Best Case I've Ever Used

[Timman_24]

I made a hackintosh several months ago and it has been working much better than I ever expected. As a side project I hollowed out the inside of a G5 case and mounted my motherboard and such in there. I used it for a while but needed a real case when I decided to add more HDDs. The main problem with the Apple case was how loud it was. I needed a lot of fans due to the partitioning of the drive bays from the motherboard. The PSU also needed its own fan system.

I decided to look into getting a silent case. Since I am not overclocking this system nor do I have an extreme GPU in it, I thought going silent would be relatively easy.

I looked around and most silent cases seemed kind of outdated in terms of USB 3.0 support, proper cable management, and a decent aesthetic look. I own a Corsair 800D and absolutely loved the design and quality, so corsair was my first stop. They recently came out with a cost effective silent case called the 550D. Reviews were good and it offered a lot for the price (I paid 119 on amazon.) So, I purchased the 550D.

Upon receiving and inspecting the case, I was impressed by the quality for what I paid. My 800D was a $200+ case, so I wasn't expecting the same quality in this $120 silent case, but it was at the same level only smaller. As with the 800D, cable routing was a pleasure to do. The HDD mounts slid into place with no effort and have mounting slots for 2.5" drives. The door is hinged and locks into place firmly. The interior is finished as nicely as the exterior. Dual USB3.0 ports are on the front. Everything fell into place without a single hitch or hassle. All the fan slots even have magnetic filters for easy cleaning.

The only thing I noticed while putting together the case was that the front 5.25" bays will not support a fan controller with knobs and still allow the door to close, but that is a minor issue.

After I got everything put together and fired it up, I was very impressed with how quiet it is. I literally can not hear it (it is sitting right below my desk.) This is the first time that I've had a truly silent case (to my ears.) I can't even tell that it is running. I push the button and the only indication is the light turns on. Really neat, especially the first time you try it.

Overall, I highly recommend this case for you guys. Definitely look into it if you are in the market. If you are looking for a solid all-round case, then this is it. It even supports 240mm radiators. I'll post some pics if you guys are interested.

[vertices]

The 550D is great. I built my new system at my St. Augustine office with one and was very impressed. Then I just had to build a budget home server dedicated to Plex Media Server and used the same case again. Definitely a quality case, especially for the money.