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Need a good full-tower, budget $300-$400 or (preferably) less

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ronopp, yeah I'm thinking that as long as there's plenty of space for air to flow I should be fine with most cases, regardless of all these fans and all that other crap.

Thing about the HAF though, is it's cousin the ATCS 840 is very similar, they both have a front 230mm fan, both have at least one 230mm exhaust fan at the top (840 has 2), and they both have another exhaust fan that is smaller at the rear (120mm for the 840, 140mm for the HAF). So if you say the HAF will cool very well, then I think the 840 will do the same.

And as far as the sidefan, I'm pretty sure that mounting a 120mm fan on the inside on the internal 3.5" drive cage in the 840 that is basically pointed at the same spot as the HAF's sidefan as (albeit from a different angle) will give me similar results. If anything, it's better, it keeps with the airflow (wouldn't a sidefan push air everywhere on the inside and ruin the flow?), and I think that it pushing air along the video/sound/etc cards and out of the case at the rear through whatever ventilation there is will work better than blasting them from the side, no?

Not to mention that the sidefan on the HAF means there isn't a great amount of noise-reduction like a closed door on say, the 840 would have, and with that in mind, the little hypothetical fan on the inside of the 840 would be giving the same thing as the HAF sidefan cooling-wise, but also having its noise suppressed by the closed door compared to the out-in-the-open HAF sidefan.

Wow, I sound like an ATCS 840 fanboy.

Maybe I should go with it after all. But bah, those other cases also look great and have their own pros.
 
I think the cases <200 I have researched myself:
Antec 1200 - I think it's great lots cooling but getting long in tooth in terms of features.
P193 - too hot, not enough ventilation
Haf 932 - excellent and quiet, very well ventilated but has no dust filters. this case incorporates most modern features in cases today.
LL - the top half has no ventilation, although excellent case, I feel as the core count increases this case will be short on ventilation in the future. excellent quality though.

my personal favor is haf 932, but an high end alternative is ATCS 840 but the side has no ventilation which means SLI/Xfire won't get cooled.
 
About the 840 not cooling the cards, it will if you stick a 120mm fan on the harddrive cage, hell like I said in my wall-of-text above you, it'll probably do it even better because it'll blow the air along the card and send the hot air out the rear, unlike the HAF which blows on it from the side, which I suppose will cool the cars but will mess with the flow of air.

As far as the Lian Li's, how do they not have ventilation? Half of their cases don't have a fan blowing air straight across the top section of the case (but which cases do? That's where ODD's and other drives are stuck, not fans), but they do have the right exhaust holes and fans at the rear and top to let hot air out. Some of their cases even have another fan at the top, though if I grabbed one of those I'd probably stick my ODD a few slots down so that the top fan can blow across properly (why would I need to cool my ODD?).

But yeah, out of those cases the 932 is probably the best choice, but I definitely won't be getting it, I'd rather grab an 840, among other cases.

Oh and on a sidenote, nyker what's the 96 at the end of your name mean?
 
That's why the ATCS 840 has a box that you put a 120mm fan in over the rear card slots... it sucks air out of the video card area....
here's a pic of the ASUS 785G build I just RMA'd (going i7/i5 with discrete video card):

*as you can see, the 120mm fan mounts on the HDD cage won't put the fans in a place to blow on the cards much because the case is so large.
amdasusbuild2.jpg
 
Really? That sucks. I don't really want to stick that cube thing on the case to cool the cards.

Damn, and I was so excited about the 840. I mean it's not a huge thing, but I kind of liked the idea of the video cards being taken care of as well.
 
Last edited:
ChorniyVolk said:
Really? That sucks. I don't really want to stick that cube thing on the case to cool the cards.

Damn, and I was so excited about the 840. I mean it's not a huge thing, but I kind of liked the idea of the video cards being taken care of as well.
Click to expand...

Well, I'm sure the cards would get a drift of that air being blown over, but it's not directly on them... that's why they designed the rear card heat sucker contraption. 😱
 
ChorniyVolk said:
http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/cases/2008/10/31/cooler-master-atcs-840-classic-review/4

And suddenly I'm not so excited about the ATCS 840.

Damn, picking a case is harder than picking any other part, imo.
Click to expand...

???? Of course the HAF 932 keeps the video card slots cooler (side fan), but for me the ATCS 840 is a happy medium between tons of dust inside the case (HAF 932) and excellent cooling, as well as mature aesthetics (I am not a little pimply gamer kid and I share a place with my girlfriend who is not a gamer). All that aside, I don't see anything terribly salient with the delta temps or otherwise in those test comparisons.

from the bit-tech review:
... the internal case temperature in the ATCS 840 was constant throughout our testing, never differing from the external ambient temperature despite all our thermally intensive hardware under load. This demonstrates superb airflow through the case. The problem lies in the fact that the cooling fans are not as able to draw heat away from the sources of heat as directly as competing chassis, so performance has suffered a little.
Click to expand...

the reviewer even says:
... Cooler Master has really gone out of its way to produce a quality product here - the whole case benefits from the feeling that nothing has been left out or overlooked. It looks fantastic, is a delight to fit a system into and the build quality throughout is excellent - there really is almost nothing to fault the ATCS 840 on, either internally or externally.
Click to expand...

