New case or mod my current one?

[Guden Oden]

How can you say it was good when you went ahead and then said you zip tied things?

This may seem contradictory to you, but I assure you, to a normal person it is not. You see, I keep my chassis closed at all times, I do not see the cables inside the box. Therefore, some ziptied bunches do not concern, nor bother me...

Good wiring means you cant see the wiring.

No, that's GEEKY wiring you're thinking of. There's absolutely no merit whatsoever to hiding away all the wires inside the case, it makes no difference where cooling is concerned. Besides, hardly any cases are built with such facilities (nor do power supplies typically come with leads long enough to stick 'em behind the back plate, etc).

and you do not use round cables (they're terrible).

Was nothing wrong at all with the cheap ones I used. Well, except that the particular set I bought did not support the cable select. feature, so I had to manually jumper my drives for master/slave. I ran them at ATA100 speed, never had any issues whatsoever with them despite heavy use for 2+ years.

A good case and design allows you to put the cables where you can not even see them.

Makes for quite a bother if you need to change anything. I can't imagine having to rip out all my expansion cards and the mobo just because I managed to pull off one of the ATA connectors from the ribbon, gyeesh. I can think of at least 500 better ways of spending those 30+ minutes.

 

[digitalwanderer]

I'd say just mod yours with 1-2 _good_ fans.

No real good way to do that on my current case though, no front ventilation and the rear is made for an 80mm fan.

I never planned this case to be a dual GPU set-up, I'm just adjusting for component growth.

 

[digitalwanderer]

F-word!

Found a decent looking cheapy that's similar to the Enermax....

Biggest difference I'm interested in is it has mounts for 2x80mm fans in back instead of a 120mm and it looks kind of cheap.

 

[Skrying]

F-word!

Found a decent looking cheapy that's similar to the Enermax....

Biggest difference I'm interested in is it has mounts for 2x80mm fans in back instead of a 120mm and it looks kind of cheap.

It has a mount for either two 80mm or 120mm like the Aerocool I posted earlier, so it works out pretty well.

Its not bad, it'll probably have good airflow at least and the front intake place looks like you have a range of fans you can put there, another bonus.

Besides the looks, the design seems solid and should have plenty of airflow.

 

[digitalwanderer]

Yeah, I realized that after posting that it was a dual use mount.

Hmmm, I'll ponder it a bit...I already kind of broke the news to my wife so hopefully I'll hear some happy news in the morning.

 

[martrox]

Don't buy cheap cases!!!!!! Buy good cases cheap!!!

You might want to check this Thermaltake case out:

http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductDetail.jsp?ProductCode=371295

$24.00 shipped after a $20 rebate. Uses 2 - 120mm fans (comes with one). You will get excellent airflow and still remain quiet if you use 120mm fans that run at 900-1400rpm. Granted, it doesn't come with a cheapPOS power supply, but you really don't want to use one of those anyway. This is a really good price on a decent, good quality case.

 

[Bouncing Zabaglione Bros.]

You might want to check this Thermaltake case out:

http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductDetail.jsp?ProductCode=371295

$24.00 shipped after a $20 rebate. Uses 2 - 120mm fans (comes with one). You will get excellent airflow and still remain quiet if you use 120mm fans that run at 900-1400rpm. Granted, it doesn't come with a cheapPOS power supply, but you really don't want to use one of those anyway. This is a really good price on a decent, good quality case.

If this is basically a Swing case with a door (which is what it looks like to me), it probably has the Swing's issue with the front ventilation intake being blocked if you stand it on carpet. Might or might not matter to you, but that does cause the hard drive in the front drive bays to get hot.

 

[Guden Oden]

Biggest difference I'm interested in is it has mounts for 2x80mm fans in back instead of a 120mm and it looks kind of cheap.

If you can get over the cheap-looking part of the equation, 2x Arctic Cooling's side-less 80mm cooling fans would be a great mate for such a case. You pretty much simply can't hear them when they're running unless you put your head right next to them.

 

[martrox]

If this is basically a Swing case with a door (which is what it looks like to me), it probably has the Swing's issue with the front ventilation intake being blocked if you stand it on carpet. Might or might not matter to you, but that does cause the hard drive in the front drive bays to get hot.

It's not quite the same case, but it does have the same problem. However, it's an easy mod to open it up.

 

[Frank]

Well, I have a great no-brand case. That's no help, I know.

If you want the best cooling, you should look at 2 things:

- Have 2 fans, one taking air out of the case at the back and one with a duct that only cools the processor at the side.
- Have plenty of room in the case and a generous air inlet, so the air can circulate.