Rosewill Line-M Case Review: Wherefore Art Thou Micro-ATX?
by Dustin Sklavos on February 26, 2013 12:01 AM EST- Posted in
- Cases/Cooling/PSUs
- MicroATX
- Rosewill
Conclusion: The Line-M Almost Hits Its Mark
My instincts when I saw the Line-M hiding in Rosewill's suite during CES 2013 turned out to be pretty much on the money. Rosewill has produced a budget case that is exceedingly effective at cooling hardware, producing competitive if not superior thermal performance even with some heady overclocking going on under the hood. This is by no means a perfect enclosure, but it's definitely a strong one and worthy of your attention.
Part of the reason why the Line-M is so effective is the simple and smart cooling design. The conventional ATX cooling design is honestly pretty awful, and even most case designers will agree. Bottom-front intake to top-rear exhaust is inefficient design, and you really do need to create a pretty strong updraft to get the air to move the way it needs to. Silverstone advertises natural convection as being one of the reasons why its rotated motherboard cases are as effective as they are, but it barely comes into play; the reason those cases are so good at cooling hardware is because there's nothing between the intakes and the hardware. Air just moves in a straight shot through the tower cooler and blower and out of the top of the case. Rosewill's Line-M doesn't have to rely on convection either; cool air comes in through the front and has almost a straight shot through the coolers.
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Where I think Rosewill starts to miss the mark is that the Line-M is too conservative in some ways. Silverstone's excellent Temjin TJ08-E featured a vent in the top of the case and allowed you to flip the power supply so that you didn't run the risk of pushing hot air through the PSU's components. I would've liked to have seen better cable management features in the Line-M as well, although that would undoubtedly add to the size of the case. I'm also perplexed by the use of an LED fan in the front. It sticks out like a sore thumb when the rest of the case is really quite staid.
Finally, while I don't think $55 is too much to ask for the Line-M, I do think it's not as competitive as it ought to be. I'd like to see this about ten dollars cheaper to be honest, and hopefully NewEgg's regular sales will drive it down to the price range it probably needs to be in. For the price, the Line-M is within range of Antec's more ostentatious but also more flexible GX700, though Antec's case is also much larger. Performance is comparable between the two, though, and the GX700 can do its job more quietly than the Line-M can.
When all is said and done, though, I do think the Line-M is a very strong choice for a budget build. For bottom-line enthusiasts it offers compelling thermal performance, while for office builds it has the potential to be a basic, reliable enclosure with the minimum needed trimmings. The Line-M could stand to lose the LED illumination in the front fan and does ask for a motherboard with some kind of fan control to spin down the fans when the system is idle. Despite these qualms, though, it's a pretty solid offering at $55, and if it shows up on sale for south of $50 it's going to be tough to beat.
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Sweepster - Tuesday, February 26, 2013 - link
Furthermore, two seconds of research will bring you this:The 'wherefore' here means why rather than where. What Juliet is asking, in allusion to the feud between her Capulet family and Romeo's Montague clan, is 'Romeo, why are you a Montague?'. Their love is impossible because of their family names and she asks him to change his allegiance, or else she will change hers.
rangerdavid - Tuesday, February 26, 2013 - link
Thanks - I was going to point this out, as an English Lit snob, but you got there first.Juliet says this to bemoan the fact that the guy she loves is Romeo, and not someone else - "Why are you Romeo (...and not some other guy down the street who's family doesn't want to kill mine)"
Not "where are you." She's not looking for him, she's complaining about falling in love with the wrong guy.
The more you know!
rRansom - Tuesday, February 26, 2013 - link
That's why I don't like Romeo and Juliet - or Shakespeare in general.sjakti - Tuesday, February 26, 2013 - link
At first I thought the author indeed meant "Wherefore", as that could make sense too if the author questioned why it was micro-ATX. I don't think that was his intention.cjs150 - Tuesday, February 26, 2013 - link
Would be a better title for this article because this is a case that time forgot. It is simply a retread of a late 1990s design.It is very cheap, it does not do a bad job in will do fine for the vast majority of people.
