Competition for the Antec Aria.

[Silversierra]

I may just be the last to know this, but I saw this today and was surprised. I thought the Aria was the only micro atx sff cube case. This seems better(maybe not quite as nice looking, but still nice). Windowed, 2 optical drive bays, 120mm fan, slide out mobo tray, front temp lcd, if I'm reading correctly, an ATX psu! Plus it's cheaper than an aria, about $85+shipping. You might as well toss the psu and get a good one though, aspire psus are crap. I just thought is was cool, and wanted to let others know about it. If everyone already knows about it, or it's already been posted, then sorry.
Silversierra

 

[andrewsdw]

Looks good! A lot of room for a sff

 

[Phantronius]

To bad the selection of good quality mATX boards blows.

 

[imported_Kensai]

Damn. I want one.

 

[QueBert]

damn I want one, now to find the best MATX AMD 64 board, and if this sucker will support any ATX PSU, it's just that much nicer

 

[Zepper]

Not bad looking. 1mm is kinda thin for aluminum, but with such small panels it may be OK. I still think cases like the Enermax Venus series are a better form factor.

.bh.

 

[QueBert]

I haven't seen many SFF cases that didn't come bundled with MB+CPU. Are there any others out there with 2 5.25 bays? The single 5.25 is what kept me from getting the Antec one I saw at Circuit City.

this Aspire sure looks nice on-line, but it's pretty inexpensive I wonder how it is close up.

 

[richham3]

The Egg has them in stock in 5 different colors.
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=11-144-112&depa=1
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=11-144-113&depa=1
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=11-144-111&depa=1
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=11-144-110&depa=1
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=11-144-109&depa=1

 

[Silversierra]

I don't know of any other cubes that take matx besides this and the aria. I'm sure some other types of matx cases can use two optical drives.
I wonder if the psu really is standard(i.e. replaceable). The size listed on the site isn't quite the same as my psu but close, do you think a standard psu will fit?

 

[QueBert]

Originally posted by: Silversierra
I don't know of any other cubes that take matx besides this and the aria. I'm sure some other types of matx cases can use two optical drives.
I wonder if the psu really is standard(i.e. replaceable). The size listed on the site isn't quite the same as my psu but close, do you think a standard psu will fit?

maybe, it has a 120MM fan which I haven't seen on most small cases. But the fact all the MATX MB's with PCI-E MB's I found were Intel

will wait for more AMD boards before I jump on this.

 

[filterxg]

Check out the MSI's ATI RS480 board. PCIE, and mATX.

 

[Silversierra]

Foxconn has a nforce 4 matx, it supposedly has oc options that the msi rs480 doesn't have.
http://www2.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16813186040

 

[DarkKnight]

regret getting my aria now

 

[BigLan]

It looks to me like it has a mATX PSU. Pretty nice case otherwise, the silver would make a nice htpc case (minus the LED lighting.)

 

[imported_vdorta]

Originally posted by: BigLan
It looks to me like it has a mATX PSU.

It is a non-standard ATX PSU, 116mm in depth instead of 140mm. Aspire says you may be able to install a regular ATX PSU with a short DVD (LiteOn) but it would still be cramped. This is my favorite small case by far, especially the one-windowed Chenming.

 

[Silversierra]

I think the sony 710 dvd drives are 1" shorter than normal.

 

[GnomeCop]

I may try this case out with my pentium M matx system.

 

[Zepper]

Sony~LiteOn
Toshiba~Samsung
Hitachi~LG
Ricoh~AOpen
etc.

They're all in bed together these days.

.bh.

 

[QueBert]

so about MATX PSU's, are there any worth a crap for a gaming system? I'm thinkin about getting this case but if I need a MATX PSU I know I'll be real limited in what I can pop in it

 

[Zepper]

I think the form factor of the PSU in this is called mini-ATX. There's a spec for it on formfactors.org. Another size called the PS/3 is even shorter than the miniATX, but I haven't seen a very high powered PS/3 PSU either. As others said, if you use the shorter optical drives a full ATX PSU may fit if you need... But a decent 420W PSU should be able to handle most any system - even for gaming.

.bh.

 

[QueBert]

I'd be fine with a good 350 watt PSU. But from what I've heard most M-ATX PSU's are pretty low quality if you throw a power hungry PC to them.

 

[GnomeCop]

my system with a 2ghz dothan and GF6800 ultra is running on a 350 watt vantec so i think the stock PSu will be fine in this case. However I dont know how loud it is...

 

[RobsTV]

Originally posted by: DarkKnight
regret getting my aria now

I've regretted getting mine almost from the first day, back in Sept 2004.
Was to be my personal HTPC box for Sat DVB-S and HDTV.
The Athenatech's A100BB at 1/2 the price did a much better job, and looked better too.
Aria is now simply a backup for every other week lan parties, and is maybe used 20 hours a month.
Had hoped that one of the Lan gamers would take it off my hands, but no takers.

Why I am here though is to report the Aria PS just died over the weekend.
Yep, with less than 140 hours on it, it was going along for about 7 hours straight when POP.
This in a system with nothing. All onboard video/audio/lan. No cards. 1 drive. It does not get any more basic than this setup, yet still POP.

In comparison, the other HTPC's I built and sold (around 12 units a month), using cheap Athenatech case with 200w supplies, and all slots filled, have never had a failure in 3+ years.

I have since went back to Athenatech A100BB for my personal system, but upgraded the PS to SilentX 300w so that I can feel better running the ATi 9700 Pro. It worked fine with stock 200w, but it just seemed too small.

Now I have to pay to ship PS back since you can not use any other in the case.

EDIT: The Aspire in this thread does look like a great choice for higher end system.

 

[BW86]

That looks pretty good. I might look more into it.

 

[imported_burningrave101]

Originally posted by: vdorta

Originally posted by: BigLan
It looks to me like it has a mATX PSU.

It is a non-standard ATX PSU, 116mm in depth instead of 140mm. Aspire says you may be able to install a regular ATX PSU with a short DVD (LiteOn) but it would still be cramped. This is my favorite small case by far, especially the one-windowed Chenming.

You shouldn't have any problem installing a normal size ATX PSU in it.

http://www.hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=890213&page=2&pp=20