Antec Three Hundred Two: Stay Cool, Budget Enthusiasts
by Dustin Sklavos on January 24, 2012 7:00 AM EST- Posted in
- Cases/Cooling/PSUs
- Antec
- mid-tower
Testing Methodology
For testing ATX cases, we use the following standardized testbed in stock and overclocked configurations to get a feel for how well the case handles heat and noise.
| Full ATX Test Configuration | |
| CPU |
Intel Core i7-875K (95W TDP, tested at stock speed and overclocked to 3.8GHz @ 1.38V) |
| Motherboard | ASUS P7P55D-E Pro |
| Graphics Card | Zotac NVIDIA GeForce GTX 580 (244W TDP) |
| Memory | 2x2GB Crucial Ballistix Smart Tracer DDR3-1600 |
| Drives |
Kingston SSDNow V+ 100 64GB SSD Western Digital Caviar Black 1TB SATA 6Gbps Samsung 5.25" BD-ROM/DVDRW Drive |
| CPU Cooler | Zalman CNPS9900 MAX with Cooler Master ThermalFusion 400 |
| Power Supply | SilverStone Strider Gold 750W 80 Plus Gold |
A refresher on how we test:
Acoustic testing is standardized on a foot from the front of the case, using the Extech SL10 with an ambient noise floor of ~32dB. For reference, that's what my silent apartment measures with nothing running, testing acoustics in the dead of night (usually between 1am and 3am). A lot of us sit about a foot away from our computers, so this should be a fairly accurate representation of the kind of noise the case generates, and it's close enough to get noise levels that should register above ambient.
Thermal testing is run with the computer having idled at the desktop for fifteen minutes, and again with the computer running both Furmark (where applicable) and Prime95 (less one thread when a GPU is being used) for fifteen minutes. I've found that leaving one thread open in Prime95 allows the processor to heat up enough while making sure Furmark isn't CPU-limited. We're using the thermal diodes included with the hardware to keep everything standardized, and ambient testing temperature is always between 71F and 74F. Processor temperatures reported are the average of the CPU cores.
For more details on how we arrived at this testbed, you can check out our introductory passage in the review for the IN-WIN BUC.
Last but not least, we'd also like to thank the vendors who made our testbed possible:
Thank You!
We have some thanks in order before we press on:
- Thank you to Crucial for providing us with the Ballistix Smart Tracer memory we used to add memory thermals to our testing.
- Thank you to Zalman for providing us with the CNPS9900 MAX heatsink and fan unit we used.
- Thank you to Kingston for providing us with the SSDNow V+ 100 SSD.
- Thank you to CyberPower for providing us with the Western Digital Caviar Black hard drive, Intel Core i7-875K processor, ASUS P7P55D-E Pro motherboard, and Samsung BD-ROM/DVD+/-RW drive.
- And thank you to SilverStone for providing us with the power supply.
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
50 Comments
View All Comments
Eridanus - Tuesday, January 24, 2012 - link
The curves on the front edges simply don't fit the rest of the design.GuyIncognito_ - Wednesday, January 25, 2012 - link
They are hideous.Azsen - Tuesday, January 24, 2012 - link
The 2.5" slot at the bottom of the case does not work at all. I got the Antec 200 v2 recently and an Asus motherboard with SATA 6G cables that bend 90 degrees and look like this:http://techinstyle.tv/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/p...
So you can't fit your 2.5" SSD in the bottom and use the 90 degree connector because there's no room because the bottom of the case gets in the way. Then you can't just swap the connector ends around and use the straight connector on the drive because on the Asus motherboard the system panel pins (PWR, HDD, LEDs etc) get in the way so you can't use the 90 degree connector there either.
So my choices were
a) Abandon the 2.5" slot down the bottom, or
b) Buy a SATA 6G cable with two straight ends.
In the end I ended up screwing it into a 3.5" slot from one side and it's suspended there. Probably going to snap off with the weight soon so I'll be forced to shell out for the 3.5 -> 2.5" converter.
Burticus - Tuesday, January 24, 2012 - link
At first I thought this was taking the original Three Hundred and changing what I consider to be the achilles heel.... the hard drive mounts. They re-oriented them to face outwards instead of inline which is awesome. USB 3 is nice.Front these pics and the ones on Newegg, it looks like they got rid of the front 2 120mm fans and the removable filter. The front filter is still there, and they added a power supply intake filter. But they did away with the front 2 120mm fans and made them "optional". So be prepared to pick up a couple extra fans. Honestly on my original Three Hundred I replaced the 120mm fans anyway because they were a little noisy.
http://www.antec.com/Believe_it/product.php?id=NzA...
FYI this is $69 at Newegg right now, so I think we might see some sub $50 sales in the future.
bnolsen - Thursday, January 26, 2012 - link
Side mounted hard drives are vastly inferior for cooling. The brackets block half the air flow even if no hard drives are installed. Additionally it looks as if they got rid of the spacing between the drives.From the drive cooling and general airflow this case is a big thumbs down compared with the 300 which is an excellent case for small raid arrays.
zero2dash - Tuesday, January 24, 2012 - link
I'm a fan of Antec and have been for years. Loved the P182 (even though it was too big), love my 300, loved building in a 100 a few months ago for a customer.That being said - why would anyone buy this over a 300 let alone a BitFenix Outlaw for $49?
If I'm case shopping, the Outlaw is the case to buy in the sub-$100 market.
Antec seems to have become fans of redundancy. Forgetting about the Outlaw for a minute - the 100 has a good feature set and a decent price point; the 300, slightly better in both regards. Is Antec's new objective to over-saturate the computer case market with Antec enclosures that are $10-$20 different in price than all their other enclosures, with a minor upgrade here or there? Has Antec really done anything sub-$100 other than take the same case frame, churn out a modified outside, and sell re-hash after re-hash?
I guess in Antec's world, there is no BitFenix Outlaw (or any other lower end, cheap, high feature-set case....Nzxt Gamma also comes to mind). I guess in their minds, Antec only competes with Antec.
JarredWalton - Tuesday, January 24, 2012 - link
I'm pretty sure the Three Hundred will be discontinued now and Antec will only make the Three Hundred Two going forward.bnolsen - Thursday, January 26, 2012 - link
i bought all my antec 300's for $49. I haven't seen this case before, the door is bad, blocking proper air intake. It seems microcenter carries these, i'll probably go take a look since the 302 looks to be a major downgrade.rodrigu3 - Tuesday, January 24, 2012 - link
Buying this case was cheaper than it would have been for me to replace my 6 case fans that have started to die after many years. Seems like a good build.Arbie - Tuesday, January 24, 2012 - link
"Anyway, though I do think AnandTech does some of the best reviews on the net when it comes to cases, I'd love to see them start using the fanbays in these cases. "I agree with this. And it would be great to see more discussion of motherboard fan controls, which are the other part of the equation. Mobo reviewers almost always use an open test bed, and either ignore or only briefly mention the hardware and (BIOS) firmware supporting thermal sensors and fan speeds. Some companies (eg Asus) do a far better job of this than others (eg Gigabyte) but get no credit for it on the review sites.
Personally, I'd much rather have a thorough set of sensors and controls (which I will absolutely use) than a second graphics slot which will just sit empty. And I think that in reality most DIY folks would be better served that way. But fans and cooling are a lot less glamorous than graphics boards, so any mobo built like that would get killed in the press.