ANTEC P160 (aluminium case)

[otispunkmeyer]

this is the case i intend to be buying soon, along with it i will also buy an extra 120mm fan (1500rpm) and a zalman northbridge cooler...the current one (on my MSI KT3 Ultra 2 (KT333 chipset) ) is making awful noises , and plus the whole rig is gettin an overhaul soon so i want to be able to sell the old gear on ebay, and would be nice if the person who buys it doesnt stick his finger up my nose telling me the fan is faulty.

antec p160

my plan is to go A64, and possibly use this cooler also coolermaster hyper 6
this case will do icely yes?

or are there better alternatives (i do want a case that looks nice, like this one does)

TIA

Otis

 

[Tiamat]

If you live near a microcenter, or any computer store that sells this computer case, i highly suggest looking at this case in person. I personally, wouldnt mind having one of these cases - save for the front bezel which IMO is cheap looking. The LEDs were too bright IMO and added to the cheap/cheesy look. Also, the ports at the top is a nice idea, but not quite engineered properly. If felt like it would break within 2 months.

That being said, it provides adequate space for most setups, and the dual 120mm fans are key. I believe if you buy it from newegg, you get 2 120mm fans, however if you buy it elsewhere, you only get the 120mm exhaust. You defn want to have 2 x 120mm fans.

The thickness of the aluminum is greater than that of the Superlanboy which i have. This should help with minimizing the resonation which results when fans are on low rpm.

For HSF, i would recommend the Thermalright SLK948U and 92mm panaflo M1A. The hyper6 does a great job of cooling, however the amount of torque it applies to the motherboard is enough to scare the sh1t outta me. You do not want any chance of a 60$(?) HSF destroying a 150$ mobo, 250$ processor, and 500$ graphics card especially if you move your case occasionally.

I dunno if the Lianli V2000 or V1000 suits your fancy.

 

[Blain]

The Super LANBoy looks good and also has twin 120mm fans. It's about 1/2 the price of the P160.

 

[Mik3y]

i 3rd the super lanboy. its uber sexy

 

[Jeff7]

I recently bought an Antec SLK-3700AMB from Newegg. Overall, I'd say their design is quite nice - filtered front intake fan (120mm, not included), and a 120mm exhaust fan (included). This can make for a quiet case. I do have some issues with it:
- The slim drive rails don't work quite right with my Sunbeam Rheobus. I had to take a Dremel to the fanbus to get it to fit in the case.
- It uses weird clips for the fans. This prevented me from using the Vantec noise dampeners I bought, as the clips don't permit the extra thickness that the dampeners add.
And because of the clips, should you choose to slice out the stamped fan grilles in favor of chrome wire grilles, you'll be left only with the plastic guards provided by the clips themselves, which still permit a finger to contact the blades. Not too much of an issue, as the only "exposed" fan is in the back of the case, but I still would have preferred standard spacing screw mounting holes.
- It has one power LED and 3 hard drive LED's. Problem is, the three drive LED plugs are each simply labeled "HDD LED" with no indication as to which one goes to which LED. This must be determined through experimentation.

Other than those issues, I do like the case. It's got a cooled, removable 5-drive cage right next to the intake, which is perfect for my 4 disk RAID 5 setup. The paint finish is excellent too. It comes with a 350W power supply, which if you need, it should do fine. If you don't need it, it's an instant rebate.
I looked at the P-160 too, but found that the SLK-3700AMB offers a good number of the same features, such as the efficient airflow system, but it costs about half what the P-160 costs. Granted, that's because it's steel, but I figure that a computer case is going to be quite heavy after it's loaded anyway, so what do a few more pounds matter?

 

[eastvillager]

I think it is a great case. Well-engineered, easily modded, etc. Some of the aluminum could be a bit thicker,you definitely don't want to sit on this case.

