Thanks for the review Devon.

Here is the obligatory spelling (erm..... grammar) error, Page 7, Configuration 3, second from bottom line, "speeded" should be "sped".

Now down to the nitty gritty.

I cant stand the look of the fridge myself, all black would be much better, however I guess that someone must like it.

Terrible HDD & PSU airflow path, a dremmel and a drill will be the only alternative to keeping the door open after cutting away the front grill, and removing the filter - not exacty ideal. Did you measure the temperature of the air coming out of the PSU.??? How does the temp compare to other cases.???

A bizzare but interesting airflow system in the top half of the case, I can see that Lian-Li are trying to keep the GPU(s) cool, but they have only gone half way. Why did they come up with the idea of blowing hot air from the CPU straight past the GPU, surely a seperate air output would help the CPU a huge amount, and as a knock-on effect help the GPU(s) as little air from the CPU would reach the GPU(s).

This is not exactly an "out of the box" silent case, like many of the newer Antec cases are (Sonata 1 & 2, P180, P150, NSK2400 etc), and has so many drawbacks that few people will want to touch it, unless they are really into modding, or are preppared to mod just to get a case thats "different".

This would only be on my shortlist if you could "realistically" fit 6 HDD's in and have a cool and quiet machine at the end of it.


Andy

You people must have fancy fridges. All of the ones I've been in contact were just plain white (P150??)...

Personally i thought it looked more like a "OOh, let´s make a fancy design case!" kind of case. I like my 6077b much more, and i thing it has much better potential to be cool and quiet. At least my sig system in it is seriously quiet, inaudible for non trained ears from 50cm away, and the only mods are damping material and cut out grilles. I can suspend eight HDDs in elastic in there if i want to. Or use enclosures. Whatever. PSU ducting takes five minutes. Bottom intake is great.

I know someone who has his frigde look like all the other doors in the kitchen including washing machine, meaning dark wood, quite nice. Its damn quiet too. Ours is white and noisy.

And the fact that computers in aluminium cases can be quiet wasn´t any surprise to me, both my computers are in aluminium cases and both are silent to untrained ears.

But yeah, thanks for the review Im not in a smilieface kind of mood today, its saturday, so just one smilie in the post.

is it me or is 9.5kg kinda heavy for an alu case? Sometimes seems that increasing the thickness of alu panels to avoid resonance issues cancels out one of the main advantages of alu cases in the first place - their low weight.

interesting idea on the airflow, though it just doesn't quite make sense - largely because there's no way I can see to stop it short cutting the CPU HS completely. Or is the graphics card supposed to act as some sort of divider?

I also wonder if the PSU was starved for fresh air, considering the restricted intake. Could this have contributed to the high PSU fan speed under load with the 6800GT, or does this compare to the original test of this PSU? I should check it out myself, but it's late and I'm knackered

very thorough and diligent review though, as always - keep up the outstanding work!

My 6077 is 5,9kg stock so its much lighter, but it doesnt have all those divider thingies inside. I proabably have 7kg of damping in it though, i always thought the main advantage of alu cases is looks

Greetings,

In a general sense, I really like it: it "one-ups" the P180 in the sense that it "corrects" the inherent ATX problem of all the expansions cards being the wrong side up.

And I got my hopes up with the front door, but the slots on the side are obviously too small, and the restrictive air grills are inexplicable -- could they be removed easily? I would imagine that if they are, that wire grills would be simple enough to afix.

Imagine how sweet it would be if you could suspend 4-6 HD's a la Solo/P150 -- I also like the placement of the HD's in the coolest part of the case; if only the air flow was better, it might even suffice to use just the PS (120mm) to cool the HD's?

What I wonder is, how is that fan over the expansion slots supposed to do anything? Any air it draws out of the case would just be sucked right back in on either side of the fan! I wonder what those designers were thinking.

This seems obvious, but in reality, it's not what seems to happen -- unless the PC is shoved into a very constricted space. I don't know enough science around thermal airflow in "free" air to explain why, but when hot air is exhausted, it does not usually get pulled back in by an intake vent even when it is directly above the exhaust vent. It may have something to do with the velocity of the airflows and their real "suction" power at the low RPM we usually employ.

