How To Select The Right Case

What Makes A Good Case?

Right out of the gate, it is important to note that different applications might necessitate different style cases. While there is no one case that will universally appeal to everyone, currently the mid-tower cases seem to be most popular ; we will focus on the mid-tower cases in this article. For the vast majority of users, the purchase of a mid-tower case is the right choice.

Typical mid-tower ATX cases provide a good balance of bays and features in an overall size that most users find to be acceptable. While the cases are bigger than the mini-tower cases, most users are willing to sacrifice the increased size for more overall flexibility over the long term of case ownership.

The overall construction of the case is one of the things that can be a downfall first and foremost. In order to cut costs, many case manufactures choose to use thinner materials in the construction of their cases. While it is true that using these thinner materials does make for a cheaper product in many cases, it also can mean that the over all quality of the case is compromised.

Another major thing that needs looked at is the quality of the welding or riveting of the case. Cases that are aluminum tend to be riveted rather than welded, because it is more difficult to weld aluminum than steel. If done correctly, welding or riveting can work well for your case of choice, I see no advantage of one over the other.

In this close-up, you can see the quality of this Antec case. Multiple rivets are used in all sections in order to fasten the case together. Of course this case is heavy, weighing in at over 40lbs, but as you can see, Antec has spent a lot of time on it’s high quality construction.