If you want to see one that has been chopped up a bit, you can look at this thread:

my finished worklog over on hardocp

While the chrome on the front looks a bit cheesy sometimes, it looked much better in person, at least to my eyes. The leds in the front intakes are easily removed or disconnected if the blue light is too much. I moved them into the case so they'd light up the window in the side. Also, that grillwork on the front is so deep, it makes the case an excellent mod choice if you want to watercool and mount your radiator up front(which is what I did, squeezed a dual-120mm fan rad in there pretty easily).

From newegg, mine came with 2 fans, didn't have to buy the second one.

 

[otispunkmeyer]

Originally posted by: Blain
The Super LANBoy looks good and also has twin 120mm fans. It's about 1/2 the price of the P160.

yeah i looked at that.... aluminium sounds bit flimsy plus i know its got a door but, my drives still arent silver, i picked the P160 because of its 2 front bezels

and i am kinda tryin to steer away from steel....my friends thermaltake needs both of us to carry it !, his desk is bowing in the middle too!!! dont wanna be there wen the MDF gives up!

 

[otispunkmeyer]

Originally posted by: Jeff7
I recently bought an Antec SLK-3700AMB from Newegg. Overall, I'd say their design is quite nice - filtered front intake fan (120mm, not included), and a 120mm exhaust fan (included). This can make for a quiet case. I do have some issues with it:
- The slim drive rails don't work quite right with my Sunbeam Rheobus. I had to take a Dremel to the fanbus to get it to fit in the case.
- It uses weird clips for the fans. This prevented me from using the Vantec noise dampeners I bought, as the clips don't permit the extra thickness that the dampeners add.
And because of the clips, should you choose to slice out the stamped fan grilles in favor of chrome wire grilles, you'll be left only with the plastic guards provided by the clips themselves, which still permit a finger to contact the blades. Not too much of an issue, as the only "exposed" fan is in the back of the case, but I still would have preferred standard spacing screw mounting holes.
- It has one power LED and 3 hard drive LED's. Problem is, the three drive LED plugs are each simply labeled "HDD LED" with no indication as to which one goes to which LED. This must be determined through experimentation.

Other than those issues, I do like the case. It's got a cooled, removable 5-drive cage right next to the intake, which is perfect for my 4 disk RAID 5 setup. The paint finish is excellent too. It comes with a 350W power supply, which if you need, it should do fine. If you don't need it, it's an instant rebate.
I looked at the P-160 too, but found that the SLK-3700AMB offers a good number of the same features, such as the efficient airflow system, but it costs about half what the P-160 costs. Granted, that's because it's steel, but I figure that a computer case is going to be quite heavy after it's loaded anyway, so what do a few more pounds matter?

the 3700 jus looks to, i dunno OEM it reminds me of TIME computer cases (really sh!t computers) and it also reminds me of my schools computers......

 

[otispunkmeyer]

Originally posted by: eastvillager
I think it is a great case. Well-engineered, easily modded, etc. Some of the aluminum could be a bit thicker,you definitely don't want to sit on this case.

If you want to see one that has been chopped up a bit, you can look at this thread:

my finished worklog over on hardocp

While the chrome on the front looks a bit cheesy sometimes, it looked much better in person, at least to my eyes. The leds in the front intakes are easily removed or disconnected if the blue light is too much. I moved them into the case so they'd light up the window in the side. Also, that grillwork on the front is so deep, it makes the case an excellent mod choice if you want to watercool and mount your radiator up front(which is what I did, squeezed a dual-120mm fan rad in there pretty easily).

From newegg, mine came with 2 fans, didn't have to buy the second one.

holy SH!T that is sweet man i salute you!!!! you got sum skillz man

 

[otispunkmeyer]

the lian li cases look really nice.....and i like their upside down layout!....but theyre 60 quid more expensive (im in UK so no newegg for me)

put it this way the antec wont look any cheaper or be built anyworse than what i got now

>steel case, no case fans, no space for case fans, 2 bays for HDD, 4 for CD, the cheapest platic ever has been used to build the front....u cant shatter it easily