Case Size

[hawkeye91]

Hi guys --

The general consensus about cases seems to be go with what you like in terms of looks, "bling," etc but be wary of power supply. Good enough. That said, is there any significant advantage to going with a full tower atx case verus a mid-tower? I'm thinking it's mostly an issue of cooling and space for components, right? (Not suggesting that mid-towers don't cool adequately though).

I'm looking to build a machine geared prmiarily towards gaming and my preference would be mid-tower for looks, space and cost. Cost-wise, the full towers seem to be considerably more expensive and while I don't want to be cheap, I don't want to be wasteful either. Bottom line...I'll go big if I need to but I'd rather not.

Thoughts?

Thanks!

[Alaron]

Nothing wrong with a mid tower. There are plenty of cases that don't conform exactly to the "Full Tower" or "Mid-Tower" sizes. Real full towers are massive, and not at all necessary for most people. And some Mid towers are smaller then others. I would look at something that is technically a mid tower, but still has plenty of room inside.

Here are a couple examples. Both are "Mid-Towers" but is clearly larger the other.

Smaller Mid Tower: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16811129148
Larger Mid Tower: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16811129158

So between the two, I'd go with the second one. But you can choose any brand you like.

[newbuilder14]

Your right, people choose full tower cases for space and cooling, but you can get great cooling with a mid tower too, with a couple of case fans.

[hawkeye91]

Alaron --

I like your second example as well and this gives me a good idea of what to look for in general.

newbuilder --

I liked your thread on popular gaming cases and that got me to thinking about this some more. I just realized today that the case I was originally looking at is a full tower and after reading your thread I definitely wanted to consider the mid-towers.

Any brands that either of you would consider poor quality that I should stay away from?

[blue60007]

Originally Posted by hawkeye91 Any brands that either of you would consider poor quality that I should stay away from?

A lot of the "blingy" cases (the ones with cheapo PSU's bundled) seem to be lower quality than others. I've never used one of these, but I've heard they sometimes are flimsy and bundle cheap (noisy) fans. Not always of course, there are exceptions.

Brands I like are Antec, Cooler master, Lian Li, and Thermaltake (to name a few good brands). Generally the more it costs the higher quality it's bound to be. A $100 case will be higher quality than a $10 case... Also, check what comes with the case. Cheapo cases either don't include fans or include cheap noisy ones. Of course, I've seen expensive cases lack fans so check what comes with the case regardless of price.

A good thing to do would be to Google reviews for the case you are looking at. Usually reviews give a run down of what's included and pro's and con's (was it quiet or noisy? sturdy or flimsy? etc).

[newbuilder14]

Hmm... well shows us some your interested in, because it really varies case by case. Usually Thermaltake, Antec, Cooler Master, etc. make good cases. Aspire is decent for gaming cases.

[hawkeye91]

Wow! There's a lot to choose from out there! While I'm going through the 600+ mid-towers on newegg here are two that I found quickly that are pretty sharp...

I've heard good things about Silverstone as well. The SST-J50B looks like a good deal. It's a bit more expensive than some of the other mid-towers, but it's 150 bucks cheaper than the full tower I was looking at originally!

The THermaltake Tsunami

Not sure how I feel about the front door though...will have to give that some thought.

[Cricket]

Originally Posted by Alaron Nothing wrong with a mid tower. There are plenty of cases that don't conform exactly to the "Full Tower" or "Mid-Tower" sizes. Real full towers are massive, and not at all necessary for most people. And some Mid towers are smaller then others. I would look at something that is technically a mid tower, but still has plenty of room inside. Here are a couple examples. Both are "Mid-Towers" but is clearly larger the other. Smaller Mid Tower: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16811129148 Larger Mid Tower: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16811129158 So between the two, I'd go with the second one. But you can choose any brand you like.

What's funny is Antec used to call the first example a mini-tower and the second example a full tower. Now they're both identified as mid-towers.

I was just at the Antec web site and they list a 16.75" high case (Sonata II) as a mid-tower and a 17.5" high case (Solo) as a mini-tower...go figure.

I consider cases that stand between 15 to 17 inches to be mid-towers and cases that stand 22 to 26 inches as full-towers. Cases that stand 18 to 21 inches I consider them to be workstation or server class cases.

You really don't need a full-tower case...most mid-tower cases provide more than adequate cooling and more than enough space for your drives

Cricket.