Do you remember this case?

[chrisjames61]

I think the point of newer cases is that it's a lot more of just a frame and little to no structural support outside the fram. For example on Fractal one of the strongest built enthusiast cases the whole center area at the top are plastic plates to hide sound deadening material, where these old Antec's/Chieftec's the top was like 6mm thick steel riveted to the frame. The doors on these cases where nearly as heavy as most cases empty are today.

I agree with you. I don't think it is practical to make the huge, heavy, mostly higher grade metal cases anymore. Too expensive to both manufacture and ship. Cases today are becoming like everything else. Throw away's made in China. Looks good at a distance but under close inspection not very well made.

 

[mindless1]

^ Disagree. It's senseless to make tinfoil throwaway cases when the same case can last decades... until Intel tries to change the *TX standard again. Why do people think they need a new case? Mine isn't a fashion statement to me, gets put beside or under a desk where I don't see it until the periodic filter panel cleaning or an upgrade.

The old Antecs/Chieftecs were only 1mm steel which was about right, or before that era, some server grade cases were 1.2mm sheeting.

They were not too expensive to manufacturer or ship. There is minimal difference in production of say a 0.6mm sheeting case and 1.0mm, the dimensions are the same and going to dictate more (if any) shipping cost difference because the weight difference with all else equal is only about 6 lbs, and mild steel is about $0.40/lb so that's only $2.40 material cost difference, and really less when you consider that using the thicker sheeting means you need less folds, less machinery to make a case than if it used thinner sheeting.

Only excuse I can see for a thin flimsy case is if you're hauling it to lan parties, and yet then it might be prudent to have one all that much more sturdy.

 

[mindless1]

I too have one of those Chen Mings, silver color and aluminum. I used silver vinyl dye to get floppy and optical drive bezels to pretty closely match it.

The only reason I don't have a current build in it is that it has 80mm fan mounts and I didn't have the heart to cut it up to use 120mm fans.

Come to think of it, years ago Tiger Direct had a clearance sale on the windowed side panels so I have a replacement side panel I got dirt cheap, might just put a 120mm or larger fan hole in that, though I could care less about it having a side panel window. My original did only because that one was deeply discounted at the time, got it for something like $30 delivered which wasn't bad at all for aluminum.

Another oldie but goodie that I do still use is an Enlight 7237. I had three of those, got rid of two that had the awkward whole-top-shell that came off and kept the one with normal side panels. Put an addt'l HDD rack in it and it's now a fileserver.

 

[Ranulf]

Why do people think they need a new case?

Airflow. Cases with better design for water cooling or HD placement/number etc. etc.. I liked my LianLi cases from 15 years ago but they really couldn't handle the heat past 2006 era chips. And those were cases with twin 80mm fan speed control intakes, top and rear exhaust. Even a cheapo rosewill that cost less than half what the lian li did with one 120mm fan with a decent mesh intake was superior.

 

[mindless1]

^ If you don't have a tinfoil case that's barely more than a frame, you can add fans anywhere you want by merely cutting the holes, or expanding the existing ones for larger fans. Cases with thicker sheeting don't need all the ridges and grooves to try to stiffen them up so you have a lot of flat panel surfaces to work with.

Granted some of the old Lian Li cases had funky designs that threw a curve in that plan, but I've even picked up dirt cheap and free leftover Compaq/HP/Gateway etc cases from a friend at a computer shop and they did fine once a 120mm fan was added.

Newer cases, meh I have no desire to use them. Excessive # of fan mounts and perforations everywhere so you either have louder front fans to positively pressurize the case to pull all intake air through a front filter, or you'll be plugging up holes/slits/gaps everywhere to keep dust from getting in. Only real catch is that I find myself swapping in USB3 ports where the USB1 or USB2 were, or using a bay to provide those, except for my primary use system were I run a hub off a rear USB3 port.

 

[WilliamM2]

Airflow. Cases with better design for water cooling or HD placement/number etc. etc.. I liked my LianLi cases from 15 years ago but they really couldn't handle the heat past 2006 era chips. And those were cases with twin 80mm fan speed control intakes, top and rear exhaust. Even a cheapo rosewill that cost less than half what the lian li did with one 120mm fan with a decent mesh intake was superior.

