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Modern case trends

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Reply 20 of 39, by tayyare

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> Overpiced
> Very poor build quality with poor quality materials

This is my main concern really. In the past, even very entry level cheap Chinese cases had decent material. They were having shitty PSUs and finger cutting edges, yes, but the steel used in them were thick enough to at least counter their own weight. Nowadays, they are building them out of tin foil apparently, and to get some decent thickness in material, you need to go up quite a bit in price.

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Reply 21 of 39, by candle_86

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HighTreason wrote:
I hate modern cases, they're the absolute pinnacle of retarded design in the field of computers for many reasons; […]
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I hate modern cases, they're the absolute pinnacle of retarded design in the field of computers for many reasons;

> Overpiced
> Very poor build quality with poor quality materials
> Bottom mounter PSU - there is literally no benefit to this and I believe it violates the ATX standard anyway.
> Often screwless... Am I supposed to use tape?
> Silly drive bays, not only screwless but in the worst possible position and orientation. My hard drive manuals say you can't mount them vertically but the case maker put them this way.
> Drive bays also rotated by 90 Degrees so the wires point OUT of the case and catch the side panel.
> Horrible cable management.
> Ugly colors.
> Ugly, often over bright LED lights... Sometimes an LED is omitted (Usually for the hard drive).
> Often there is no RESET button.
> Front panel connectors. They're usually rubbish and often there are ones my board has no header for.
> That PSU thing really pisses me off so I'm mentioning it again.
> Quite often they omit a 3.5" external bay, I like to put a flash card reader there!
> The PSU again.
> Nowhere to mount radiators unless you pay a lot of money, but they are in the worst possible place, usually directly above and obstructing the CPU.
> Wonky fan sizes. A lot of cheap cases come with weird sized fans that have annoying LEDs. I cannot get a replacement for this 173mm piece of crap, what am I meant to do? And if I mount a 140m one it looks shitty(er)!
> That FUCKING PSU!!!
> These cases are huge, how come there is so little room to install drives and such?
> THAT FUCKING PSU!!! I HATE IT! I HATE IT!!! I... FFFFFFFFFFFFUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

To name a few.

No the PSU thing is not a violation of ATX and it prolongs the life of the PSU by removing it from the overly warm inside of a modern computer.

Reply 22 of 39, by MMaximus

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While I"m definitely guilty of thinking "things were better back then" sometimes, I'm not sure I agree with you guys about modern cases. I built myself a new rig last year and settled on the Fractal Design Define R5, after reading good reviews and also because I liked its simple, understated looks. I've built quite a few PCs over the years but my last two were housed in an Antec Sonata 2 and also an Antec P180. Well, the Define R5 is so much better than any of these cases. Sure, it only has two 5.25" front bays and no 3.5", but the build quality is great, there's so much space inside for "cable management" and airflow, it's really easy to work with, and the noise/dust insulation is top-notch. The price is not excessive either so I think it shows that for the same money than 10 years ago, you can have a much better product.

In the end, there are plenty of cheap modern cases with shoddy materials on the market, but if you spend a little bit more, there are probably also plenty of great cases to choose from.

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Reply 23 of 39, by HighTreason

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Posts magically appeared, so the following is mainly a reply to orek;

Cool the computer properly and the problem will go away with the PSU at the top. How about doing it like my case and segmenting the system so the PSU pulls air from above? Dragging dust from the carpet is a bad idea and running fairly high current DC over a few feet of wire inside the case is an inefficient fire waiting to happen. Plus the poor airflow often causes the heat to build up in the area and get drawn back in. Having that vent in the top of the case is retarded, I can't put stuff on top of it, debris and liquid can fall into it and it makes mounting radiators difficult and otherwise a poor idea anyway because you either cool them with hot air from the system or blow the hot air into the system... Stupid design from all angles. If that vent must be in the top, then flip the PSU over and have it draw air in through that instead of having that long, messy and often hot trunk of wire running ten miles around the inside of the case - where you can't put it anywhere neat because there's no space for it.

