Antec 300: Owner Opinion/Amateur Review
Posted: Thu May 22, 2008 9:05 pm
I've installed a couple of different setups into this case now, over the last couple of months, as I fuss with my systems in an attempt to appease my sense of inner happiness.
System 1: My old socket 939 MSI Neo4 platinum setup, complete with a scythe ninja (a), and a western digital caviar 400, and a 640. Running linux, not that it really matters.
System 2: My new evga 780i setup, q6600 cpu, mini-ninja, with a pair of 74 gig Raptors.
Airflow is spectacular with the perforated front and the side vent. With both the 120 and the 140mm antec tricools set to low speed, it generated a nice intake wash throughout the entirety of the perforated front panel. I was concerned at first that it would simply draw air from near the top, closer to the fans. However, the perforations appear to generated enough resistance that it's pulling air fairly evenly over the entire front surface. The cooling is enough to keep either setup cool with minimal noise involved.
As far as layout is concerned, the bottom mounted PSU has it's usual benefits. The psu isn't seperated from the main chamber by any barrier, but it still performs nicely. Both my PC Power and Cooling Turbo Cool 510 SLI (780i setup) and my Seasonic 380 GB (MSI Nforce 4) happily fit in the space provided. There's even some bracing, so that there's room to put any bottom feeding psu's with the fan oriented downwards, allowing it to pull air from the very bottom of the case without issue. Also, because the supply is at the bottom of the case, and sitting on braces... heavy units won't be a problem. (some cases exhibit bending of the back panel due to lack of support for the power supplies.
Silencing: The case isn't naturally insulated vs sound. All that perforated metal unfortunately does pass sound fairly well. However, if you use quiet/passive components, all that airflow means that everything naturally stays nice and cool... and quiet/passive components don't need any additional silencing, usually.
Hard drives: Plenty of space behind the perforated panel to place drives directly in the air wash.. they stay nice and cool. (my two caviars are steady at 35-36c even as I write this little mini-review). The raptors when the other setup was installed were similarly well cared for. No issues concerning heat with this case at all. As for the 5+1/4"" bays up top, the bay covers are NOT perforated for those, which is good if you want to force the air to come through the front grill lower down, but not so good if you want to say, mount a smartdrive or similar setup into the wider bays. You'd need to leave the bay cover off, or any such mounting will receive minimal, if any, airflow.
Vibration: No noticeable resonance/vibration with either setup, although admittedly the pc power and cooling supply is noisy enough to mask such a problem. The seasonic based setup, which runs.. not silent, but nearly so, exhibits no vibration normally either. I did catch the front bezel/panel vibrating a bit the other night, but simply pressure near the bottom with a finger, caused it to stop and stay stopped. The feet on the case are a very soft, VERY 'grippy' black rubber of some sort. Might be silicone based. Once they contact my desk, it's a serious pain to slide it. It's easier just to pick it up and reposition the case.
For the record, my pc power and cooling setup was a fair bit quieter, compared to the chenbro case that is it's current home. Still not nearly silent in that config, though. The PSU would need to go for that to happen. the athlon + seasonic combo, however, runs nearly dead silent. From across the room, you can't really hear it at all over ambient noise. sitting next to it, it expresses itself with the idle noise from the drives (a quiet 'whir... very quiet) drive access is noted as a mild ticking that can be heard over the idle noise. video card is my modified x800-xl ati card with a zalman vf700 cooler... it's noise is well below ambient unless the card overheats.. I've never heard it spin up since returning it to active duty in this case. My 8800 gts/320 runs 5c cooler in this case, vs my chenbro, with no other changes. (using software temp monitoring... alas, I don't have linux set up to pull temps from the ati yet.. it's not spotting the sensor for some reason)
Verdict: If you've got a quiet/passifve setup, this case is VERY nice in terms of layout/airflow for keeping it nice and cool, quietly.
If you have a noisier setup and/or it runs hotter, this case will help you cool it down, let the power supply run a bit more quietly, etc. It will not muffle anything, though.
TheAtomicKid
Bonus Thought: It works wonderfully as a negative pressure setup. Converting it to positive pressure would be tough, though. All that perforated real estate would work against you. The grill at the front seems to work well at catching larger airborn materials... wiping it off every couple of days will save you time spent opening it up for a 'real' cleaning. There's space behind the front panel to put a filter in, and mountings for a couple of 120mm drives, either/or. However, it'd combine with the case front to be fairly restrictive.
