Thoughts on this Antec

croc_croc_ New
edited November 2003 in Hardware
http://www.antec-inc.com/pro_details_enclosure.php?ProdID=93700

2 120mm fan holes. Prolly add 2 more fans (92mm, top and side).

Lots of drive bays, looks to have decent room for the size.

Those antec smartpower 350w psu's any good? (will be running: 3.2c / 9800pro / 2x Harddrive / CD-R / soundcard)

Comments

  • SimGuySimGuy Ottawa, Canada
    edited October 2003
    mm... might want to go for something a little more heavy than the 350W PSU with that gear. 400 Minimum these days for anything usually. IMHO, I'd take a TruePower over a SmartPower. I will attest to the 350W SmartPower though, as in my LanBoy system (2500+, 512, Ti4400, 2x40GB's, CD-RW, DVD) it's working wonderfully.

    As for the chassis, it's light-weight and very durable. The 3700 has much better airflow than the 2600 (LanBoy) which only uses 2 80mm fans. Make sure to use 2 high-powered 120mm fans (90 CFM+) for good airflow throughout the case and you'll be happy.
  • croc_croc_ New
    edited October 2003
    Will that case be big enough to oc the 3.2 and keep the temps low? It comes with a smartpower, so if thats sufficient I would like to use it.

    I'm going to FRY's today to look at what they have, then PC club. I get my 3.2c today and I really want to build this bad boy, don't wanna have to wait another 3 days for a case. :X
  • SimGuySimGuy Ottawa, Canada
    edited October 2003
    With 2 high-powered 120mm fans, it will provide enough airflow for your case. You'll want to concentrate on using a good ThermalRight heatsink & a high-output 92mm fan to cool that heat-monster of a CPU.

    The SmartPower will do fine for your application.

    SLK3700AMB_inside.jpg
  • TheBaronTheBaron Austin, TX
    edited October 2003
    i like
  • croc_croc_ New
    edited October 2003
    yeah I have an slk900u lying around and 2 sunon 92mm fans, I'm ready to OC this bad boy.

    Oh, found this one, I like the inside better.

    http://www.antec-inc.com/pro_details_enclosure.php?ProdID=93703
  • Geeky1Geeky1 University of the Pacific (Stockton, CA, USA)
    edited October 2003
    Got one, not thrilled with it.

    The PS is excellent, and yes, it'll run the system just fine.

    The case, on the other hand, could use some (read: a lot of) work.

    The airflow design means that the RAM gets absurdly hot, and it traps a lot of hot air between the optical drives and the front of the PS. I modified mine with 2 80mm blowholes, and it's now passable. It'll keep an overclocked Athlon XP passably cool, but it doesn't really do all that well. And, since there are no holes for air intake except for the side fans, if you have intake and exhaust airflow mismatched by more than a few CFM, your actual airflow drops to basically nothing. You can actually feel the airflow drop at the rear fan when the front one is off.

    If you get it, it'll need a good deal of work to make it a good overclocker's case. I'd recommend the Antec SX835 from Newegg for the same price ($83). It's always been my favorite case in the Performance line anyhow, after the SX1240. The SX1040 (which is the same thing as the chieftecs you see) has worse cooling than the 835 does, so...

    Here's a pic of my SLK-3700AMB, which has been relegated to housing my print server (1.3GHz Celeron, MSI Pro266TD-LR dual P3/DDR board, 512MB PC2100, Rage 128 32MB AGP, 52/32/52 CD-RW, 80GB/8MB/7200RPM DiamondMax 9 HDD) because that's the only thing I put in it that I was really happy with it's ability to keep cool. Even with all the fans set at minimum speed (2 Enermax Adjustable 120mm and 2 80mm stealths, all on a Vantec Nexus fanbus) and a 12cfm 60mm fan on a globalwin CAK-38 heatsink, the Celeron stays <100*F, and it's folding 24/7.
  • Geeky1Geeky1 University of the Pacific (Stockton, CA, USA)
    edited October 2003
    Oh, and the cooling on that BQE is even worse, so...
  • croc_croc_ New
    edited October 2003
    thanks for the input, saved me a headache.