Otherwise;
@tayyare; Yeah, they're so easy to bend now and it makes me nervous.

@candle_86; No, it actually shortens the life of it for the reasons stated above. Anyway, why then, is the ATX connector still near the top of the board? Should they not move it? At least design the case to turn the board over like SilverStone did, this negated the problem a little but was stupid for completely different reasons.

@MMaximus; Stupid sideways drive bays, hardly any room for wires or the motherboard, no real space for radiators, stupid fan placement, stupid PSU mount... No, horrible case, 3/10 at best. Waste of a good PSU really... Also, is it me, or is are guy's video cards bending? This leads me to another point that is partly the fault of the card makers;

> Long, heavy cards with no retaining slots at the front. In old computers, long cards were common but lighter than today's video cards. A slot at the front of the case (usually on the fan holder) held the cards steady to protect from shock, vibration, thermal movement and bending under their own weight. Now, with BGAs and heavy heatsinks, you'd think something like this would come back, but no. Instead, the drive bays often get in the way.

The last decent cases I saw were the XSPC H1 and H2 (The originals I think, or perhaps the + versions, can't remember and they stopped making them quickly). These got around some of the problems.

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Reply 24 of 39, by shamino

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I'd rather have the PSU in the top for a typical build. I do have an old HP machine with the PSU in the bottom, but it's a proprietary form factor which was designed to work that way. The power connector is at the bottom, and there's a ducted exhaust fan for the CPUs at the top so the air up there is still being purged. Generic ATX stuff is better with the PSU at the top IMO.

My 4U file server is turned on it's side right now (making it basically like a standard tower) and I needed to turn it in a direction that put the PSU at the bottom. I'm noticing a lot of heat sitting at the top of the case. There's ventilation at the rear in that area but it's not really satisfactory, it would need a dedicated fan up there to cool properly. Vent holes in the top of a tower is something I'm definitely opposed to, I want to be able to put stuff there and don't want it to be easy to spill something into it.
I'm not worried about the PSU getting warmer air, if it's a decent PSU then it shouldn't be that sensitive. The temperature difference is greatly reduced by the fact that the air is being blown out and not just sitting there getting warmer and warmer.

Re: external drives and deleting bays - I really hate needing to go find some external drive to hook up with USB when I suddenly want it and then have it hanging around somewhere on the desk. DVD drives are cheap, I just want to leave it in the computer where it belongs. Deleting parts from a PC because they don't get used often just creates a needless annoyance and more clutter of external garbage hanging around. I'm not a fan of minimalistic design in desktop builds, and I wouldn't be willing to pay money for a case that doesn't accommodate every device I might conceivably want to put in it.

Reset switches:
It's occurred to me recently that in the era of SSDs, the reset switch may have a renewed importance. There have been problems with SSDs corrupting themselves when faced with an unexpected power off. So what do you do when the system locks up? I think pushing reset is the safest answer.

Reply 26 of 39, by Skyscraper

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I do not like the PSU in the bottom of the case design either.

People I help with computers do often not live in perfectly clean homes nor do they care about cleaning the dust filter for the PSU air intake under the computer even if I remind them. The result is that the PSU gets no air at all and runs hotter than it ever would in an older case as exhaust fans have no filters and cool air will always get into the case somehow even if the intake filters get clogged.

My favorite case is the Lian Li PC-90 "The Hammer". Its an aluminium case though so its not for those who want cases made of think steel. It's the only "normal sized" case (that I know of) that can fit the EVGA SR-2. I bought a buch of these cases when they were on sale, I think I still have 8 left.

http://www.anandtech.com/show/5556/lian-lis-p … er-strikes-hard

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Reply 27 of 39, by ynari

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I disagree. I've got a cheap (30 quid) Zalman Z series mini tower for my main gaming system (it's only a core2quad, not that exciting) - it's a decent case and light years ahead of the beige monstrosities I have with proper retro systems. It's much better ventilated and looks smart.

5.25" brackets are easily converted to 3.5, and I'm quite happy with PSUs at the bottom.

