The Best of the Best: Cases

[pdonket]

Alright, so I come here today looking for all of your help in compiling a list of different cases that top all of the rest in their respective categories. I was trying to think of all of the case types and I've come up with the list below.

Best Silent (Air Cooled)


Watercooled Friendly




The Coolermaster Stacker 830 (with bottom grating) is the best for watercooling that you can find on the retail market. With an opportunity for an internal or external radiator you have a multitude of options. Check it out for yourself.



Many cases from mountain mods are good choices for watercooling, the cube design allows for a near tidy look while still having tubing going all over the place. The triple fan front is fantastic for installation of a triple rad. This isn't for everyone because of the price and space a cube takes up, but it may be for a die-hard water cooler.

Best Air Cooled






The SwordM VD5000BNA from ThermalTake is by far the dominator in this category. Housing 5 fans this thing is literally made for air cooling. The sides have a grill type of layout to expand surface area for heat diffusion. Also the rear is not normal, it has 2 fans to expel even more air instead of having the I/O shield as a barrier.



Best Looking


Best HTPC


Best Mid-ATX case


Best Full Tower


With full towers, I acknowledge that people have different taste, some liking a more simplistic refined style, some enjoying a futuristic twist, and some going with a show it all style where you enjoy people noticing the light glaring from your rig. I've pulled a different full tower for each of these categories.

The full tower that is for the refined type is the TJ10, allowing a large amount of upgrades to be done while still allowing room to spare.

Source: 3DGameMan


In the still partially refined, but futuristic category we have the Cooler Master Cosmos. This case although still not blazingly "out there" still makes itself seen, and has some interesting design features that many cases do not.




The blaring lights and windows come in at stop 3, the ThermalTake Armor w/ 25cm side fan. This case, while offering high end cooling also allows you to have the gamer looks of a system, the perfect case for someone who wants their system to be NOTICED.




As we can see, this thing also has the ability to hold large amounts of hard drives and CD/DVD burners (blu-ray if you choose)


Best OEM Case




The Blackbird 002 is a revolutionary computing concept, the idea of a foot on the bottom to provide extra surface area on the outside of the case is something no one else came up with. Unlike all of the other OEM computer cases, this one did something original rather than add some flashy lights and call it pretty. Case closed.


Best Upgrade-Ability of the case


The winner here is the LL343B, in my opinion and others holding a large amount of customize-ability.




A company worth noting is Mountain Mods which make custom cube cases that will suit any user's demands quite surely.



Best Discount Case




The Ultra Aluminus is a fantastic discount case allowing you to have a bunch of room without the $150 cost. It certainly isn't as amazing as some of the expensive cases otherwise mentioned here, but for those of you looking for a full tower while trying to squeeze into a smaller budget, this may be a good fit for you.

Qualifications for best Upgradeability *#of HD's--- vid card clearance-- removable inner racks---5.25 openings---fan openings---Built in water cooling---water cooling friendly---internal space---external connectability*

If anybody has other categories please post them

The overall idea I had was that in general, cases don't evolve as rapidly as other components so if this thread were to be stickied it would still hold water (and I would regularly update it) in the future. So if you all post about it in here I'll start adding images and putting categories together maybe even a 1st 2nd and 3rd for each category.

[RockSteady]

Coolermaster Cosmos -Silent-Full Tower-Best Looking
Silverstone SG03-Best mATX/uATX-Best Looking
How about a Functional Catagory of some sort. You know the cases that have the most upgradable capability like built in water cooling or most hard drive trays ot some such?

[pdonket]

Originally Posted by RockSteady

Coolermaster Cosmos -Silent-Full Tower-Best Looking
Silverstone SG03-Best mATX/uATX-Best Looking
How about a Functional Catagory of some sort. You know the cases that have the most upgradable capability like built in water cooling or most hard drive trays ot some such?

Cases taken into consideration will look at them shortly, also I like the functional idea a lot since some people needs tons of HDs or something or other that is high case capacity requiring

[RockSteady]

Originally Posted by pdonket

Cases taken into consideration will look at them shortly, also I like the functional idea a lot since some people needs tons of HDs or something or other that is high case capacity requiring

Yeah but if you break it out into individual functions that would be alot of categories so we'd need to define the functional category as a whole...

[pdonket]

Originally Posted by RockSteady

Yeah but if you break it out into individual functions that would be alot of categories so we'd need to define the functional category as a whole...

alright I can do that too, what are your ideas for all the different categories?

#of HD's
vid card clearance?
removable inner racks
5.25 openings
fan openings

feel free to add/remove from there accordingly

[RockSteady]

Originally Posted by pdonket

alright I can do that too, what are your ideas for all the different categories?

#of HD's
vid card clearance?
removable inner racks
5.25 openings
fan openings
Built in water cooling
water cooling friendly
internal space
external connectability
anything else?


feel free to add/remove from there accordingly

Added inside the quote. Not categories but features that should be reviewed for most functional case

[Alcyone]

Silverstone TJ10 - Best full tower

What can I say, I like my case.

[pdonket]

I dunno, I feel like the cosmos may be a better full tower than the TJ10, at least in terms of style. The TJ10 looks a little boxy to me

[Alcyone]

It's classy instead of busy. I prefer simple designs.

[shazza]

For high end cases, I gotta go with Mountain Mods ... especially now with the modular configurations. Great cases for water cooling.

For the mega Hard Drive user, the Lian Li 343B is also a good choice, although hard to come by in the states.

Other good cases for Water Cooling ... Silverstone TJ07, Lian Li V2000.

I also like the Lian Li PC-A70 or A71 for a full tower.

Cosmos looks good too.

Can't decide which case I'm going with next...

[RockSteady]

Mountain Mods looks good but it will build whatever you want so then it becomes a case of mass produced or per order produced...

Lian Li 343B is beautiful. Big and spacious...

Silverstone TJ07 that's a nice case aswell kind of a larger TJ10 Same with the PC-A70 or 71.

[pdonket]

Seems Lian Li has taken almost all of your hearts

I've looked at the Lian Li 343B and it's definitely a customizable beast, I give it the customize-ability award for now, there's just so much that can be changed that will suit the user.

For full tower, I'm going to put up both the Cosmos and the TJ10 for now, Cosmos being for the user that is looking for more of a busy design, TJ10 for someone looking for refined. Do remember that I'll be updating these as people change opinion and I look at all of the cases. I'm also considering putting the TT Armor window edition being that if someone is looking for a window, they won't want the TJ10 or Cosmos.

Keep the ideas coming everybody, enjoying checking out all the new cases in prospect of my upcoming build and also in the interest of the passers-by

[shazza]

The Lian Li 343B is a good case, but Mountain Mods wins hands down for customizing...

[pdonket]

Originally Posted by shazza

The Lian Li 343B is a good case, but Mountain Mods wins hands down for customizing...

I'll throw them in as well, although buying a stock case is where I was initially targeting this to rather than companies that will build a case that you personally like, but no harm in including a link to them!

[shazza]

Well, actually, Mountain Mods offers a number of stock cases. You just have additional options to mix and match panels or buy custom features ... but the stock cases are most likely their main sellers.