Antec P150

[egale]

:frown:I got mine yesterday. Put everything together, fire it up, the fans spin and nothing else. Take everything apart put back only the minimum ..... same thing! Finally pull out the power supply and put in the power supply from the Sonata II. Fire it up, perfect!!!

Mine has the dreaded DOA powersupply as well. Emailed newegg but don't expect to hear from them till Monday. I wonder if they will take back only the power supply or if I should invest in something better. I am not taking everything apart to send back the entire case (which is very nice by the way).

 

[RalfHutter]

Originally posted by: egale
Mine has the dreaded DOA powersupply as well.

What mobo are you using in it?

 

[eastvillager]

Hopefully they start selling it without the powersupply. They've got a long way to go before I'll use one of their powersupplies again, although I really like the p-series of cases.

 

[egale]

It is an Asus P5LD2 Deluxe

 

[StarTech]

I think this case has a serious problem with noise when you up the speed of the 120mm rear fan to high. As you know this fan comes with a three position mini switch. If you set it to HI, and close the side panel, it does this relatively low frequency wind tunel noise. I can think of two reasone for the noise level:

1. The rear fan is mounted directly to the metal chasis, with no dumpening.

2. The intake holes in the front bezel are too restrictive for this air flow and the air pasage makes a noise that gets amplified in the case (some resonance?)

I tend to believe that while there is no doubt that #1 adds to the dB level, I think #2 is the cause of the problem.

I have sent a note to Antec reporting the problem.

 

[Tiamat]

I finally set up the case. It is definately not without flaws:

1. Paint chips very easily.
2. Not all exterior edges are bent inwards
3. Installation of PCI/AGP cards is not so nice. I had to bend the tip of the metal slot covers in order for the card to install straight

4. The stealth bays are NOT compatible with Pioneer A08XL DVD burner. The Pioneer DVD burner's tray door is too big to fit through the Stealth bay door. This is a massive bummer here as I cant even make the Pioneer flush with the front bezel due to the restrictive drive sleds.


The Good:
1. PSU is decently quiet
2. case looks very pretty

What I have done:
1. 2x Nexus 92mm fans in front. They are way too noisy so I have to invest in some fanmates.

2. All fans installed with EAR Isolators

3. Spent 4 hrs neatly arranging the cables and figuring out that I needed to bend the PCI card's metal slot covers.


Was it worth $145?

I would say maybe. The PSU warrants a chunk of that amount - and I was going to get the PSU anyways. The quality is a letdown. It is better than the Super lanboy, but fails to even approach the quality of my Lian Li PC61.

Did I expect better? - YES. Do I regret purchasing the case? No.


Edit:

Called customer support. They were completely unhelpful, unknowledgeable, and unengaged. They don't seem to care about customer problems with their products. I got the brush off and the person sounded less intelligent than the typical bestbuy employee. Sheesh, what is this world coming to?

Edit 2:

Customer support called me in response to an email concerning the problems listed above. These folks were much more informative, knowledgeable, and friendly than the previous phone conversation. These guys were willing to listen to comments, and took notes on what I felt would make the case better - ie shipping 4 EAR fan isolators for the rear fan just like they did with the superlanboy.

 

[Vidmar]

:|
FYI: I and others that have purchased an Antec P150 which includes the NeoHE 430 are running into severe problems with this power supply and some ASUS motherboards. The machine will boot but then shutdown after 5-10 secs due to power issues.

DO NOT purchase this power supply or an Antec P150 if you are using an ASUS A8N-SLI Premium motherboard.

I ended up buying an Antec TruePower 2.0 430W power supply for my A8N-SLI Premium which works just fine.

Look at NewEgg for examples of others who have had problems:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16811129166

 

[StarTech]

Originally posted by: Vidmar
:|
FYI: I and others that have purchased an Antec P150 which includes the NeoHE 430 are running into severe problems with this power supply and some ASUS motherboards. The machine will boot but then shutdown after 5-10 secs due to power issues.