Until last week it also had no optical drive, I'd occasionally plug in a USB DVD drive to install software. Unfortunately I installed Jade Empire from DVD, and found the sodding thing uses SecuROM. SecuROM doesn't work with virtual CDROMs/it was quicker to stick in a DVD drive than find how to hack SecuROM.

Reply 28 of 39, by Munx

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HighTreason wrote:
I hate modern cases, they're the absolute pinnacle of retarded design in the field of computers for many reasons; […]
Show full quote

I hate modern cases, they're the absolute pinnacle of retarded design in the field of computers for many reasons;

> Overpiced
> Often screwless... Am I supposed to use tape?
> Drive bays also rotated by 90 Degrees so the wires point OUT of the case and catch the side panel.
> Horrible cable management.

Why would screwless make it worse? Pretty convenient if you ask me.
Also the drive bays point outwards so you could hide the cable behind the back panel, like every other wire, making cable management easier.

I'm also guessing you'd hate my current setup 🤣

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Reply 29 of 39, by shamino

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TELVM wrote:
shamino wrote:

... I'm not worried about the PSU getting warmer air ...

That's your prerogative.

To put it another way, I consider ventilating the top of the case to be the power supply's job. If it's doing that job then the air up there won't be much warmer than elsewhere, so it doesn't end up suffering much. If it's mounted in the bottom then it will be more prone to pull in dust while the top of the case still has to be exhausted by other means or else it will bake.

Reply 31 of 39, by Munx

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sprcorreia wrote:

Hey Munx, what's your opinion on that Tesseract?

Its pretty good for the cost. There are coners cut like no gromets for the cable management holes and plastic that looks and feels on the cheap side (the window actually looks pretty decent), however its got tons of space, good expandability and overall was a pleasure to work with. Considering its a 40 euro case Id definitely recommend it.

I just wish the front fan wasnt taking the whole pc gaming "master race" to uncomfortable levels 🤣

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The Underdog - The budget K6
The Voodoo powerhouse - The power-hungry K7
The troll PC - The Socket 423 Pentium 4

Reply 32 of 39, by MrEWhite

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Munx wrote:
Its pretty good for the cost. There are coners cut like no gromets for the cable management holes and plastic that looks and fee […]
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sprcorreia wrote:

Hey Munx, what's your opinion on that Tesseract?

Its pretty good for the cost. There are coners cut like no gromets for the cable management holes and plastic that looks and feels on the cheap side (the window actually looks pretty decent), however its got tons of space, good expandability and overall was a pleasure to work with. Considering its a 40 euro case Id definitely recommend it.

I just wish the front fan wasnt taking the whole pc gaming "master race" to uncomfortable levels 🤣

P_20160307_201117.jpg

Which "masterrace" do you speak of in this case 🤣

Reply 33 of 39, by BSA Starfire

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HighTreason wrote:
I hate modern cases, they're the absolute pinnacle of retarded design in the field of computers for many reasons; […]
Show full quote

I hate modern cases, they're the absolute pinnacle of retarded design in the field of computers for many reasons;

> Overpiced
> Very poor build quality with poor quality materials
> Bottom mounter PSU - there is literally no benefit to this and I believe it violates the ATX standard anyway.
> Often screwless... Am I supposed to use tape?
> Silly drive bays, not only screwless but in the worst possible position and orientation. My hard drive manuals say you can't mount them vertically but the case maker put them this way.
> Drive bays also rotated by 90 Degrees so the wires point OUT of the case and catch the side panel.
> Horrible cable management.
> Ugly colors.
> Ugly, often over bright LED lights... Sometimes an LED is omitted (Usually for the hard drive).
> Often there is no RESET button.
> Front panel connectors. They're usually rubbish and often there are ones my board has no header for.
> That PSU thing really pisses me off so I'm mentioning it again.
> Quite often they omit a 3.5" external bay, I like to put a flash card reader there!
> The PSU again.
> Nowhere to mount radiators unless you pay a lot of money, but they are in the worst possible place, usually directly above and obstructing the CPU.
> Wonky fan sizes. A lot of cheap cases come with weird sized fans that have annoying LEDs. I cannot get a replacement for this 173mm piece of crap, what am I meant to do? And if I mount a 140m one it looks shitty(er)!
> That FUCKING PSU!!!
> These cases are huge, how come there is so little room to install drives and such?
> THAT FUCKING PSU!!! I HATE IT! I HATE IT!!! I... FFFFFFFFFFFFUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

To name a few.

