Antec Nine Hundred case, anyone got it?

DanGDanG I AM CANADIAN Icrontian
edited January 2009 in Hardware
I'm looking to replace my Antec Sonata II, and this new case from Antec looks like it will fit the bill.

Comes with 2 120mm trispeed front intake fans and a 120mm trispeed exhaust fan and a massive 200mm trispeed exhaust fan with the option of adding another 2 120mm fans.

http://www.antec.com/us/productDetails.php?ProdID=15900#

I've read a bunch of reviews on Newegg and the only valid complaints (IMO) are the place the PSU mounts requiring some people to need CPU power extensions and the fact that the hard drive mounts can be difficult, but really, how often do you move hard drives around?

What do you guys think? I'm thinking for $120, it's a great deal, has lots of cooling and looks good.

Comments

  • djshowdowndjshowdown London
    edited December 2006
    looks pretty cool (no pun intended)

    very expandable too which helps

    cant tell you technically if its any good but certainly looks decent
  • Datsun-1600Datsun-1600 Sydney.au
    edited December 2006
    Great case, but the first release had the problem of the first expansion card slot not having enough clearance to fit a video cable if a GFX card was in it. Antec know the problem and are rectifying it. The mobo I have in it has the GFX in the second PCI slot, so this problem for me doesn't exist.

    Datsun 1600
  • DanGDanG I AM CANADIAN Icrontian
    edited December 2006
    I did see the reviews with people saying that was an issue, but there were no recent complaints about it, so I'm thinking they must have rectified the problem.
  • edited December 2006
    I first saw this case at Showdown LAN back in August when it hadnt yet been released. Antec had about 5 of em there with systems in them. I liked the design of the case, however I found them to be predominately plasticy.

    For the cost, the front bezel should definately be metal, and the entire top peice where the fan is mounted is also entirely plastic, should also be metal.

    Just my thoughts, I personally use a Gigabyte 3D Aurora
  • DanGDanG I AM CANADIAN Icrontian
    edited December 2006
    Just ordered the case and a new heatsink, the Thermalright ULTRA 120 with an 86 cfm Panaflo 120mm fan. Hopefully this will let me break 3.4ghz stable on my E6600. I'll have pics and comments when I get the stuff.
  • GHoosdumGHoosdum Icrontian
    edited December 2006
    I can't wait to see your feedback on the setup, DanG.
  • edited January 2009
    A ton of people have this case, me being one of them. There are a few slight annoyances, like having to open the case to adjust the fan speeds. There are individual 3-way toggles for each fan (low, med, high) and the fans use molex connectors instead of the 3-pin. This makes using an aftermarket fan controller with RPM monitoring a pain in the neck. However, A setting of medium on the 120mm fans and high on the 200mm fan keeps the system very cool and the noise isn't that bad. I wouldn't let this deter anyone from buying the case as it's very nice.

    The hard drive bays slide out the front with the fan attached via removing 8 thumbscrews per cage assembly (4 on each side). You then have the ability to mount 3 drives in each cage with brilliant fan placement.

    Some people don't like having the PSU on the bottom. I prefer it because when it draws in air from the case, it is doing it at the lowest portion of the case where the naturally cooler dense air is. When a PSU is located high it draws from the high-heat upper area. With the 200mm top fan in its place it eliminates those stagnant heat zones. To me, wire management is second to design physics so I get over the wire management issue so many complain about. As for some wires needing extensions, it depends on your PSU and motherboard socket locations.

    For me, until something better comes along, any new PC I build will have this case.
  • airbornflghtairbornflght Houston, TX Icrontian
    edited January 2009
    I have the 900 and love it but will disagree with sirus about the fan speeds. I have all case fans and my heatsink fan on low (I forget which one, but its one of those huge 120mm equipped heatpipes) because I absolutely hate noise. It is barely audible with no noise in the room and my temps hover around 30C idle and 54C full load on prime. Which is very acceptable. Even with my fan temps up to medium and my cpu heatsink fan on full blast my idle temps were only 28 and load was 51. Not a big enough difference to warrant the extra noise. I appreciate a silent case and the big fans capable of moving lots of air at low revs is why I bought this case.

    The only complaint I have about the case is the lack of a removable motherboard tray.
  • edited January 2009
    airbornflght, remember that your CPU temp isn't the only indicator of a cool case. You have an aftermarket heatsink that I assume blows across the mobo now instead of radiating outwards (like stock intel). You have to remember that with an aftermarket CPU heatsink you no longer have the well thought out airflow blowing across your northbridge and cap heat sinks. Not to mention your RAM (not knowing if you use a RAM cooling solution).

    Getting that air moving helps keep those important components cool. So remember, CPU temp being low doesn't mean the rest of your gear is low.
  • airbornflghtairbornflght Houston, TX Icrontian
    edited January 2009
    my cooler blows straight into the exhaust fan. so any airflow across the motherboard is a result of the intake and exhaust fans. Which I'm confident happens. If that type of thing worries one then go ahead and turn the fans up, but remember there are diminishing returns in the cfm and velocity flowing over a heat exchanger because at a certain point the heat exchanger just cant transport any more heat in an amount of time depending on the material used. Which is evident in my pc cooler. I more than tripled the cfm of the fan and only achieved a 3C decrease in temperatures. Which lends to the assumption that either the heat exchanger had already reached its capacity at the current thermal load.

    So again, I see no need to increase airflow unless for a 'peace of mind' feeling.
  • edited January 2009
    I agree with airbornflght that the largest factor in setting your fan speeds in the antec 900 case is the "warm fuzzy feeling" factor. Even on the lowest speed settings the Antec 900 has better airflow than most other cases regardless of fan setup. I imagine having a Crossfire setup with two largely overclocked graphics cards, a RAID 5 setup, and a few other heat sources would be the only reason to ever put these fans on high.

    Seems like its about time for someone with one of those fan controllers that has the remote temperature sensors to chime in and show some test results on this idea. I'd like to see the actual temperature differences.
  • airbornflghtairbornflght Houston, TX Icrontian
    edited January 2009
    Yeh if I had a thermocouple thermometer or two I'd rig it up and see the difference volume of airflow had as far as case, chipset, cpu, and gfx temp compared to ambient but alas I don't feel like spending $50-$100 for a dual input thermometer.
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