Rosewill Armor EVO Case Review: Sometimes Performance Isn't Everything

by Dustin Sklavos on January 23, 2013 12:01 AM EST

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Assembling the Rosewill Armor EVO

I'll just get it out of the way now and hopefully not have to repeat myself later: while assembly of the Armor EVO went mostly smoothly, I absolutely loathe the notched side panels. Maybe it's because they're a royal pain to replace, maybe it's because one actually drew blood when I tried to close up, I'm not sure. These aren't specific to Rosewill; other case designers like BitFenix (case designers who should know better) have employed them in recent designs as well. This is a tired, old, impractical mounting system that needs to be put out to pasture.

With that grievance out of the way, motherboard installation went mostly smoothly. You'll have to install the standoffs yourself, but that's more a convenience issue than anything seriously meaningful. Drive installation went better, actually; the drive trays that Rosewill uses in the EVO are nice and sturdy, and the mechanisms for securing the optical drive in the 5.25" bay are both easy to use and very firm. Actually, even getting the expansion card and power supply into the EVO was mostly a breeze.

Cabling was a little more fraught but not by much. I feel like the routing holes for the motherboard headers could stand to be a bit bigger, and the opening for the AUX 12V line is still getting caught on the side panel rail behind the motherboard tray, but cabling mostly went pretty easily. The fans all include both 3-pin headers and molex connectors, and the molex connectors can be daisy chained. Really the only problem child as far as the fans go is the side panel fan; NZXT includes an extension cable for this that runs back to their hub in the pricier (and more awesome) Phantom 630, but in the EVO you're on your own and there's no easy place to daisy chain it unless you run more fan cables into the inside of the case instead of keeping them behind the motherboard tray.

Gallery: Rosewill Armor EVO Assembly

If you've assembled an ATX case before, the Armor EVO isn't going to have any surprises for you apart from the struggle to close it back up without putting it on its side. Like I said before, the design of the EVO is pretty bog standard; there are no great innovations and outside of the fans and side panels no major steps backward. This is a pretty brute force design: install your system and then let six fans move a boatload of air.

In and Around the Rosewill Armor EVO Testing Methodology

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19 Comments

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max347 - Wednesday, January 23, 2013 - link
Second paragraph, second sentence, seen->see*? Reply
Communism - Wednesday, January 23, 2013 - link
Hopefully more manufacturers get the picture and release more Antec 1100 wannabees like this case is.

Then maybe we can see something handily beat it :D.

As it is, it seems that the Antec 1100 would probably beat it with 1 or 2 more fans, assuming the only fans in the tested configuration were the stock 120mm on rear and 200mm on top.

I agree with Dustin that this case would be worthwhile if they fixed the fan mounting on the top and lowered the price to match Antec's 1100.

Antec 1100 +1 to 3 fans = $100 + ~$20
Rosewill Armor Evo = $120 Reply
SunLord - Wednesday, January 23, 2013 - link
You know what I would like to see in case reviews photos of the case with different size motherboards. I don't care about them testing the case with all the different sizes but it would be nice to see what a Full ATX and an E-ATX would look like installed in the cases that support them using a MicroATX MB is nice for a constant variable in testing across all cases but gives you zero clue on how well a motherboard you would actually use in this case would fit or look Reply
Sabresiberian - Wednesday, January 23, 2013 - link
I agree here. I understand the reson to stick with one size mainboard for all testing, but I'm very skeptical of the clams of some of these case manufacturers when they say their case will hold "XL-ATX" and "E-ATX". Get one of those EVGA SR-2s and slap that baby in there, heh. Reply
Sabresiberian - Wednesday, January 23, 2013 - link
reason*; claims*. Sheesh, my error checker was way on the blink on this post. Reply
Barbarossa - Monday, January 28, 2013 - link
The SR-2 is HPTX, most cases don't claim compatibility with that.

By E-ATX most people mean a Rampage or Maximus board from Asus or similar, which isn't actually the same as the TRUE E-ATX spec.

XL-ATX is kind of a made-up spec, but it was used to define longer than standard boards (more than 8 slots). Reply
ForeverAlone - Wednesday, January 23, 2013 - link
It's nice to see that twin-120mm fans on the front are standard now. Reply
number58 - Wednesday, January 23, 2013 - link
I noticed that the numbers from the recently reviewed phantom 630 were not in the tables to compare with this case. Any particular reason? Reply
vol7ron - Wednesday, January 23, 2013 - link
Not sure this would have much of an impact on results, but do you take ambient temperature before/during (maybe even after) tests? Reply
pensive69 - Wednesday, January 23, 2013 - link
how about a marriage between a small home or dorm room fridge maker and a case maker? you'd be able to do your install INSIDE an actual fridge with insulation and temp controls provided in a system designed to work at 35 - 45 F anyway?
ambient air solutions start around 30 - 40 F higher out of the box Reply