This originally started out as finding a nice, new case to re-home my old gaming/entertainment PC after building a new system. It turned into a more thorough rebuild than expected.. Original system: Old review of the GPUs in a similar system linky Specs: Case: Silverstone GD09 Motherboard: Asus X99-Deluxe II CPU: i7 6850K (stock settings, 3.6GHz base, 4GHz boost) CPU cooler: Thermaltake Frio Silent 12 GPU: Titan X Pascal (2016) SLI RAM: Corsair 4x4GB 3000MHz Vengeance LPX Black DDR4 (running at 2133MHz JEDEC) Boot drive: Samsung EVO 850 250GB Scratch drive: Samsung EVO 850 250GB Storage drive: 5400RPM 2.5" HDD 2TB Game drive: Samsung EVO 850 1TB (2 off, RAID 0) Optical drive: LG WH16NS40 Super Multi Blue Internal SATA 16x Blu-ray Disc Rewriter PSU: Corsair RM1000i Fans: assorted Noctua and Scythe ------------------------------------ ORIGINAL POST BELOW ------------------------------------ Thread title: Recommend me a...stylish tower ATX case Hi folks, With my new system almost finished, I want to re-house the old system to put in my study. Here are the notable requirements: Motherboard is ATX Fits two Founders Edition GTX 1080 Tis. Must fit a 5.25" DVD drive. Ideally black to match the DVD drive, but not essential if there's a big front door that hides things. Vertical tower (the GD09 isn't appropriate). Glass or window to see gubbins within. Looks good. Will be sat on an oak desk. No RGB. The main killer here is the DVD drive. Otherwise I'd go for the Fractal North. Also, while I'm at it, should I get a new PSU? System is 9 years old. Might treat it to a nice Noctua CPU cooler too. Anyway, see if you can wow me with suggestions!
This is getting bloody hard these days. Was browsing mATX cases on PC Part Picker, and 5.25" bays were few and far between - pretty much my only option was the modern version of my existing Fractal Define Mini or whatever it's called. Not ideal, I'll grant you, but have you considered a USB DVD drive? I've got one 'ere - ancient DVD writer thing, slimline laptop style, has two USB Type-A plugs on the end so it can get enough power from USB 2.0 - and it works pretty well. Yes, it's desk clutter, but you can put it away when you're not using it and it vastly increases your case options. Wouldn't choose to do it m'self, 'cos I've also got a SATA hotswap bay in mine, but it's a possibility!
I would also look to change the requirement of the DVD drive rather than completely limit your case options especially if it's the only reason not to go for a case that's basically universally well thought of (Fractal North) As Gareth said, you can get USB drives and unless you're using it all the time shouldn't be a problem looking out of place.
Mostly a matter of personal opinion but... Fractal Pop Air? It has external 5.25 bays [albeit hidden behind a panel... depends how annoying that would be]
If the window is negotiable the Fractal Pop Silent looks like a lovely chunky monolith of a computer. Next build of mine is going in the matx version. Edit: they have a windowed one! https://www.overclockers.co.uk/fractal-design-pop-silent-tempered-glass-mid-tower-case-black-ca-0aa-fd.html
What i cant speak to is how the magnetic vanity panel behaves with an optical drive, but it can, on paper, accommodate one.
Sorry not meeting your requirements. But may be consider an external DVD drive would open up your options? Buy Asus Slim External DVD Writer - Black | CD and DVD rewriters | Argos
The current version of what I have might fit the bill, Fractal Design Define 7 (or 7XL), I have an R5. https://www.fractal-design.com/products/cases/define/define-7/
Why stylish, hide unit under desk, never look at it again use a USB drive on your desk, nice and convenient. I have a fractal something XL it is lovely with a window to see all my water cooling etc under my desk, not looked at it in years, could be any old tin can box
I'm with the majority here, I'd never compromise a case choice for the sake of an optical drive - there are plenty of external DVD choices out there, some quite stylish. In looking for them I came across this Amazon listing that gave me a chortle, although contributes nothing to this thread. I particularly like how their depiction of a "poor quality" CD player uses a picture of the actual model they are trying to sell you, with with the image reversed and the colour desaturated, with an insert of the laser completely (and badly) object erased
I'll admit that it's been a few years since I fired up an optical disc and if I'm honest to myself, there is effectively a zero chance that I'll ever need it - but I paid my £30 back in 2016 and I want my money's worth! . Having said that, at some point, I do want to play some of my old skool games: Mechwarrior 3 and Freelancer have been sat in my desk drawer for a while now. That's pretty cool, good to know external optical drives have both shrunk and been made quite stylish. Last time I laid eyes on one, it was about the size of a breeze block and had an external power supply. Ahh, now these look promising, thanks chaps. Hidden panel is perfect as it will be a rare occasion that I actually want to put a disc in. Going to have to think about whether I want to have that monolith look, or better airflow (probably the former). Since I'm reassembling, I might look at: New air cooler (and using the rest of the PTM7950 I have). New PSU Replacing 2TB storage 3.5" HDD with a 2.5" SSD Installing 3.5" to 2x 2.5" SSD holder so everything fits
The mobo is from a time when NVME was a new and exciting thing. As a result, it only has one slot, which is being used for the OS drive!
