Aspire X-QPack: A Lanparty Dream
by Joshua Buss on July 2, 2005 1:15 PM EST- Posted in
- Cases/Cooling/PSUs
Benchmarking - Thermal
To test the case's ability to keep temperatures of key components in check, we installed our standard micro ATX test bed, using the included power supply, along with an additional hard drive and a DVD burner into the top 5.25" bay.
| HTPC Micro ATX Test Bed | |
DFI K8M800 MLV |
|
Due to the nature of the small design and the triple-side-covering cover, it was both difficult and somewhat pointless to do an inch-by-inch analysis of ambient air temperatures. After leaving the system running for a while and waiting for our thermometers to settle, we did record the exhaust air at 28.3 degrees Celsius from the 120mm fan, and 33.3 degrees from the power supply exhaust. Considering the case was in a room with an ambient temperature of 23.0 degrees, these temperatures are well within acceptable limits. Keep in mind that the figure coming from the 120mm fan exhaust is the one to use when considering the ambient air temperature inside the case, as the extra heat generated by the power supply is not a factor. Here's a look at how the X-QPack did at keeping the components cool:
| Component Temperatures | |
CPU |
32 / 44 C |
GPU |
49 / 64 C |
HDD |
30 C |
Northbridge |
34 C |
Power Supply |
32 C |
All in all this is a very impressive showing given the case's size. The 120mm is most certainly the reason behind these good temperatures - one can feel it's moving an awful lot of air. But is it making a lot of noise too? Let's take a look at the case's total sound output.
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Questioner - Sunday, July 3, 2005 - link
I have this case with the MSI Radeon Xpress 200 MB with an AMD64 (Venice)3200+, 4 sticks of Geil 512MB PC3200(With Blue heatsinks)ATI 550 Pro TV Tuner card, VIA Vinyl Sound card, 2 Plextor SATA DVD/DVDRW drives, 2 Segate 120GB SATA drives,Mitsume 3.5 floppy drive with built in smart card reader,Gigabyte cpu cooler with blue led fan, blue led SATA power connectors, UV SATA drive cables,Logitech MX 1000 laser mouse, Logisys lighted blue keyboard and Sceptre 19" LCD 12ms. The question about can full sized power supplies be used is yes, only if you use Liteon or Sony optical drives because they are shorter than the other drives. This case is great it is very quiet and cool the motherboard lacks any overclocking options but I was able to push it to 2.2gHz with a software tweak and it was stable and I didn't need any other voltage tweaks to do it. If any one wants pictures of my system I would be glad to show it if I knew how to post pictures on Anandtech, plus my system is alot neater than what the Anand's reveiw looks like because I have alot less cable clutter than Anand's, plus I did a little cable modding to make it look better.at80eighty - Sunday, July 3, 2005 - link
#30 , did you even read my disclaimer?thanx for the answers though :p
bbomb - Sunday, July 3, 2005 - link
How does this case compare to an Antec Aria? Its a pity they didnt compare the two as they are very similiar looking from the outside.IPSecGuy - Sunday, July 3, 2005 - link
Great review - thanks for the in depth info.Just a couple of (hopefully) quick questions;
1 - What MicroATX mobo's would you recommend for this case? I have looked at some Intel 915 foxconn and ASUS mobo's and have also looked at some AMD 939 based MicroATX boards. AMD vs Intel aside, which would be your top pick from each camp? (btw - haven't seen one with SATA-II support, so if you are aware of one let me know)
2 - Assuming that selecting a mATX board with pci-x16 is a given, do you think the PSU included with this case would support a vid-card such as a nVidia 6800GT/Ultra or the newer 7800GTX?
Thanks for your time!
deathwalker - Sunday, July 3, 2005 - link
KristopherKubicki - Sunday, July 3, 2005 - link
Olaf van der Spek: Aren't there like four MicroBTX boards on the whole market? And aren't two of them based on 915G? I'll pass.Kristopher
Gholam - Sunday, July 3, 2005 - link
#29, did you even read the article? This is a case, not an SFF barebone system. It has nothing to do with SATA or SLI. It will accept pretty much any mATX motherboard, which DFI LanParty isn't. Abit is rumored to have a mATX SLI board in the works, but nobody has seen it yet. The PSU can be replaced, but the space is tight, and you'll have to use a short 5.25" drive to leave enough room for it, and fitting a long PSU such as Antec Phantom is out of the question.at80eighty - Sunday, July 3, 2005 - link
utter n00b questions :-1) SATA 2 supported?
2) SLI - capable?
3) Can a mobo like the DFI LanParty fit in this case?
4) Can the PSU be replaced with something like a Antec Neopower?
Appreciate any help :)
Olaf van der Spek - Sunday, July 3, 2005 - link
#25: MicroBTX?vfxraven19 - Sunday, July 3, 2005 - link
I bought this case and love it! I think this is better than the Antec Aria, but the Aria is still a nice case...