But if you read Anandtech you are not the vast majority of people. As far as I am concerned the best M-atx case is the Siverstone 08, sure it is a lot more expensive and not perfect (a bit more width to allow sound proofing as well as cable management would help). The silverstone is what Anandtech readers should buy (I also have a soft spot for Fractal design mni arc).
My problem fwith case design is that there has been no real innovation for years - moving PSU from top to bottom does not count. Lian Li have experimented a bit as have Silverstone but the rest keep with the same designs.
How about a design with the following features:
1. Hinges not notched panels: Dustin is right about this
2. Width so side panels have proper sound dampening but also room for cabling
3. More experimenting with PSU placement, I like the idea of 90 degrees to current method, but need to be convinced.
4. More thought about isolating PSU from case for vibration
5. Oprical drives need noise dampening and vibration isolation as well.
6. More use of grooves in back of motherboard panel to direct cabling and lots of points to attach cable ties to.
7. Fewer hard drive cages
8. Bring back the supports for the GPU
CeriseCogburn - Tuesday, February 26, 2013 - link
I find the stark contrast between the WHINING of the "luxury item" titan $999 brand spanking new awesome nVidia card, and the COMPLAINING about this mid range tiny case simply amazing.In the first case the BRATS can't comprehend nor condone the price, nor do they, any of them, save a few, in 300 comments, desire it for gaming at the price.
In this case, it's not good enough - so some will go waste $100 or more (above or beyond this one's price) on some tiny case they can "feel good about". What a waste in comparison when an extra unneeded $100 is blown away on a feel good whim ( probably more than once so $200 or more ) - then the claimed extra $200 for the $999 Titan is the biggest sin in the world...
So you get the usb extension to the front, that's a bonus, too, like the toolless drive mounting.
Another luxury item others will call low end garbage then waste away their build dollars and scream about $5 $10 or $20 $50 or $200 on some (Titan or other) vid card they can't codnone or stomach the few bucks or few hundred extra they already WASTED.
beemeup - Tuesday, February 26, 2013 - link
My favorite Micro-ATX case is the Thermaltake WingMA.What sets it apart from most other M-ATX cases is the fact that it has 3 filtered 5.25" bays,
which makes it perfect for equipping a Xigmatek 4-in-3 HDD cage. In total it can hold up to 7 3.5" HDDs making it ideal for a compact media server / storage machine.
It also has motherboard standoffs built-in so no need to fiddle around with additional spacers.
It's "just" wide enough to fit a Hyper 212+ CPU cooler in the intended vertical position with hot air blowing out the rear 120mm fan, and "just" tall enough to allow removal of the PSU without first taking out the aforementioned Hyper 212+ cooler making swapping out PSUs a much less tedious affair.
It would be perfect if it had a modular / removable HDD cage and front panel USB 3.0.
beemeup - Tuesday, February 26, 2013 - link
Correction: It can hold a total of 8x 3.5" HDDs + 4x 2.5" SSDs if you decide to equip the two front 3.5" bays with 2-in-1 2.5-to-3.5" adapters.That's 12 drives total! Very impressive for a Micro-ATX case.
lwatcdr - Tuesday, February 26, 2013 - link
I would like to see more mATX cases reviewed/ They are a good compromise between the extremely small and hard to work on iTX cases and the large in your face ATX cases.http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N8...
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N8...
I think this one would be great for a Hackintosh build
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N8...
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N8...
And this for your typical home office http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N8...
NZXT even builds a gaming mATX case but it lacks USB 3 front ports so I left it of my list.
Grok42 - Sunday, March 3, 2013 - link
I would add a few mITX cases to your list as well. There are a few mITX cases that size wise are almost mATX but can only accommodate a mITX board. They are typically when you want a small form factor that can hold a lot of storage or bigger graphics cards.The one I just bought is amazing with a few small flaws. It is 14.41" x 7.83" x 11.02" or 1243 cubic inches Vs your first mATX which is 10.35" x 8.35" x 15.47" 1337 cubic inches. Being almost mATX size means it can hold 7x 3.5" + 3x 2.5" drives Vs. the mATX's 2x 3.5" and 2x 5.25" capacity.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N8...