I have been seeing more and more cases with acrylic fronts and windows due to the fact that people are tired of the normal beige case and want something cooler. This case looks a lot like both of the Enermax cases that I have reviewed in the past. This case has the same kind of fan cutouts, and inside chassis so I am guessing the outside is the main difference. The chassis is also very similar to that of the SkyHawk Jupiter that I just reviewed.
- Standard ATX form factor
- Intel P4 ready case (requires a 350 watts P/S to be P4 ready)
- 4 open 5.25″ drive bays
- 2 open 3.5″ drive bays
- 4 hidden 3.5″ drive bays (total of 10 drive bays)
- Build in 2 front USB port connectors
- Includes a 8cm side panel fan
- 4 optional 8cm fans in the lower front of the case
- 2 optional 8cm fans in rear of the case
- Max. 7 cooling fans could be installed (6 optional)
- Dimensions: 17″ (H) x 7.75″ (W) x 19″ (D)
- Max. motherboard size: 12″ x 10″
- Standard 350 watts ATX power supply (AMD recommended up to 1.2 GHz CPU)
The case comes double boxed which is really nice because a lot of the times cases are damaged during shipping. Double boxing the case gives it a lot more protection so that it will not be damaged. The box of the case is plain brown cardboard with just a few pictures and words.
I took the case out of the box and right away it reminded me of both Enermax cases that I had reviewed. The front bezel is protected with a sheet of plastic so the arcylic does not get scratched. I took the plastic off and the front of the case is really nice looking, I do like the arcylic. From the back of the case you can see the power supply which we will look at later along with the cutouts for the fans.
The case also comes with front USB which are hid away behind a little door at the bottom of the case. All you have to do is push in the door and let go and it will open right up to expose the two USB ports behind it. As always I love front USB because it makes using these devices much easier and faster like they were meant to be used.
The case comes with four thumbscrews which hold both doors in place, I love thumbscrews for the obvious reason. The door of the case has a pre cut window which has a blue tint to it. The window design is very similar to a lot on the market including both of the Enermax. There is a translucent blue 80mm case fan in the middle of the window which will help cool your system down. The window is attached to the case with eight rivets which look really cool. I like the design of this window and if you don’t have the time, knowledge, skill, or desire to cut your own window this will make your day.
I got inside the case and found a power supply, power supply cable, jumpers, a box of extras, and a blue cold cathode which was attached to the chassis with cat3 (phone cord). The inside is almost identical to both of the Enermax cases and the Skyhawk Jupiter which I previously reviewed. I will be taking a look at the cold cathode and power supply on the next page. The case does not have a removable motherboard tray which is disappointing, because a removable motherboard tray makes things so much easier. A thing I really like about this case is that all of the edges are not sharp so that you will not cut yourself.
The case comes with all but one of the expansion slot covers which is nice. It’s really irritating when a case does not come with them because after you punch out the one that comes attached you don’t have anything to cover the hole. One of the expansion slot covers is missing because they are assuming that you will be using at least one card which is usually correct. Right next to the expansion slots there are 2 cutouts which are for an extra parallel and serial port, these will probably not be used by many. The back of the case comes ready to hold two 80mm fans just as the previous Enermax cases did. I will say the same thing about all of these fan cutouts, they are not good. As you can see there is a lot of metal in the way which will impede air flow, I never understand why companies don’t cut the hole out better.
The inside front of the case is a little different than the past Enermax cases. This case comes with cutouts for four 80mm fans in the front of the case rather than a single 120mm fan. This looks all well and good however I think that a 120mm fan would have been better. I say this because even though four fans will look much more impressive they will be a lot louder and will probably not move much more air due to the small intake opening at the bottom of the case. I guess it really depends on what you want to do, personally I prefer a quiet 120mm fan that will move as much air as two to four 80mm.
The front bezel is held on by three clips on each side of the case which when pressed together will let you take off the front bezel. I tried to remove the front bezel with just my hands for a few minutes but was unable to do so. I then got out some pliers and gave it a go and still was unable to remove the bezel for a good five minutes at least. I don’t much understand the point of not needing tools to take off the bezel if you are not able to. Then again I am a computer nerd and not the strongest guy, but how many of us are?
The power supply that comes with this case is a LC-A350ATX power supply which is made my L&C Computer Co., LTD. This is basically a generic power supply but that does not mean that it’s not good. I went ahead and opened it up as I usually do power supplies to take a look around. I did not find any pots in the power supply but I did find two really big capacitors which look like they should do a good job keeping this power supply full. The cables on the power supply are pretty short, which I like because it will make your case a lot cleaner. It is AMD approved and Pentium 4 ready so this thing should be able to handle whatever you throw at it. There are three four pin, one floppy, one auxiliary, one 12v, and one motherboard connector.
The case does not come stock with the cold cathode but it can be added for only $20. The cold cathode I got is a blue one which is made by Sunbeam, I have had previous experience with their products and really like them. Nothing really fancy about the box, basically just tells you what color you are getting, you can choose from: red, green, blue, purple, yellow, and UV. Koolcases currently only carries blue and red, both of which look really cool.