    I don't like the look of those chieftec/antec cases (full tower with door and air fin thingys). I don't like windows either, or neon lights. I just want a nice looking case (clean, without any flashy lines or curves) that has good/excellent cooling. Any suggestions? I know, I am picky. You should see me eat. :X
  • Geeky1Geeky1 University of the Pacific (Stockton, CA, USA)
    edited October 2003
    I'll see what I can find. You have any interest in modding the thing? That is, would you be OK with cutting out fan grills or whatever? There are some decent cheap cases out there, but they've got the world's worst fan grills, and they block like 75% of the airflow and create huge amounts of noise.
  • ArmoArmo Mr. Nice Guy Is Dead,Only Aqua Remains Member
    edited October 2003
    intrested in cases u might wanna check out

    http://www.xoxide.com/allcases.html

    i love that yellow 1 witht the window
  • citrixmetacitrixmeta Montreal, Quebec Icrontian
    edited October 2003
    i had one of those antec,


    they are great.

    i was running my P4 2.6ghz in it, with 3 drives, and a radeon 9700.

    nice PSU too.
  • BudBud Chesterfield, Va
    edited October 2003
    I have a antec lanboy and it works great. I use 2 80mm pc toys fans at 40cfm each and a 80mm tornado on a volcano 10 and it stays cold. My system isnt as powerful but if you put bigger fans (92-120mm) in you wouldnt have a problem.
  • croc_croc_ New
    edited October 2003
    Well, I plan to overclock the 3.2c, so I'm sure I will need more than just average cooling in the case. I have narrowed it down to 2 different cases:

    Kingwin KT-424-BK Here
    FrozenCPU Blizzard 360 Here

    The blizzard isn't the most beautiful case, but looks like it has very nice cooling potential.
  • Geeky1Geeky1 University of the Pacific (Stockton, CA, USA)
    edited October 2003
    The link to the kingwin case isn't working for me. The only complaint I have about the other one is that it looks/sounds like it's based on a standard Enlight case that has no HDD cooling.
  • croc_croc_ New
    edited October 2003
    Fixed that link.

    The blizzard is based off a globalwin case, I don't remember which one, but its in an artice on one of the overclocker sites.

    As for HDD cooling, I do have an extra 92mm sunon fan sitting here, and access to any power tool I could imagine.
  • Geeky1Geeky1 University of the Pacific (Stockton, CA, USA)
    edited October 2003
    I'd probably go with the blizzard and mod it so it'll cool your hard drive(s)... I'm somewhat paranoid about HD cooling (and cooling in general, actually), probably because I had 10k RPM SCSIs for a while...
  • croc_croc_ New
    edited October 2003
    Ok, I just decided on the Blizzard, due to the size and the 3 120mm fan holes. I will probably get 3 panaflos and mod a hole for HDD cooling, and maybe one more fan to balance input/output. My cpu comes today. I wonder how high I can O/C in my crappy dell poweredge 400sc case (it does have a cpu -> rear fan duct tho!!!)
  • Geeky1Geeky1 University of the Pacific (Stockton, CA, USA)
    edited October 2003
    If you haven't ordered the Blizzard yet, have you thought about ordering a standard mid-tower and modding it?

    I was just looking at the bench PS I have with 3 rotron fans sitting on it and I realized that you could probably get better performance out of those, if you wanted to go to the effort to put them in...

    They're 24vDC (altho you can get 12v, 36v and 48v versions), 6.75x5.92x2" push 235cfm each @ full voltage, start & run of <1/2 their rated voltage (my 24v start @ 10, run @ 8...) and are pretty quiet @ 1/2 of their rated voltage. And, they're <$9 each.

