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Price-Point Comparing Three-Way Case Shootout

 by Joshua Buss on January 13, 2006 12:05 AM EST
69 Comments | Add A Comment
69 Comments
Dynapower E68

In our last roundup, Dynapower surprised us with a very sturdy case designed for more ”industrial” use (namely a server configuration), which offered many great tool-less features and was simply built like a tank. At roughly the same time, the company released a more typically configured tower, the E68. In this first picture of the tower, take note of the gold-colored 120mm fan grill – it's the only active cooling component included in the case.


Click to enlarge.

Normally, we're not fans of taking any pictures of the packing job of any hardware; we expect the packaging to do a good enough job of protecting the vital components and don't feel that readers care to see the packaging unless something is horridly wrong. Upon the opening of the E68 though, we discovered something that we've never exactly seen before, and felt we should share what we saw. The tower of the case was 90% there, but the front bezel itself was packaged separately.

We found it particularly interesting because the front bezel of the E68 is only plastic. However, that really doesn't change the fact that it's a thoughtfully designed unit, which is both highly functional and styled in a particularly unique manner.

Connecting the front bezel to the rest of the case simply consists of guiding the cabling through the circular opening and pushing until the clips snap in place. The bottom portion slides to the left to reveal the port cluster on the E68, which only includes two audio jacks and two USB ports, and unfortunately, the USB ports are pretty tightly placed.


Click to enlarge.

This portion of the bezel is also where the power and HDD activity LEDs are found. Moving upwards, we find the large power button and much smaller, recessed reset button. The silver space to the right of the buttons is not another space for an external 3½” bay, but there is still a dedicated bay centered above.


Click to enlarge.

Raidmax X1 (cont’d) Dynapower E68 (cont’d)
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  • yacoub - Friday, January 13, 2006 - link

    Yes, the Antec P150 is the best case EVER. No really, it's awesome. I wish they'd offer it without the included PSU though, since that PSU has issues with some Asus boards. I ended up buying a different PSU ahead of time since I knew that and was getting an A8N-SLI Premium.

    I highly recommend the P150. No reason for any other case unless you simply need MORE room than it offers.

    The best part about the P150 is you can build a silent PC system in it very easily. I have the included 120mm fan on the lowest setting and insulated from the case itself with rubber grommets so it's totally silent, a TruePowerII 480w PSU (has a 120mm fan inside it) which is totally silent, the harddrive isolated with the included grommets, the CPU fan throttled down dynamically with CPUSpeed, and the GPU fan throttled with ATITool.

    It's also high quality part and construction-wise.

  • Live - Friday, January 13, 2006 - link

    The optional front fans in the P150 are for 92mm.

  • Tamale - Friday, January 13, 2006 - link

    fixed.

  • xsilver - Friday, January 13, 2006 - link

    anybody here from Australia? know where I can get the raidmax X1? not sure if there are any australian distributers -- (cant find anybody on staticice.com.au)

  • Cygni - Friday, January 13, 2006 - link

    My only comment is with the title of the article. Probably should be a bit more descriptive... like "Cases - 3 Way Price Point Shootout" or something,.

  • balilu - Friday, January 13, 2006 - link

    Is the P150 available in black or any chance of being in the near future?

  • Tamale - Friday, January 13, 2006 - link

    I haven't seen any indication that antec is going to release other models of the P150.. that being said, you might want to check out their Sonata II reviewed several months back.

  • Avalon - Friday, January 13, 2006 - link

    Raidmax getting an editor's gold choice award makes me giggle inside.

  • Googer - Friday, January 13, 2006 - link

    Why does the title of the page say

    ate: January 13th, 2006
    Topic: Cases & Cooling
    Manufacturer: 3Com/U.S. Robotics
    Author: Joshua Buss

    Why is 3Com and US Robotics listed? 3COM Spun them off and they are no longer part of 3COM. Also 3COM and US Robotics do not make PC Cases and there were no other USR or 3COM Components reviewed in this article.

  • Tamale - Friday, January 13, 2006 - link

    no idea. Thanks for point it out....
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