ABS Black Pearl?

[MichaelD]

Link. Aside from the cheesy front LED display, it actually looks pretty decent! Good airflow, filter on the intake, no side vents, 8 internal HD spots + 6 5.25" bays (dont' know if the 7th slot (floppy bay) is convertable to 5.25" or not.

It looks very similar to the LianLi's of the same layout (reversed MB, drives at bottom).

Is it made by LianLi? The ABS website has no info on the case. $250 is a big chunk of change...

ps
How does air get into the main (MB) chamber? No intake for that top half that I see. Wow...that ruins the case.

 

[Ika]

Ooh, motherboard tray + rear 120mm fan? Coooool... but there's a 120mm fan up front with no way for intake... I don't get it...

 

[Bluefront]

Yeah...pretty bad airflow for the upper chamber. A ducted exhaust fan with a small, passive intake vent right over it. Poor. You wonder what these guys were smoking when they designed this thing.

 

[DerwenArtos12]

It's a v2000 without the perforated shell. *shrug* flow looks decent but, a bit underwhelming at best. It looks to be less of a rip-off and more of a liscenced chassis design. It's too indentical to just be a copycat.

 

[MichaelD]

Yeah, "licensed chassis design" is a better way to put it.

The longer I search for a new case, the more the LianLi PC-A71B looks like my only choice.

-lots of drive bays
-no side vents/fans
-no bling
-excellent airflow

 

[Bluefront]

Is there really a "licensed chassis design"? Never heard of such a thing. Who would enforce such a copyright?

 

[DerwenArtos12]

Originally posted by: Bluefront
Is there really a "licensed chassis design"? Never heard of such a thing. Who would enforce such a copyright?

It's a standard licensing agreement just like with Silverstone and enermax or Cooler Master and Gigabyte and iStarUSA. Saves a lot of time and money on R&D. In this case Lian Li would hold the patent on the chasis design and just license the design out to APC for either specific use on this case or for general use in their product line-up. It's a lot more common than most people think.

EDIT:
It's very possible for that matter than Lian Li produces all or parts of the case for APC.

 

[Bluefront]

So what you're saying is that there is no actual patent involved.....just a sharing of R&D between certain companies, with maybe a common source for the hardware.

Somebody of a different company could directly copy the design, with no legal problems?

 

[Anubis]

Originally posted by: Aflac
Ooh, motherboard tray + rear 120mm fan? Coooool... but there's a 120mm fan up front with no way for intake... I don't get it...

its just like the lian li's and they dont have airslow issues, and you can put a 120mm fan in there in the drive bays unless you need all 7

 

[Ika]

Originally posted by: Anubis

Originally posted by: Aflac
Ooh, motherboard tray + rear 120mm fan? Coooool... but there's a 120mm fan up front with no way for intake... I don't get it...

its just like the lian li's and they dont have airslow issues, and you can put a 120mm fan in there in the drive bays unless you need all 7

I don't see any holes or vents near the fan, unless they're on the bottom, which IMO is a pretty bad way to get air into the case. There are no holes on the front or the sides next to the fan.

 

[DerwenArtos12]

Originally posted by: Bluefront
So what you're saying is that there is no actual patent involved.....just a sharing of R&D between certain companies, with maybe a common source for the hardware.

Somebody of a different company could directly copy the design, with no legal problems?

No, Lian Li holds the patent on the chassis design, I'd guarantee it, APC is paying Lian Li to use the design, that is if they're not just paying Lian Li to make the cases for them which, IMHO is more likely than not.

 

[aigomorla]

ABS.. not APC. this aint an amored personal carrier...


the company also makes a lot of msi ripoff laptops.

The case also doesnt look that bad. It reminds me of how enermax used to copy the TJ-03 style on one of there settings.

 

[LOUISSSSS]

yea thats is DEF a Lian Li case re badged with minor changes to the exterior.
looks great with the LCD

 

[MichaelD]

Unfortunately, it looks like the ventilation for the top chamber is FUBARED. Whether or not the LCD is useful is subjective, of course. IMO, it's pretty useless. I'd rather have another 5.25" bay.

 

[aigomorla]

Originally posted by: MichaelD
Unfortunately, it looks like the ventilation for the top chamber is FUBARED. Whether or not the LCD is useful is subjective, of course. IMO, it's pretty useless. I'd rather have another 5.25" bay.

*shurg* looks identical to the layout inside a V2000 to me. Only difference is its not porforated, meaning doesnt have the holes up front.

But otherwise its a lian li, minus the roller wheels.

 

[Zepper]

Most of the steel chassis that Silverstone uses are OEMed, not designed by Silverstone. SST just does the aluminum bezel and may tweek the steel chassis design a bit. The case under discussion here can be found in cases under the Tagan or A Plus brand too. I don't care for inverted ATX designs... If you like this case, look at the SST-TJ09. It's not perverted like this one is.

.bh.

 

[slpaulson]

Lian Li is probably the OEM for the case, similar to my Best Buy Rocketfish case, which actually said Lian Li right on the barcode.

 

[DerwenArtos12]

Originally posted by: Zepper
Most of the steel chassis that Silverstone uses are OEMed, not designed by Silverstone. SST just does the aluminum bezel and may tweek the steel chassis design a bit. The case under discussion here can be found in cases under the Tagan or A Plus brand too. I don't care for inverted ATX designs... If you like this case, look at the SST-TJ09. It's not perverted like this one is.

.bh.

What have you against inverted designs? Just out of curiousity. I've used both and while I can't find any speical reason to love them, I've not found a reason to dislike them either.

 

[Fallen Kell]

Yeah, the entire case looks a lot like a Lian Li PC-201B but without the upper side exhaust fan, front intake vent, and front door. The vents and fans are a huge deal, as without them the air flow design is horrendous. In my PC-201B, everything stays very cool, but that is because it has a way for air to circulate into and out of the case, but the ABS has no real intake/exhaust!!!

http://www.newegg.com/Product/...With+Side+Panel+Window

http://www.newegg.com/Product/...1B+Black+Computer+Case

 

[MichaelD]

After staring at the pics of this thing for a couple of days, and reading what you guys have posted, it's not hard to come to the conclusion that the airflow in this case (or lack of, actually...) is utter crapola.

 

[Zepper]

DA said:

What have you against inverted designs?

1- Most internal components are designed with the normal ATX orientation in mind (if any). 2- And mainly because my computer sits at the left side of my desk...

.bh.

 

[DerwenArtos12]

Originally posted by: Zepper
DA said:

What have you against inverted designs?

1- Most internal components are designed with the normal ATX orientation in mind (if any). 2- And mainly because my computer sits at the left side of my desk...

.bh.

Ok, I'll just say that GPU cooling is the only real reason I've ever found to consider the inverted design, and thats essentially going out the window due to multi-card solutions. In a single card solution though, the inverted design can help evacuate that hot air that would normally be trapped at the bottom of the case without proper flow design. Like I said though, even that point is going the way of the dinosaur. I just like to play devils-advocate to get other people perspectives.