ATM I have the Silverstone Raven RV01, and it has amazing airflow and personally I think it has the coolest exterior design ever! Though the only thing I don't like is it's a little too large. Then I saw this...The Silverstone Raven RV02! And one thing really caught my attention...are those video cards facing the front? so you will will actually be able to see the cooling unit and not the PCB side? If so, I must buy it!!! http://www.hardwarecanucks.com/news...silverstone-set-relaunch-gen-raven-case-rv02/ http://silverstone-usa.com/images/RV02/RV02_2s.jpg I took this from a review: "The hole behind the CPU socket on the motherboard tray for easy HSF installation. 2. Wire management holes are nice and big now as compared to the puny little holes on the RV01 3. The rather nifty SSD bracket. 4. A much deeper I/O port area on the top of the case which allows the usage of DVI-VGA adapter plugs and also fat DVI wires. 5. Cooling performance should be a lot better than RV01. 6. Rubber grommet mounting for the HDDs. 7. 3x speed controllers for the intake fans. 8. Easy maintenance with filters on all intake fans."
yes. those gpus are 'facing the front'. the pcb is facing the back of the case. i love the ninety degree turn. but i must say. imho. that is one strikingly hideous case. lxrysprtmscl
jesus how could you even consider one of those? if you want something striking why not go for an antec or HAF. dont buy that whatever you do
Why not, yeah it might be a little plasticy, and over price as it is after all a silverstone. But it has potential.
It looks less offensive than some cases I've seen. I'm not totally sold on having the motherboard in that orientation, but I can see the theoretical advantages. If it was a little taller, I'd probably like it more. If I could try one out before actually deciding to purchase it, I'd probably give it a shot for a couple of weeks. However, with something like that, I'm not gonna outlay the cash it would cost on an 'experiment'... If you could get thinner 180mm fans and a slim 540mm radiator, that'd be quite neat for watercooling I think. It just runs the risk of clashing with that bottom 5.25" bay.
sorry having read my OP i realise it was a little bit strong! imho that case is horribly fugly and is not a tried and tested method of cooling your system. ok so it works in theory but i think the bit-tech review of the original raven shows that theoretical performance is fairly worthless.
Imo that's a pretty nice case for putting on a desk - it's quite striking and not too tall, with an innovative cabling method that means you don't have to be squirrelling behind it all the time. It's a bit plastic, but not as bad as some cases.
The RV02 looks a lot better than the original, IMO. Not having wires poking out the back would be an advantage for me - the box is crammed in the corner under a desk, so it's the devil's own job working around the back of it without moving stuff around. All ways around they've improved the inside layout over the original Raven, too. The fact that it's £33 cheaper than the original doesn't hurt, either (£148 for the RV01 on Scan, £115 for the RV02...) Just done some measuring... it's basically the same hight at the Antec P180, about six inches deeper and the same width. I can't find the length of the XSPC RX480 (not listed in the specs anywhere I've checked) but the BIXGT 480 is 517mm... fitting a quad radiator in the bottom is very doable... you might lose the fourth fan under that 5.25" bay, though... ...ah, just checked Aquatuning UK - it's apparently 510mm for the RX480. I'm kinda tempted, I admit. I'm sure an RX480 will cope with a Core i7 overclocked and a 4870X2... well, if it doesn't I'll be wondering how air cooling copes, I'll put it that way.