This is a nice review. This case does have some drawbacks...

I've had for a few months a Lian-Li PC-V2100B Plus case, and even tough this is an older model I think it is better than this one.

For one, the "cramped" PSU space is not a problem on my case. Of course it's also much bigger (Full tower VS Mid tower).

My case has sound isulation included on all side panels. A rubber band seals the front panel.

The front intake is actually a "slot hole" below the case, between the front panel and the fan itself.

The new Plus II series has the same patented "side exaust" fan, but the Plus series only has an additionnal side blower that I do not use. The side exaust is not attractrive, mainly because of sound leaking from the side.

As for the fans, I only use 2: the front intake and rear intake, both of which are Nexus Real Silent at full speed.

I needed to buy longer (24 and 36 inches) cables to connect everything, especially HDD in the front/botton space.

The ONE problem I see is CPU air increases temp of MB and component around it... My CPU is a P4 640 3.2 GHz @ 3.6 GHz, using a Scythe Ninja in fanless mode (with the duct that came with the case). Even tough it's usually a hot CPU, in idle it's only around 35°C and at full load around 60°C which is a lot better than the stock heatsink, however MB temps can rise up to 45-50°C. My VGA is an Ati Radeon X800 XT PE with an Arctic Cooling Ati Silencer 5 REV2. It acts as an exaust for the whole system too.

I really like my case, would it be for the monstruous space or sound-reducing features. If you need a smaller case, the Lian-Li PC-V1100 is the alternative, comparable to the one in this review except with sound insulation. Considering this is "SilentPC" I would have reviewed this one instead.

kk so i came here hoping to find some solutions to the hdd mounting issue. the hard plastic rails in the drive cage and the way they are setup is causing pretty much the only noise coming out of my case. i am DETERMINED to quiet my 2 WD hdd's down.

1. i would like to see if there is a mod here at spcr for the li li drive cage as it is stock. i would rather not remove it from my case since it seems to provide a fair amount of case stability and rigidity by providing a support structure to the mid-floor. i have removed it and rotated and changed it position but i always keep it in.

2. if i HAD to remove the drive cage, then my first assumption is i would have space to lay both drives side by side. how then can i silence them and remove their low vibration hum? is there anything like the grommeted screws on the zalman i can stand my hdds on? i would like them to be mounted as opposed to sitting loose on a bed of foam. and what foam would that be anyway?

What model Lian Li case do you have? The different case types have different mounting options. If you have one of the 6x series of cases, I can give you some advice on what worked for me. There are also several detailed posts that are useful.

Also, go to the general gallery and check this thread out.

http://forums.silentpcreview.com/viewtopic.php?t=19147

I am using a sewing elastic solution in my case and it works very well. However, I only have 1 drive. The cage in my system might at most hold 2 drives with this method; and then it would be iffy. For your situation with 2 drives, you would probably be better off with the stretch-magic solution in the drive suspension thread.

Finally, I have become a believer in testing the principle before spending money on a solution. In this instance, I wanted to find out if drive suspension would help my system. I wadded up a soft rag on the bottom of the case, and put the drive on it. I put the side back on the case, and booted the machine. The hard drive noise was effectively eliminated, so I proceeded to use the elastic suspension method and am satisfied with it.

well i have the same v series case like was reviewed, noting the same noise issues the hdd cage caused. someone has suggested that maximumPC did a mod where they were able to suspend the drives WITHIN the stock cage with the old' pencils on the outside, elastic wrapped between trick. gonna research that now.

and yea im with you on the test/reserach before spending
here is my topic about it on these forums: http://forums.silentpcreview.com/viewto ... highlight=

can i see a pic of yours beel? where can i find the stretch magic stuff? same for sewing elastic? i wanna try some out this week.

Here. Posting on Thur and wanting to try this week? Hmm. Artbeads ships free. They just put the stuff in an envelope and mail it first class.