Really? Chips have continually dropped in power and heat output since 2006. My Skylake 6600K runs cooler than any chip before it in my SX840. Only 2 low speed silent 80mm fans for exhaust, that's it. And yes it's overclocked to 4.5Ghz.

Even at 24 cfm, those fans are changing the air inside the case several times per minute.

 

[Ranulf]

Really, especially if you want to lower noise. Think about video card size and heat output as well. One of these days I'll get around to swapping in some fractal or arctic cooling 80mm I have to see if that improves things. The airflow is better in the antec/chieftec design, namely the front intake being stacked vertical instead of horizontal at the bottom of the case. Along with the 3.5 drives being above the fans in some setups (take out the hdd cage), so the hdd don't get active cooling and all that fresh air goes to the video card and cpu.

 

[nitromullet]

I had a gray Antec branded one of these and a blue and red Chieftech version, and while I have fond nostalgic memories of these cases I cannot imagine buying one for $80+ in 2018.

Corsair forever raised the bar for cases with the 800D, and subsequent cases have only refined the formula. For just one example, look at the the Phanteks Enthoo Pro. $89 gets you way more features than anything the Dragon could offer....

140mm fan support vs. 80mm on the Dragon
3x 120/140mm radiator support
fan filters
cable grommets
cable management behind the motherboard
pwm fan hub
psu shroud

Progress has been incremental so perhaps we don't really notice how far we've come, but modern cases offer a lot more amenities than cases from the past. I'm all for nostalgia, but the Dragon is not up to par with a modern case.

 

[Mnpctech]

CHEIFTEC was the OEM manufacturer of this case and re-branded it for all of the other companies with option for different bezels, including Alienware

I was pleased to see they're making a new case, the scorpion, but only avail in EU, http://www.chieftec.eu/de/

 

[Topweasel]

CHEIFTEC was the OEM manufacturer of this case and re-branded it for all of the other companies with option for different bezels, including Alienware

I was pleased to see they're making a new case, the scorpion, but only avail in EU, http://www.chieftec.eu/de/

Not quite.. A little more research. Apparently Chenming is the actual manufacturer of the case. Probably the actual builder of Antec's cases back in the day, so they were the OEM supplier. Doesn't tell us who is actually responsible for the design (because Antec, Corsair, and most other american computer brands don't actually manufacturer anything). But either there deal was not exclusive or was them ordering a Chenming design for their brand.

 

[Ranulf]

CHEIFTEC was the OEM manufacturer of this case and re-branded it for all of the other companies with option for different bezels, including Alienware

I was pleased to see they're making a new case, the scorpion, but only avail in EU, http://www.chieftec.eu/de/

From their EU site they have that x-pack cube case, which Apevia sells here in US. So maybe they'll bring it over?

 

[dave_the_nerd]

Really? Chips have continually dropped in power and heat output since 2006. My Skylake 6600K runs cooler than any chip before it in my SX840. Only 2 low speed silent 80mm fans for exhaust, that's it. And yes it's overclocked to 4.5Ghz.

Not really. They've stayed about the same at the very high end. (i.e., Pentium D 960 had a 130w TDP. An i9-7900X is 140w.)

A 6600K (91w TDP) is comparable to a midrange chip like the Pentium D 820 (95w). And CPU temperature limits are higher now than they used to be.

Modern chips run cooler because they underclock themselves when they're not being used (which is most of the time) unlike the old chips, that ran full-tilt basically all the time. But a 2006 era system designed to keep itself cool at full load would handle a modern CPU just fine.

GPUs are another story, though. A top-of-the-line 7900 GTX used <100w. That's be low-powered today.

But anyway; I don't think it's so much that the old cases can't keep up, as much as our standards have risen. When you've experienced "cool and quiet" with quad-120mm fans and a well-vented case, the old narrow ATX towers with one or two fans are just... gross. Not to mention the absolutely gigantic tower-style HSFs we put on things these days. (vs. the old solution, which was a little aluminum cooler with some obscene fan on it.) Thermodynamics hasn't changed - we're just spoiled.

 

[Ranulf]

Remember when this used to be a "big" cpu cooler?

http://www.overclockersclub.com/reviews/thermaltakevolcano7/

 

[B-Riz]

Chieftec still has similar cases to the old Dragon.

http://www.chieftec.com/CX01.html

Not sure where to get it though.

 

[enigmaticdill]

Used to have a case like the green one in OP's post,

Black Ultra Aluminus loved that case.