Can you help me come to a decision please.

Right, some of you may of noticed i have posted a few threads concerning Cases and Cooling. But now i'm stuck now, i like a case so i read some reviews about it which are good reviews then i read some bad reviews which puts me off. For example the AntecP180 got the best review in CustomPC magazine for cooling, but then i read some more reviews and such comments like, "The door does not shut flush" "Grounding Cables is impossible" have put me off. Then i was insterested in the Thermaltake Armor, because i like the idea of having a case with a window, i havent read any bad reviews about this case but the more i look at pictures of it the more i dislike the looks of it.

So now i need your help, could you please suggest to me what you think is a good case, preferably one that is compatible with water cooling and supports ATX mobos. Thanks

 

If you can afford it and you like the design, then I would recommend what I'm using (Coolermaster Stacker 830).
Firstly it looks better than any other case I've seen.
Build quality is as good as anything I've ever used (top quality).
Strong, light weight (considering size).
Easy to work on, tool free fitting, removable tray.
ATX and BTX support.
Fantastic cooling properties.
Designed with water-cooling as a for-thought not after-thought.
Did I already mention the design, its a beautiful case :]

 

Thanks for reply. Yeah, there is a review of that case in CustomPC magazine, highly recommended case, does look good aswell, the cheapest i can find it for is £136.14 on ebuyer, problem is i can only go up to £100. Any more suggestions?

 

Yeah the price on Ebuyer is not including VAT either, so I know its not a cheap option by any means, but I figured that no matter how many times I changed the board etc... I would always appreciate the case.
There's always a good range of cases on overclockers, I've always tended to go for big expensive cases for good quality and loads of space.
Another coolermaster to look at maybe is the CM Stacker STC-T01
Review here:
Its a beast of a case with very good cooling by the look of things, and about £100.
http://www.systemcooling.com/cm_stacker-01.html

 

www.aria.co.uk has the WC compatible NZXT Lexa (listed as NZXT classic) for about £87. I think that's a smart case, but I'd avoid water cooling if I were you. That case has ample cooling already installed, and it's very quiet. Just get a decent cpu heatsink and you don't even need Water cooling at all.

 

The trouble is everyone sees watercooling as purely limited to CPUs.
The amount of heat generated from GPUs can be far more than CPU's.
When you add together a CPU, GPUs in SLi,the chipset and then several HDDs, and then add a high ambient room temperature on a summer day, it does pay off to have the watercooling, the raptors I use generate a lot more heat than the standard sata drives as they run a lot faster, and as for OCing the PC, you can push it a lot further with better stabilty.
Add to that the reduction in noise and you have a good reason to make the investment if you can afford the money and effort involved.

 

While Water cooling will make numerous systems run very cool, I personally don't think it's worth the risk. I've seen too many cases where one drip has caused thousands worth of damage. Just do your research and get quiet fans!

 

Yeah, i cant really afford to replace my PC is the water cooling leaks, so i think ill pass on it for now, ill get a better CPU heatsink and a chipset fan along with a fan for my GPU. Cheers for your replies guys, keep em coming if you think of anything else please.

 

since you're a UK dude, check out kustomPCs, they do a lot of specialist work for stuff, you could have your name etched onto a PC side window for example.

 

cool ill check them out

 

Well i think i have come to a decision at long last. I think im just going to get the Thermaltake Armor, i was worried about there not being anything covering the front, so the optical drives etc are on show, but all my drives are black so it shouldnt be a problem to be honest, and all the reviews i have seen on it have been good. I'm currently trying to find where i can get the alternative side window from, it has a 20CM fan in it, but i cant find it anywhere, any ideas who might have this? I need a new CPU heatsink, so any good suggestions, i have the socket lga775

 

Again, look through www.kustompcs.co.uk, plus the usual candidates ebuyer, overclockers, dabs, misco, savastore...
In general you want above 50CFM and below 25dB for heatsinks.

 

Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro CPU Cooler (Socket 775)
http://www.arctic-cooling.com/cpu2.php?idx=34&disc=
Cheap coolers but very good thermal reductions and quiet about £15
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/acatalog/copy_of_Arctic_Cooling.html

 

Does anyone know a way of converting Sone to dB? My cooler is 2.0 Sone and the Freezer series are 0.8-1.4, but I thought my cooler was quite quiet...

 

1 Sone: nearly inaudible in a computer case
2 Sones: clearly audible
3 Sones and more: disturbing

Use the following formula to convert sones to decibels:
dBA = 33.2 Log 10 (sones) + 28, Accuracy +/- 2dBA.

Also i think im going to get the Zalman Aero Flower http://www.overclockers.co.uk/acatalog/Online_Catalogue_Zalman_121.html its the first on on this page i want.

 

Cheers for that formula, that's exactly what I was looking for.
As for that heatsink, it is very good, and if you can run on the low setting (should be no problem if you use Arctic Silver V) then 18dB is piffling, I doubt you'll hear it over your hard disk!

Edit: My heatsink is apparently 2.0 Sone on high setting (which I run it at), which according to the formula is 38dB. This seems unlikely since it's significantly quieter than my old 35dB heatsink, such that it's not audible over the other fans...

 

The formula is give or take 2,3 DB, so it could actually be like 33dB

 

Nah, I'd say 30 absolute maximum, there's no audible difference between the high and low settings, and pretty much all of the fans I use are 30dBA tops.

 

hm, ok, thanks for you guys help, and sorry that formula wasnt over accurate

 

Well i'm not commenting on it from a personal point of view, but I don't quite see it.