Kingwin KT-436-WM Case: The Mod Dream

Conclusion

There was a lot of say about the Kingwin 436-WM case.  The cooling performance was definitely better than expected for 4 no-name fans.  The fifth LED fan did not seem to contribute much to the exhaust of the unit, but may have contributed to circulation inside the case. Even with a mess of untied wires we were able to get plenty of airflow through the case and not have to sacrifice performance for noise.

The market that the Kingwin 436-WM shoots for are users who want a Lian Li case but can not justify spending the additional 50–60 USD for it.  As we mentioned earlier, the Kingwin 436 is remarkably similar to the Lian Li 60xx series cases but retails between 150-180USD.  Modified Lian Li’s sell for over 220USD.  Kingwin did a good job of combining elements of already proven designs and incorporating them into their new case. 

We mentioned earlier that certain case manufacturers often rely on other companies to fabricate their products.  For example, the Antec/Cheiftec/Directron/ThermalTake/Alienware design all look familiar because they all use Chenming as their manufacturer. Apparently, the stakes in the aftermarket PC case industry have become fairly cutthroat.

Update 2002/11/12: Special Thanks to those of you who emailed us! Although Lian Li has still not responded to our inquiries, we just received an email from Kingwin claiming they are the exclusive manufacturer of their design.

Overall, we rate this case a good buy for anyone in the modification market.  We know this is a very limited audience, and certainly don’t expect to see any of these cases in your company’s server room anytime soon.  However, for the enthusiast, the 436-WM provides solid cooling to back up its good looks.  This case certainly isn’t for everyone, but it proves itself worthy of all the hype it has been creating.

A special thanks goes out to Case-Mod.com for providing us with a review sample of the KT-436-WM.