ancient VME design isn't going to change the fact that you'll need a big honkin' fan. More importantly still, the ideal solution just won't have any dead air...

I work on equipment that pumps out the watts. Do you?

Everything from rackmount pc's to multirack storage arrays to liquid-cooled computer systems. Ain't none of that stuff going to benefit from passive convection air cooling.

Re:OT: Thermal management: PC design sucks...

[jandrese]

Ages ago on Slashdot I gave my reccomendation for a vertical PC, which has almost everything (power supply, cards, external bays) mounted vertically and fans on the bottom sucking air in and pushing it out the top. The case would be designed to avoid the terrible obsructions to airflow most PC cases have, and would allow fairly easy access to the cards (especially those danged USB ports). The only downside is you can't stack anything on top of it, and it would be longer/shorter than a typical PC case. You would have to be careful that all of your equipment could be mounted vertically, but that shoudln't be a big problem these days. Because I'm terrible at explaining it, I've posted a quick drawing of my concept. It's not to scale, but it should give you an idea of what I want.

smaller is better, weirder is not

[gelfling]

Put all the connections on the front. Make the whole case smaller. Make the whole chassis a heat sink and build a fan into the MoBo.

Re:Nice.

[danimrich]

I'd say Apple has been one of the most design-oriented mass-market computer manufacturers over the past few years. I'd personally prefer an Apple case over one of these cases, which I doubt will have a long future as they seem not to fit many computer tables.

that's all well and good BUT

[spudwiser]

where are you gonna put the nice big showy window? it seems the only place conducive towards putting a window there would be pretty boring with just he cables there and such. as zaphod would probably put it... 10 out of 10 for engineering, but -10,000,000 for no style.

Perfect Match!

[KidSock]

Cool, as one of the few Girls Going into CS this looks like an excuse to use my new DIY Ambient Light Keyboard Kit. I just have to Recycle a Pay Phone into a MAME Emulation Console with one of these New Generation Cases. If only I could find a Water Cooled Power Supply. Mmmm.

Re:What?!? I can't hear you.....

[Toraz Chryx]

To be fair, the noise from the MDD Powermacs is a tad nasty if you want to use it in a production (audio/video) environment...

that said, they ain't got NOTHIN' on a 7000rpm Delta :)

Just when I thought I knew what "ugly" meant...

[phillymjs]

...this beast comes along and redefines the term.

This thing looks like a G4 that got broadsided by a PC that was reversing at a high rate of speed-- or maybe what you'd get if you were teleporting a G4 and a PC fell into the pod.

I can remember those old Reese's Peanut Butter Cup commercials where the one guy's chocolate fell into the other guy's peanut butter. Except that that was a good idea, and this isn't. Somehow I don't think "You got your P4 in my G4!" "No, you got your G4 in my P4!" would be much of an ad campaign.

~Philly

Re:Just when I thought I knew what "ugly" meant...

[swv3752]

Actually I think it looks kinda neat. The aethestics are nice, I am just concerned over the practicality of having cords stick out the side.

what about the Apple // ?

[Aqua OS X]

My old Apple // had a handle on the monitor as well and the computer itself. Moreover, that thing came out well before that Compaq you linked us too.

But seriously, who cares about who pioneered the computer handle?

Some of the folks here are simply trying to say that Apple's PowerMac cases offer a combo of accessibility, portability, and style that no one in the PC world has been able to duplicate.

I know that when my PowerMac is no longer functional I'm probably going to gut it and save the case for one of my PCs. It's compact, it has a door, it has WiFi antennas nested in handles that don't really look like handles, and it not ugly and boring.

Re:damping vs. dampening

[alienmole]

dampening means to make wet. sorry - just tired of seeing/hearing it used incorrectly

Good news, and easy problem to solve - you haven't been seeing it used incorrectly, it's just that everyone else knows the definition and you don't:

Main Entry: dampen
Pronunciation: 'dam-p&n
Function: verb
Inflected Form(s): dampened; dampening /'damp-ni[ng], 'dam-p&-/
Date: 1547
transitive senses
1 : to check or diminish the activity or vigor of : DEADEN <the heat dampened our spirits>

Poor design

[zero_offset]

They have the motherboard tray completely backwards. When you fold it open, the card slots are closest to the rest of the case, and the CPU end of the motherboard -- where all the connectors are -- is farthest away. There are a few exceptions of course, like an IT7 with RAID -- which still has non-RAID IDE connectors in the usual spot, but connector location is generally pretty standard these days.) That case is the least-useful arrangement imaginable for a number of reasons -- all of which could be addressed if they had rotated the motherboard 180 degrees.

First, your IDE cables have to reach a LOT farther than they would in a normal case -- at least twice as far. Second, your IDE cables would be stretching over your PCI cards. Third, in this configuration the power connectors for the board, fans, and CPU are as far away from the powersupply as you can get. I'm assuming their PSU has super-extra-long cables, but again, those cables are hanging across everything else, and some of us like to swap up to better-quality PSUs in the machines we build -- PSUs which do not normally have ultra-mega-long cables. Fourth, with the positioning of the PCI cards, you're working right up against the vertical tower portion of the case -- not a huge hassle, but something that a 180 would have fixed. Fifth, all those extra-long cables wadded up inside will impede airflow.

i've got one and here's what I think

[netean]

i've bough one the other day and put my pc bits into it and here's what I think. Pros Looks nice, nice design - great colour (I got the orange one) completely screwless which is great. Good drive bay support, enough for my needs anyway. works well. Cons. Cable clutter isn't reduced at all, it's just as cluttered as any other pc case I've ever used... The back end comes off completely allowing you to place the motherboard and extra cards in it, great idea, except that my ide cable isn't long enough to stretch from the cdrom drive at the top of the case and to my ide zip drive underneath and still stay attached to the motherboard. (the lower hd cables are fine though) Two side fans, aren't quiet but they're not overly noisy. Front panel support is wank though (bit let down) my motherboard MSI kt3 comes with support for front panels like the bluetooth connector and the usb 2 panel and extra sound ports. But they can't connect to the existing front panel on the case (USB and line out, mic)- different connectors. Thus rendering them useless and meaning that the front panel add-ons supplied with the board now have to go at the back - covering two expansion card slots) overall it's a nice case, that looks smart, and is reasonably priced. But doesn't really do all it's cracked up to. I'd love to be able to say that cable clutter was down, but it's not, and I'd love to be able to use the front ports, but I can't. Shame but it is Orange :)

Re:Test, please ignore

[billstewart]

remember those //s. Watch out for truncation.