    Mfr:
    http://www.comairrotron.com/DCFans/MajorDC.htm

    Where to buy:
    http://www.bgmicro.com/prodinfo.asp?sid=058704861111111164170122118&prodid=FAN1049&page=1&cri=FAN&stype=2

    I bought 4 of them from them. Great company (the LEDs I ordered with the fans were out of stock, so they backordered them and paid the shipping to send them out when they were back in stock)
  • croc_croc_ New
    edited October 2003
    Wow.... thats impressive. I haven't ordered anything yet. Now I think I want to do what you suggested.

    Do you still have pictures of that setup?
  • Geeky1Geeky1 University of the Pacific (Stockton, CA, USA)
    edited October 2003
    Not sure what setup you're talking about. I've got the fans, but I haven't actually done anything with them. I use them to cool my room/laptop...

    I'll probably be ordering a few of these, tho:
    http://www.allelectronics.com/cgi-bin/category.cgi?category=220&item=CF-171&type=store

    If you've seen my posts in <a href="http://www.short-media.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&threadid=5555&highlight=squirrel">this thread</a>, you know that squirrel cage fans produce relatively low CFMs at high static pressures. That particular blower appears to push ~100cfm, if it's similar to Rotron's current 4" blowers, and it does it at much higher pressures than an axial fan would. So, I'm going to attempt to put one on an SLK-900... you could try that, too, but w/o trying it, I don't know how well it'll work.
  • croc_croc_ New
    edited October 2003
    Who had the mobo sitting on an open desktop with a bunch of big ass fans blowing on it?
  • Geeky1Geeky1 University of the Pacific (Stockton, CA, USA)
    edited October 2003
    croc_, talked to you on AIM about it, but for the people that are wondering what you're talking about, it's in this thread:

    http://www.short-media.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&threadid=1129&highlight=3dmark+record+8500
  • croc_croc_ New
    edited October 2003
    yeah I posted that seriously 10 seconds before you IM'ed me.
  • Geeky1Geeky1 University of the Pacific (Stockton, CA, USA)
    edited October 2003
    yeah... I refreshed the page a second or two after I IMed you and there it was, so...
  • WuGgaRoOWuGgaRoO Not in the shower Icrontian
    edited November 2003
    Geeky1 had this to say
    Not sure what setup you're talking about. I've got the fans, but I haven't actually done anything with them. I use them to cool my room/laptop...

    I'll probably be ordering a few of these, tho:
    http://www.allelectronics.com/cgi-bin/category.cgi?category=220&item=CF-171&type=store

    If you've seen my posts in <a href="http://www.short-media.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&threadid=5555&highlight=squirrel">this thread</a>, .
    whats so good about those fans?
  • Geeky1Geeky1 University of the Pacific (Stockton, CA, USA)
    edited November 2003
    What, the Rotrons?

    <ul>Well, lessee...
    <li>They're friggin HUGE!
    <li>They're insanely efficient... How many 12v fans can you think of that'll run off 4v or less? These are 24v fans that run off 8v or even less sometimes, which is like a 12v fan running off 4v or less.
    <li>They move a crapload of air at full power- 235cfm
    <li>Even @ 12v, they're still easily moving at least 100cfm, and they're pretty damn quiet while doing it. Not silent, but not loud enough to bother most people, either.
    <li>The bearings on these things are VERY high quality- these fans spin for 29-31s after the power is cut off of 12v...
    <li>Rotron is a major fan manufacturer. They are not a household name by any means, but they supply a very large number of fans for industrial equipment. They are up there with Sanyo-Denki, Sunon, Papst, Delta and Panasonic Panaflo in terms of quality and reliability.
    </ul>

    Basically, they're just very high quality fans, they're dirt cheap, and they move more air than anything else you'll get for that price. Sure, there are more powerful fans (the 1000+ CFM AC fan that Sunon makes comes to mind...) but they have an msrp of $50+ EACH.
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