Installation
So what are we going to be installing in this case? Our test system is comprised of an Intel Core i7-965 Extreme processor, Gigabyte X58A-UD5 motherboard, Sapphire Radeon HD 6850 video card, OCZ 6GB DDR3 memory, Kingwin Lazer Gold 1000W power supply, Samsung 750GB SATA hard drive and SATA Blu-ray drive.
The motherboard is the first thing we are going to install. First you need to install the standoffs. The holes are labeled so it is pretty easy to see where you need to put the standoffs. Once you have all your standoffs in just place your motherboard and secure it with screws.
Hard drive installation is very easy. Just take out one of the removable tray and put your hard drive in it by pushing the pushpins into the holes on each side of your hard drive. When you are done you can slide the drive right back into the case.
The optical drive is just as easy. First take of the drive bay bezel cover on the front of the case and then slide the drive in from the front. Line up the drive with the front of the case and then press in the button on the tool-less system and it should lock it in place. If you do not want to use the tool-less system there are holes for screws.
The power supply is easily installed in the bottom of the case. Routing the cables is pretty easy too with all of the cable management holes. I did notice that some of the grommets fell off when I was feeding cables through. This wouldn’t be such a big deal, except that the grommets are extremely hard to get back on correctly.
I was quite impressed with the tool-less system for your expansion cards. You just lift the levers up, install your video card and slide the levers back down to lock your card in place. Although these levers are made of plastic they seem quite sturdy and strong.
With everything installed you just need to connect everything and you are good to go. You can see how much room is in the case still! If we look at the backside of the case you can see how we routed many of the cables, keeping them out of the way.
Since the case does have 2 USB 3.0 ports they have normal USB connectors. This is because many motherboards do not have on-board USB 3.0 connectors so the cables have to be routed around to the back of the case. This is easily done by taking out one of the PCI slot covers and routing the cables out of the case that way.
