Is the Aspire X-Qpack a decent case?

[clue69less]

Son #1 is pushing to get his gaming rig assembled by the date of his upcoming birthday, so I'm shopping. There are no large bags of cash to be found, so we want a good quality rig at the best price. He wants a portable desktop box and I'm considering micro-ATX. I know that some gamers don't like micro-ATX but size and portability are issues here.

So, do any of you have experience with the Aspire X-Qpack? Do you like it? Is the included 420 watt PS any good? Any advice appreciated.

 

[rodney_ws]

I believe the general consensus is that the included power supplies that come with cases are inferior to brand-name PSUs... however, if overclocking and SLI/Crossfire aren't on the menu, the included power supply with that case will likely work as expected.

 

[sunangel]

Very decent case. A little taller than a size 14.4 inch Nike shoe box. Has HHD and CPU temperature sensor wires. Aluminum and its very light. As you already know, firewire, USBs and audio on front panel. Two-bay hard drive carriage. Not many mATX board (at least on the Intel side) support RAID though. PSU had plenty of power and has a fan underneath to suck out hot gases over the PCI slots, however, I do not game so I knows nothing about the SLI/Crossfire thingy. You will want to get a different 120mm fan. The one that comes with it is like a jet engine. It cools very well but is just to loud (for my tastes). You will be limited to HSFs in relative size to a stock Intel or AMD HSF. Front panel connectors are long, more than enought to reach to the respective areas. The handle strenghth is iffy, but has not broken on me. Oh, the sideout motherboard tray is FABULOUS. I never really knew how much easier it was to install/uninstall component before I had a case with a removeable tray. SHIT, I could go on and on about this marvel of engineering. Once it put together, it feels solid and trusty. If you can put your hands on one for $65 plus shipping it would be a nice deal.

I was just thinking, if Aspire decided to make a mBTX version, you would not have to buy another case becasue the sideout motherboard tray and the rear panel connection panel are one. Thus you would only have to buy the new mBTX case, remove the motherboard tray, slide it in the old case, take the old motherboard tray, put it in the new case, and RMA it back to where ever you purchased it. No one but you would ever know. :idea:

Now for some negative. Loud fan, enough HHD bays to only support RAID 0/1 not RAID 5 or matrix RAID, will need short-type DVD drive (longer ones will bump up against the PSU).

I suggest once you have built your case to your liking, leave it the hell alone. There is nothing worse than to keep f-ing with the internal of the computer. Good luck on your build.