DO NOT purchase this power supply or an Antec P150 if you are using an ASUS A8N-SLI Premium motherboard.

I ended up buying an Antec TruePower 2.0 430W power supply for my A8N-SLI Premium which works just fine.

Look at NewEgg for examples of others who have had problems:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16811129166

Yes, I had a problem when I added had drive number 5. That makes it six drives including a CDROM. IC7-G. The system would not boot giving a CPU error. I went into the helth section of the bios and the CPU voltage was too low. I increased the setting one notch and it booted. It has a problem... The PS should be sized to support a fully configured box, with could be 2 or 3 drives more. But obviously the PS provided does not perform adequatedly.

 

[0roo0roo]

interesting. the suspension system would be great in a sonata or p180. but i don't like not having a door. and rather have 120mm instead of 92's in the front

 

[AntecCSR]

So here's the new final answer. It took Asus awhile to get back to us about the changes they've made and what they could think of to help with the last remaining stability issues.

We would have been much happier if Asus had seen fit to make sure all their techs in their various locations knew about this completely to better help our mutual customers. As it stands it looks like in most cases a BIOS rev will solve the issue for many people, replacing the NeoHE is the final step.

Testing with Asus shows this:
Older Asus BIOS + original Neo HE, 80% had a compatibility problem
New Asus BIOS + original Neo HE, 20% had a compatibility problem
New Asus BIOS + updated Neo HE = no compatibility problem.
Any Neo HE + other premium brand boards = no problem.

For anyone who still has Neo HE + Asus A8n-SLI motherboard issues, please contact Antec at 1-800-222-6832 and ask for a replacement unit that has the Asus fix implemented. We'll set you up to get a replacement power supply that along with Asus's latest BIOS (1009 very important!) should fix the problem.

We've had no reports from other motherboard manufacturers like Abit, MSI, Gigabyte etc.

We're a little curious as why folks use the 430 with an SLI board (ie the P150) unless they're planning on adding the 2nd card later.

 

[Vidmar]

Originally posted by: AntecCSRWe're a little curious as why folks use the 430 with an SLI board (ie the P150) unless they're planning on adding the 2nd card later.

AntecCSR, thanks for the info and help in this matter.

As to an answer to your question, I've built one of these "bad" systems (ASUS A8N and P150) for a friend who wanted a very fast CPU and disk subsystem, but cared almost nothing about video*. BUT it had to also be very quiet. Spending $40 more on a MB that had no NF4 chipset fan was a no-brainer in this case. Believe me my DFI Ultra-D convinced him of that.

Thus the P150 was an excellent match for this project. Its too bad things didn't work out though. I ended up having to buy an Antec 430 Truepower 2.0, since I could not get his 1.02 A8N and the NeoHE to work together even with the latest Asus bios.

BTW, I just ran across this thread yesterday after spending 4 days talking to Antec support about this problem, and they never even whispered a word about this being a known issue.

What recourse do I have at this point?
Thanks

*He will be using the system as a development platform running the latest Mandrake.

 

[johnnqq]

ok so how do we tell the difference from the old neoHE's and the new ones? if i'm going to order one, should i order the case first and then swap out the power supply for the new one if i need to?

 

[DVDdude]

AntecCSR, how about an ALL BLACK version of the P150 case?

 

[PING]

How about just a P150 without a psu?

 

[Tweakin]

Originally posted by: Tiamat
http://www.techonweb.com/products/productdetail.aspx?id=C32481

It is available for 128$ before shipping.

Out of stock also...

 

[jewps]

I got one of these cases with an Asus A8N32-SLI, even with the latest beta bios, 805, the system refuses to post properly with the PSU from the P150.

Luckily for me, my work deals with PC Hardware so I have access to many motherboards, cpu, and PSUs. I can confirm this problem exists with not only SLI boards it seems like. Just the other day we had a P150 with an A8N-E.