System 1: My old socket 939 MSI Neo4 platinum setup, complete with a scythe ninja (a), and a western digital caviar 400, and a 640. Running linux, not that it really matters.
System 2: My new evga 780i setup, q6600 cpu, mini-ninja, with a pair of 74 gig Raptors.
Airflow is spectacular with the perforated front and the side vent. With both the 120 and the 140mm antec tricools set to low speed, it generated a nice intake wash throughout the entirety of the perforated front panel. I was concerned at first that it would simply draw air from near the top, closer to the fans. However, the perforations appear to generated enough resistance that it's pulling air fairly evenly over the entire front surface. The cooling is enough to keep either setup cool with minimal noise involved.
As far as layout is concerned, the bottom mounted PSU has it's usual benefits. The psu isn't seperated from the main chamber by any barrier, but it still performs nicely. Both my PC Power and Cooling Turbo Cool 510 SLI (780i setup) and my Seasonic 380 GB (MSI Nforce 4) happily fit in the space provided. There's even some bracing, so that there's room to put any bottom feeding psu's with the fan oriented downwards, allowing it to pull air from the very bottom of the case without issue. Also, because the supply is at the bottom of the case, and sitting on braces... heavy units won't be a problem. (some cases exhibit bending of the back panel due to lack of support for the power supplies.
Silencing: The case isn't naturally insulated vs sound. All that perforated metal unfortunately does pass sound fairly well. However, if you use quiet/passive components, all that airflow means that everything naturally stays nice and cool... and quiet/passive components don't need any additional silencing, usually.
Hard drives: Plenty of space behind the perforated panel to place drives directly in the air wash.. they stay nice and cool. (my two caviars are steady at 35-36c even as I write this little mini-review). The raptors when the other setup was installed were similarly well cared for. No issues concerning heat with this case at all. As for the 5+1/4"" bays up top, the bay covers are NOT perforated for those, which is good if you want to force the air to come through the front grill lower down, but not so good if you want to say, mount a smartdrive or similar setup into the wider bays. You'd need to leave the bay cover off, or any such mounting will receive minimal, if any, airflow.
Vibration: No noticeable resonance/vibration with either setup, although admittedly the pc power and cooling supply is noisy enough to mask such a problem. The seasonic based setup, which runs.. not silent, but nearly so, exhibits no vibration normally either. I did catch the front bezel/panel vibrating a bit the other night, but simply pressure near the bottom with a finger, caused it to stop and stay stopped. The feet on the case are a very soft, VERY 'grippy' black rubber of some sort. Might be silicone based. Once they contact my desk, it's a serious pain to slide it. It's easier just to pick it up and reposition the case.
For the record, my pc power and cooling setup was a fair bit quieter, compared to the chenbro case that is it's current home. Still not nearly silent in that config, though. The PSU would need to go for that to happen. the athlon + seasonic combo, however, runs nearly dead silent. From across the room, you can't really hear it at all over ambient noise. sitting next to it, it expresses itself with the idle noise from the drives (a quiet 'whir... very quiet) drive access is noted as a mild ticking that can be heard over the idle noise. video card is my modified x800-xl ati card with a zalman vf700 cooler... it's noise is well below ambient unless the card overheats.. I've never heard it spin up since returning it to active duty in this case. My 8800 gts/320 runs 5c cooler in this case, vs my chenbro, with no other changes. (using software temp monitoring... alas, I don't have linux set up to pull temps from the ati yet.. it's not spotting the sensor for some reason)
Verdict: If you've got a quiet/passifve setup, this case is VERY nice in terms of layout/airflow for keeping it nice and cool, quietly.
If you have a noisier setup and/or it runs hotter, this case will help you cool it down, let the power supply run a bit more quietly, etc. It will not muffle anything, though.
TheAtomicKid
Bonus Thought: It works wonderfully as a negative pressure setup. Converting it to positive pressure would be tough, though. All that perforated real estate would work against you. The grill at the front seems to work well at catching larger airborn materials... wiping it off every couple of days will save you time spent opening it up for a 'real' cleaning. There's space behind the front panel to put a filter in, and mountings for a couple of 120mm drives, either/or. However, it'd combine with the case front to be fairly restrictive.