Whelp, took the plunge and ordered new components: Samsung SSD 870 EVO 4 TB 2.5" drive Noctua fans Noctua fan grills (expensive = better PC perfomance, don't you know) 140mm dust filters DeepCool ASSASSIN IV VC VISION: I want this to be a "cool" looking PC, and although I'm not a fan of RGB, I think the combination of this cooler and the lighting on the GPUs and SLI bridge is going to look nice rather than gaudy. Plus, the glass side faces away from me when I'm actually using my PC. Now , the more observant among you may have noticed something missing. Can't quite put my finger on it... Oh yeah, the damn case. Turns out the Fractal Pop Silent in black with a window is wanted by every motherlover out there: Overclockers are giving the option to pre-order, but otherwise it's out of stock everywhere unless I want to pay through the nose. This your fault @Idioteque ! Never mind. I can wait in the meantime as I want to take the old PC apart and give everything a good clean. Might even take the GPUs apart and reapply the thermal pads and paste, which would be exciting as I've never taken a GPU apart before.
My apologies for selecting the perfect case for you Seems I have to do your shopping too! See below for stock: https://www.novatech.co.uk/products...-glass-black-tower-chassis/fd-c-pos1a-02.html The regular ATX one https://www.awd-it.co.uk/fractal-de...wer-tempered-glass-pc-case-fd-c-pos1x-02.html if you fancy an XL for XL reasons. Wouldn't bother unless you're planning to watercool. Good luck with the build! I look forward to seeing it all put together EDIT: That is a beautiful CPU cooler, thought I'd maybe get one for meself. Took one look at the price and decided I'll settle for no screen in my cooler, thank you very much!
Off we go! It's a little weird revisiting the internals of the old PC as it was built during what I call the "Young Pete" era, where times were cheerful and carefree, with plenty of spare time. Young Pete made some interesting decisions - some smart, some...not so smart. Before we get started taking things apart, let's do the thing that makes even hardened IT folk sweat with fear: This is where I run into the first thing that Young Pete did a dumb thing on. I found that I'd installed two sets of 16GB RAM, for a total of 32GB. And since 2016, this RAM had been operating at the default speed of 2133MHz instead of the 3000MHz it was rated to. Looking back, I remember setting the XMP profile but after a couple of system crashes, the BIOS reverted to default mode. Ah well, I'll see if I can get them to run nicely when the system is rehoused, otherwise I might treat myself to a 128GB 3200MHz set... Let's open her up: Here we go, folks. Back in 2016, this was briefly the fourth most powerful PC in the UK. Young Pete did well to fit everything in there, even if the front panel was held on by tape to allow enough room for cables. Although not bad for nine years without being opened, notice the cobwebs. And the CPU fan held on by cable ties. Oh dear, the airflow...Anyway, let's get everything out: That was surprisingly difficult and took me a couple of hours. I was disappointed to find that Young Pete hadn't installed additional fan filters, which is something that I assumed I did in all my PC builds. Given that, the dustiness is not bad at all. I wandered outside and gave it a thorough air blast. The case has been donated to a work colleague who's getting into setting up his own server, and this case is compatible with 19" frames apparently. I left the fans in for him, which include an interesting half width Scythe thing (at the top), and a couple of Gentle Typhoons, which I had wondered where I put. BEHOLD THE MANLINESS OF THIS GPU: What's better than a 1080Ti? A souped up 1080Ti with an additional GB of VRAM, that's what. To be fair, the two GPUs are okay from a dust perspective, but I'm still going to take them apart and give them a thorough dusting. I don't thing I'll bother to do anything more extreme, such as rinsing with some distilled water. Fun fact: I was digging around in the loft yesterday and found the original boxes still looking like new. To take the PC apart, I had to take the CPU cooler off early on, which revealed another Young Pete mistake: It's not...the worst thermal paste spreading I've seen, but to think of the poor CPU being like this for many years...At least I wasn't overclocking, so the thermal load was comparatively low. I did stress test it all those years ago, and temperatures were fine. Anyway, I'll be treating it to a nice pad of PTM7950 and will be overclocking it. It's an i7 6850K by the way, and it was the 9800X3D of the time back in the day. I've already put the PSU in the Fractal Pop Silent. Stay tuned for more progress next week...
For how many seconds was that true? :'D I remember being right up the leader board in one of the 3dmarks for a few hours when I got a day 0 1080! I was going to recommend the Silverstone Temjin TJ011 as it hits all your points: Here is the bit-tech review !! I mean if you are going old school, it is really stylish! It is also gigantic, completely unavailable, and a lot of aluminium! It was £500 over a decade ago. Good luck with the rebuild Pete!
