I really like the Antec Three Hundred Two, except for the apparent airflow obstruction for the front fans due to the arrangement of the hard drive cage and the fans being mounted directly to it.

If I got one of these cases, I'd be tempted to make cuts (as shown in green lines) to remove material.



Of course this would render the stock drive cage inoperative, and would require some alternate mounting method for any 3.5" drives.

Edit: A rough mockup of the mod from the inside:

Yah, it's a shame that they did that. Nice case otherwise. You can always go with a drive bay up top.

This one will fit 4 drives in a 3 drive bay (who needs optical nowadays), and has a 120mm fan that is swappable. I use a pair of these in one of my cases, nice and quiet.
http://www.amazon.com/KingWin-Multi-Bay ... B0042U4DKC

If you're going for ultimate silence, just suspend some drives up in the top drive bays. That'll get you where you need to go for sure.

are you trying to achieve a positive pressure, push pull or negative pressure setup? to me that case would work best running as a negative pressure setup, using only exhaust fans, and no intake fans. course im a big fan (no pun intended) of not having fans on the front of the case, because any noise they produce is closer to my ears.

I'm trying to achieve positive pressure. No dust in my case.

If I got this case and did this mod, I would try to figure a way to suspend drives low in the front of case. No airflow over the drives up in the top bays.

then you are on the right track. i think your mod will work great for positive airflow.

I might give it a try.

if your planning on a powerful gaming rig, maybe even cut out every other horizontal support (alternating-leaving half for rigidity) on the other side of the hdd rack to decrease turbulence and open the air path a bit more.

The Antec 300 was originally a budget-priced case. But this is no longer true of the current versions. In the UK certainly it is priced not much less less than the Corsair Carbide 300R. Rather than attempting to modify the Antec buying the 300R could be a better option. The 300R comes with one front 140mm and one rear 120mm fan as standard which seems to be more in line with your cooling preferences. It also has a superior hard drive mounting system, more in line with current practice than the dated arrangement in the Antec.

Thanks for the suggestion.

The Corsair Carbide 300R has the same sideways HDD cage orientation as the Antec 300 Two (and P280 also - though the P280 has a somewhat less obstructing cage design), and thus the same front intake fan airflow obstructions, but at least in the Corsair they perforated it.

The thing I don't like about the 300R and many new cases is the proliferation of ventilation holes and fan placements seemingly all over the place. I look at the large grate on the top panel and all I see is just a big place for dust to naturally settle down into. It could make for a good exhaust, but having the exhaust fans up there just means more noise. Not only that, multiple side panel vents are more common - even behind the CPU socket now. I would just duct tape over all these various side vents. And the more duct tape, the uglier it gets. At least I can use black duct tape to match the color of the case.

I am not.Thanks. Interesting idea. I would probably leave some metal somewhere to facilitate my usual method of hooking the mini-bungee cords I use to suspend the drives.

Here's a revised proposal. The crosshatch pattern shows where metal would be removed.
In trying to determine which horizontal supports to leave in (in order to accommodate two drives), I figure that the center ones would perhaps be best because they cross the fan hub which produces no (or little) air flow.


Is this worth a try?