The inverter comes attached to the set of wires with the Molex connector and where you will hook your switch up. The switch doesn’t come soldered onto the wires which makes installation and un-installation easier. The inverter, which we will look at in a minute, is wrapped in Velcro. The other parts that come with the kit are 2 pieces of Velcro for the mounting of the cathode, a piece of Velcro to mount the inverter, the switch, and a template for the switch so that you can mount it correctly. I love that they included all of these things; all of it will make installation easy and help it to look really nice. Instructions are also included in the kit which explain how to install and setup your cold cathode because not everyone will know how.
The inverter comes wrapped in Velcro to insulate it, usually I prefer to see heat shrink around the inverter but I find this to be a very good method for a few reasons. The inverter is able to hold two cold cathodes, which means if you want to put another on or take one off you will need to get to the plugs. If the inverter had heat shrink around it this would be difficult, but because Velcro is used you are able to take it off and get to the plugs. Another reason why this is good is that you will be able to mount it anywhere in your case just by sticking it to the other piece of Velcro provided.
The cold cathode is really professional looking just like I expected, the cathode is surrounded by an acrylic tube which has a few lines of blue going all around it. My assumption for the reason for this is so that the light is directed evenly in every direction and to make it more intense. Each end of the cold cathode has an arcylic cube so that when you mount it, it will not roll all around.
Power supplies are a big factor in overclocking that not a lot of people pay much attention to. If your power supply is not able to give your hardware adequate power you will be less successful with your overclock. A lot of people think that just because a power supply is not a brand name that it isn’t good, that is not always the case. I installed this power supply into my big system which has the below specs.
Test Bed
- EPoX 8K3A+
- 1800+ Athlon XP
- 80GB Maxtor ATA133 HDD
- Corsair 512MB XMS3200
- 3DPower Geforce 3
- Cooler Master ATC-101-SX2
- Zalman 300w PSU
- Sound Blaster Live! Value
- ATi TV Wonder VE
- 10/100 NIC
- Plextor 40x12x40 CDRW
- pioneer 16x DVD
I wanted to test this power supply that came with the case so I loaded up Motherboard Monitor and set it to refresh every second. The main concern for most power supplies is the 5v line because that’s what AMD CPUs use the most, so that will be the main focus of the testing. I let my system idle so that the CPU usage would be at 0% and watched the voltages. The 5v line did stayed solid at 5.05v the whole time and did not fluctuate at all. I then loaded up Prime95 and ran the torture test to bump the CPU usage up to 100%. I again watched the 5v line carefully and the lowest it went at any time was 5.00v which is excellent.
After this power supply did so well in the initial testing I wanted to see what it was really capable of. I rebooted and overclocked my 1.6GHz Athlon XP 1800+ to 1737MHz (11.5×150) which is a pretty decent overclock. Like before I let my computer idle for a few minutes and watched the voltage readings. Even with my system overclocked the 5v line did not go below 5.03v with 0% CPU usage which is impressive, but let’s give the CPU some work and see how it does. I again ran Prime95 and watched the 5v drop a little to 4.97v which is nothing to be concerned about at all, it is actually really good.
I did not install a system to the case as I felt there was not much need due to the fact that the chassis is exactly the same as that of both Enermax cases I previously reviewed. So instead I installed the cold cathode to the case because I wanted to see how it looked through this window. If you are wondering how I got the cold cathode to turn out without having a motherboard installed, its simple. All you have to do to power up any ATX power supply without a motherboard is connect the green wire to any one of the six black wires on the motherboard power connector and plug the power supply in which is shown below. I hooked everything up and turned it on and man is it an impressive sight, the cold cathode is very bright and looks really good though the window. The back of the case also looks really cool with the light shining out of all the little holes.
Conclusion
Once again I am very impressed with this style of case, and this one more so than the Enermax ones. This case has some good features, cool design, and comes with a 350w power supply which is really nice. The inside of the case is really nice because there are no sharp edges and there are plenty of hard drive bays.
Front USB seems to be a standard now with cases which is a really good thing and am happy to see finally happening. The window on this case looks pretty cool and if you do not want to install a window yourself this case would be a great one for you. The only real negative aspects to this case are the fan grill cutouts which can easily be fixed with a Dremel and the fact that there is no removable motherboard tray.
The cold cathode that comes with this case makes it even better than expected and adds a lot of personality to it. I would really recommend this case to someone who wants a cool looking case without having to do a lot of work to get it that way. If you are looking for a case which has mod potential I probably would not suggest this one for you due to the fact that a good amount of modding has already been done to it.
Overall I am going to give this case a 9/10 and award it the OCmodshop seal of approval. I would like to thank Koolcases for sending this case over to review. Head on over there and check our their huge line of cases and case mods.
Pros
- Preinstalled window
- Lots of places for fans
- Front USB
- 350w power supply
- No sharp edges
- Switch and mounting template provided
Cons
- No removable motherboard tray
- Poor fan grill cutouts