Pretty much all of this, when I can no longer get old cases, I'll be making my own at work.

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Reply 34 of 39, by Matth79

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My favourite case of old, was my miraculous 7 bay desktop...
On the right, it had a stack of three 5 1/4" bays - loadout here began with CD-ROM, 5 1/4" floppy, CD-RW (later addition), followed by DVD-ROM replacing the CD-ROM.
Beside, two 3 1/2 bays (dismountable cage), loaded with floppy and tape drive (metalwork required some dremel mod to accommodate out of form factor bulge in tape drive.
Inside, another cage attached to the PSU for two HDD (both filled, mountings allowed them to be staggered for better cooling.

And finally, both cages had to be detached to reach the RAM, though there was enough slack on the drive cables to flip them to one side without disconnecting.

Ah, now I remember what the guts were, and I think I do still have it - A Cyrix 6x86L with a villainously hot running linear regulator providing the core voltage - front fan fitted to help cool it!

Reply 35 of 39, by TELVM

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Munx wrote:
... I just wish the front fan wasnt taking the whole pc gaming "master race" to uncomfortable levels :lol: […]
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... I just wish the front fan wasnt taking the whole pc gaming "master race" to uncomfortable levels 🤣

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^ 🤣 🤣 🤣 🤣 🤣

Let the air flow!

Reply 36 of 39, by Half-Saint

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@HighTreason: when I look at my old generic AT tower with PSU on top and CD-ROM in the top slot, the top of the case was always warm to the touch because hot air stayed between the PSU and the CD-ROM. The PSU was the old type with a small 80mm fan so that probably had something to do with it. However, if done properly, the new cases have, in my opinion, superior cooling. Here's where I don't agree with you.

1. Spilling/debris: if you keep the case under the desk or on top of it, you can't spill anything into the case and debris can't really fall in with a proper mesh top. If you keep the case next to the desk and you end up spilling liquid on it, it's your own fault 😜

2. Having PSU on the bottom is beneficial in most cases as the PSU is cooled properly instead of having it suck in warm/hot air from the system. Yes, dust can be a problem but a well designed case will have a filter to prevent dust from getting in.

3. Can't put stuff on the case? Well, you still can but not on the whole area of the top cover 😀

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Reply 37 of 39, by candle_86

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HighTreason wrote:

@candle_86; No, it actually shortens the life of it for the reasons stated above. Anyway, why then, is the ATX connector still near the top of the board? Should they not move it? At least design the case to turn the board over like SilverStone did, this negated the problem a little but was stupid for completely different reasons.

No if you don't set it on carpet which you should never do with a computer and instead place it on a desk or at least a board and clean your filter. My psu draws air in from under the case and expels it out the back.

Reply 38 of 39, by Errius

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The newest ATX case I have is from 2006. The only problem with old cases is that their front panel audio connectors usually don't support HD audio.

ETA: front panel USB is also limited to 2.0 of course, though that hasn't bothered me as I don't have any computers with integrated USB 3.

Is this too much voodoo?

Reply 39 of 39, by FaSMaN

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So I bought a brand new Sharkoon V4Case for a ATX Pentuim 2/3 Build, the main reason I got the case was because it came with a drive bracket for a FDD and it was in budget.

So building in a full size ATX motherboard, everything fitted well till I got to the Sound Card , the board has 1x ISA slot, and guess what, the case doesnt have the last slot stamped out, there is no screw hole for it either 😒 meaning the one ISA slot I do have, I cant use...

This is really !@#!@#!@# upsetting ....

I can forgive needing a ATX Extension Cable that cost a extra R200 , or the modern design, but having a space for the last card slot, and just not stamping it out is completely !@#!@#