Nanoxia Deep Silence 1 Case Review: You Asked For It, You Got It
by Dustin Sklavos on November 27, 2012 12:01 AM EST- Posted in
- Cases/Cooling/PSUs
- quiet
- ATX
- Nanoxia
Testing Methodology
For testing Micro-ATX and full 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.
| ATX Test Configuration | |
| CPU |
Intel Core i7-2700K (95W TDP, tested at stock speed and overclocked to 4.3GHz @ 1.38V) |
| Motherboard | Gigabyte GA-Z68MX-UD2H-B3 |
| Graphics Card |
ASUS GeForce GTX 560 Ti DCII TOP (tested at stock speed and overclocked to 1GHz/overvolted to 1.13V) |
| Memory | 2x2GB Crucial Ballistix Smart Tracer DDR3-1600 |
| Drives |
Kingston SSDNow V+ 100 64GB SSD Samsung 5.25" BD-ROM/DVDRW Drive |
| CPU Cooler | Cooler Master Hyper 212 Evo with Cooler Master ThermalFusion 400 |
| Power Supply | SilverStone Strider Plus 750W 80 Plus Silver |
Each case is tested in a stock configuration and an overclocked configuration that generates substantially more heat (and thus may produce more noise). The system is powered on and left idle for fifteen minutes, the thermal and acoustic results recorded, and then stressed by running seven threads in Prime95 (in-place large FFTs) on the CPU and OC Scanner (maximum load) on the GPU. At the end of fiteen minutes, thermal and acoustic results are recorded. This is done for the stock settings and for the overclock, and if the enclosure has a fan controller, these tests are repeated for each setting. Ambient temperature is also measured after the fifteen idle minutes but before the stress test and used to calculate the final reported results.
Thank You!
Before moving on, we'd like to thank the following vendors for providing us with the hardware used in our testbed.
- Thank you to Puget Systems for providing us with the Intel Core i7-2700K.
- Thank you to Gigabyte for providing us with the GA-Z68MX-UD2H-B3 motherboard.
- Thank you to Crucial for providing us with the Ballistix Smart Tracer memory.
- Thank you to Cooler Master for providing us with the Hyper 212 Evo heatsink and fan unit.
- Thank you to Kingston for providing us with the SSDNow V+ 100 SSD.
- Thank you to CyberPower for providing us with the Samsung BD-ROM/DVD+/-RW drive.
- And thank you to SilverStone for providing us with the power supply.
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Grok42 - Thursday, November 29, 2012 - link
I with you I too have absolutely no need for a card reader and consider them to be at best a legacy device. Really they are more like the zip drive which some people really needed and used and a lot of people never needed or used.That said, I certainly would not care if they included one. I wouldn't see it much different than all the front, side, bottom USB ports they tend to litter cases with these days like blue bullet holes. Sure if I had my choice they wouldn't be there but they don't bother me either. Given that they cost $5 retail it should be a very cheap way to move any case up market for little additional manufacturing cost. The one critical caveat is that they not just install it in an external bay but make it like the USB port an integrate it into the case in a discrete way.
roberta - Tuesday, November 27, 2012 - link
Good Day Dustin,Thank You Very Much for a SUPERB review....
I hope the Nanoxia Deep Silence 1 (DS1) becomes available in Australia in time for Haswell.
Best Regards,
Roberta
nevcairiel - Tuesday, November 27, 2012 - link
At least the DS1 is available here in Europe already (guess it helps being from the same country as the company making them), but before i go out and buy it, whats the outlook on future cases, like the DS2? Its not available yet, but i would love a comparison to the DS1 to decide if waiting is worth it.Dustin Sklavos - Tuesday, November 27, 2012 - link
From what I can see, the DS2 looks like a slightly cut down DS1. If you want a DS1, pull the trigger on it.HollyDOL - Tuesday, November 27, 2012 - link
I think openable chimney starts fulfilling it's purpose when you mount radiator under that...pdjblum - Tuesday, November 27, 2012 - link
The materials used to construct the case are important to at least a few of us, if not more. It would be nice if they were listed in the spec table. I have left a comment to this effect a few times already, but to no avail. Please consider.monkey23 - Tuesday, November 27, 2012 - link
I'm glad you finally got to review the case Dustin.I had my mind set on the Fractal Design R4 for my silent built even with all the Nanoxia DS1 reviews on the web. After reading your review, however, I'm not so sure anymore. It looks like you prefer the DS1 to the R4 since it has better performance and is "more solid". I agree that the DS1 could use some more refinement but aside from performance I thought that the R4 is more solid of the two. I guess I would like to know how the two compares on the ease of assembly, quality, features, etc. In other words if they both perform about equally at the same price, which one would you prefer?
I know that the DS2 has been announced and it looks very similar to and shares many of the features of the R4. Maybe that could be the perfect case I'm looking for if it continues to improve on what they did with DS1.
Dustin Sklavos - Tuesday, November 27, 2012 - link
I reviewed the R4 and still have it on hand. I was going to build a system for a friend in it, but now I'm going to use the DS1 instead. They're also sending me a second one in the anthracite (gunmetal) finish, and I'll be moving my desktop into that most likely.That should be about all you need to know.
monkey23 - Tuesday, November 27, 2012 - link
Thanks for the reply. I know you like the case but I didn't expect you to move your desktop into it though. Maybe you will have to make another move in the future (into the DS2.) I guess we'll have to wait and see.monkey23 - Tuesday, November 27, 2012 - link
Here's an afterthought: how would the R4 perform with Nanoxia's fans? I know Nanoxia started out making fans so they have the advantage on that department. I wonder if the R4 might perform at least as well given three better case fans. I know that would drive up the total costs and make it an unfair comparison though.