Great test comparison, link by the way! 😀

Weren't you considering modding the case originally? Pick the closest case to what you want it to be in the end and mod it. I think all you'd have to do with the ATCS 840 is mount a fan or two to blow on the card slots if you don't want to use the rear exhaust box.

Good luck!
 
Where did I say I was going to mod it?

Anyway, I was thinking a lot about it, and I think I am going to go with the 840, knew it before I even read your latest post.

I was thinking of getting it with 2 120mm fans, and a 6 fan controller. Not only will it be cooler, but the fan controller will make it look even more awesome.

I'm thinking I'll look through the cases on my list just to be sure I want the 840 over all of them, and then I'll just grab it.
 
http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=325778

What's this all about:

Cons:
- Complaints of thin, rattling side panels
- Complaints of slight gaps around drive bay covers
- No stock window, optical drive covers, or sound deadening available

Lack of window I don't mind, they sell them, drive covers I don't mind much either, and by sound deadening he means like the stuff on the side doors like on a COSMOS 1000? Eh, I'll live.

But what's with the first 2 complaints?
 
ChorniyVolk said:
Where did I say I was going to mod it?

Anyway, I was thinking a lot about it, and I think I am going to go with the 840, knew it before I even read your latest post.

I was thinking of getting it with 2 120mm fans, and a 6 fan controller. Not only will it be cooler, but the fan controller will make it look even more awesome.

I'm thinking I'll look through the cases on my list just to be sure I want the 840 over all of them, and then I'll just grab it.
Click to expand...

I don't know. Maybe it was another thread. Someone was talking about painting the inside black to look pretty or something. That wasn't you?

ChorniyVolk said:
http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=325778

What's this all about:

Cons:
- Complaints of thin, rattling side panels
- Complaints of slight gaps around drive bay covers
- No stock window, optical drive covers, or sound deadening available

Lack of window I don't mind, they sell them, drive covers I don't mind much either, and by sound deadening he means like the stuff on the side doors like on a COSMOS 1000? Eh, I'll live.

But what's with the first 2 complaints?
Click to expand...

Well, I assume any panel will rattle if it's not installed all the way, tightened down, on an uneven surface, etc. I haven't had any problems with mine on a custom oak stand that I built at my uncle's cabinet shop. The HDD mounts are vibration absorbing and the fans don't rattle. I'll see how the fans hold up over time but as of now, no issues. One of the 5.25" covers was sunken in a little bit, but I took it out to install a burner, so problem solved. I'm telling you the fit and finish of this case is second to none. Even the shipping tape over the doors was at perfect 90 degree angles :hmm:
 
Well looks like I got my case then.

Now I just need to figure out if I should put in 2 more fans, or just one. Then gotta pick them. Then gotta grab a fan controller based on how many fans I have. Then gotta grab an ODD and make sure it matches, colore-wise, and then I gotta wait a week or so and build my god damn computer already.
 
Hello,

I'm surprised nobody mentioned the Lian-Li PC-80. It's a huge, magnificent case with lots of airflow (Although the TJ-07 is a tie, but air-cooling isn't it's reason for existence.) The TJ-07 is the ONLY casi I've ever seen that'll allow you to install those ridiculous Tyan Quad Opteron+Quad Opteron (Support board) systems.

Daimon
 
dac, I checked out all the Lian Li's on my list quite a few posts above, and I just didn't like them as much as I liked the 840.

TJ07 is smaller than the 840 all-around, and that rattling complaint got to me. And it costs way more.

The PC-P80 I'm not going with because it's skinnier than the 840, which would make stuffing certain components like the NH-D14 into it a little tricky, I'd like some clearance y'know? On top of that, I don't like how their motherboard tray comes off, the 840's method seems way way way better imo. I also don't like how it looks, with all the mesh vents and stuff, even if the LEDs can be turned off it still doesn't impress me visually. And then there's the price. Sure it has some nice intake power, but how many of those fans will be blocked by stuff? Well maybe in my case, not much, I'll only be putting in one ODD and a fan controller, so I won't count that too much against it. But for the price, I can stick another one or two intake fans on the front of the 840, and not only could I get a really nice couple of fans for it, but in total it would cost less.

I mean, if they were priced the same, then it'd be a little tougher but I'd still probably choose the 840. As is though, I'm definitely not feeling it for anything but the 840.

Dammit, now I really AM a fanboy.

But thanks for the suggestions.
 
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