AntecRep, do you guys cross-ship? We solved the A8N-E problem by swapping it out with a FSP PSU so we have quite a few Antec HE PSUs collecting dust.

Other than the PSU problem, the case is great. There are problems with my setup, I don't blame it on Antec because this case simply wasn't designed for this use (please correct me if I'm wrong on thie Antec). I currently have a 7800GTX, 4 Raptors, Floppy, and DVD Writer in it, this thing gets hot. The 7800GTX touches one of the Raptor connectors so be careful in what you stuff in this thing.

Oh one thing I thought I'd note here is that if you plan on using a different PSU like an Enermax, the PSU has to be installed upside down from the norm. In other words the Enermax's exhaust fan over the CPU is actually facing the top of the case, not the CPU. I'm currently using a Enermax 370W to power this system, until I figure out what I'm going to do with this stupid HE PSU. [Edit: This is incorrect, I did not see the other sets of holes for regular PSUs.

Also, it looks like the next shipment for these things will be next week, or the first week of December.

 

[Howard]

Never before has plain functionality looked so beautiful to mine eyes. :Q

 

[Tiamat]

Originally posted by: Tweakin

Originally posted by: Tiamat
http://www.techonweb.com/products/productdetail.aspx?id=C32481

It is available for 128$ before shipping.

Out of stock also...

Well when you wait 2 weeks thats a good chance

 

[Tiamat]

Originally posted by: 0roo0roo
interesting. the suspension system would be great in a sonata or p180. but i don't like not having a door. and rather have 120mm instead of 92's in the front

Actually Dual 92mm is more airflow for less noise at any circumstance than a single 120mm when using quiet fans. (2x Nexus 92mm @ 5V is quieter and more airflow than 1x Yateloon 120mm D12SL @ 5V)

 

[Missing Ghost]

I really don't like that case.
hdd suspension reduces hdd rpms, and the hdds are not grounded correctly.
The insulation on the doors will increase the temps.
White is ugly.

 

[mountcarlmore]

this case reminds me of an ipod slightly from the front.

 

[Tiamat]

Originally posted by: Missing Ghost
I really don't like that case.
hdd suspension reduces hdd rpms, and the hdds are not grounded correctly.
The insulation on the doors will increase the temps.
White is ugly.

Temps are actually either the same or lower than a normal aluminum case with much less noise to boot. I have never heard of a case were a harddrive failed due to improper grounding.

 

[johnnqq]

is version 2.2 the "revised" psu taht doesn't have problems with the a8n sli (or a8n-e)?

 

[Howard]

Originally posted by: Missing Ghost
I really don't like that case.
hdd suspension reduces hdd rpms, and the hdds are not grounded correctly.
The insulation on the doors will increase the temps.

The hard drive gets ground from the 4-pin connector. If you were really anal about it, you could tape a wire onto it that was wrapped around a part of the chassis.

About the RPMs... WTF?

I would say that conduction from the inside to the outside through the panels is negligible, unless somebody can post temps with and without insulation.

 

[Tiamat]

Originally posted by: Howard

Originally posted by: Missing Ghost
I really don't like that case.
hdd suspension reduces hdd rpms, and the hdds are not grounded correctly.
The insulation on the doors will increase the temps.

The hard drive gets ground from the 4-pin connector. If you were really anal about it, you could tape a wire onto it that was wrapped around a part of the chassis.

About the RPMs... WTF?

I would say that conduction from the inside to the outside through the panels is negligible, unless somebody can post temps with and without insulation.

What happens is that in the case, Forced Convection is the ruling party - ie fans. Thus, insulation has no effect on the cooling of harddrives. The openness of the suspension actually improves it. The only temps I can post is before, with my superlanboy and 120mm front fan, my raptor was hot to the touch. Now, with the P150 and the 92mm fans, the harddrive is barely warm to the touch.

Both cases I suspended the drives, both cases the fans were pushing merely a whisper of air with the fans at 5V or lower, and both cases the harddrives had air moving above and below the drive.