Bigger! Better! Nicer! - ATX cases roundup test

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Introduction

Its been a year since our last big case roundup, so about time to look at what the market has to offer at the moment. Although a year is enough time for most branches of the IT industry to revolutionize, rethink and release entirely new product lines, it is different for computer case manufacturers who seem to take their time with new product releases. Having said that, 2006 still has seen the release of some very interesting new models.

PC's are becoming cheaper over time, one of the reasons for this is that computer cases are being consistently sold for lower prices. With some thorough searching its quite possible to find cases for sale for prices as low as 25 dollars and for that price you even get a power supply! Taking this at face value then you must wonder how anyone could produce a case, ship it and still make a profit for that kind of price, but experience has shown us that the overall quality of cases like this is questionable at best: steel so thin that its almost transparent, lots of sharp edges, only the most standard of build options and a power supply which wouldn't be able to cut the mustard with any decent sort of computer setup. Cases such as these are fine if your building a budget system meant for word processing or browsing your email, but things would go belly up if - and this is the case for most people who read Hardware.Info - you're continuously fiddling with your computer setup. There are several cases around which would suit most enthusiasts for prices of around $75. Hence we have taken this as our target minimum price for this test. It should be noted though that we've also included some of the more extreme cases in this roundup, the most expensive case in the test is available for prices over $300!

Little to no change

What struck us the most was the fact that there were little to no changes in the product lineups of most manufacturers since our last big case roundup last year. At the time of writing this review most of the cases we reviewed over a year ago are still up for sale and we still stand behind the cases we recommended back then. Nonetheless 2006 saw the release of numerous new cases by the various manufacturers, 23 of which we'll be reviewing here.

We noticed that the developments in the industry have been mainly cosmetic in nature: there are plenty of new designs with new face plates, colours etc. etc. but nothing truly innovative. Better yet, the cases we reviewed last year had more radical design elements than anything in our current line-up.

Though there have been little to no changes in designs, we did receive a few cases which stood out from the crowd. The A+ for example has a 25 cm fan in its side panel and then there's a Lian-Li case with insulation on all sides. Design wise we saw several manufacturers taking large steps forward. The designs for the Stacker 830, from Cooler Master, and the Zalman Fatal1ty are extreme to say the least.

On the bottom of each page you´ll find an overview of the tested cases. Click on the detail-links for the specifications and prices of the various cases.