Anidees AI Crystal XL Review
Up Close: Interior
Published: 2nd April 2018 | Source: Anidees | Price: |
Up Close: Interior
"That's the biggest case interior i've ever seen"..."That's the biggest case interior I've ever seen"...If you don't get the reference, then I recommend you go and refresh you memories of classic Arnie films, and in particular Predator, it's not all "Get to the Chopper" you know. On a more serious note, What the feck is going on in here??? OK, so there's a massive CPU cut out, and we already know the case can accept pretty much any motherboard known to man, But what of all those holes towards the front? are they for HDD racks??? well as it happens yes, a great many of them are.
The front of the case is able to support 4x120mm fans, and in fact, Anidees have pre fitted no less than four of their RGB enabled 120mm units. Yes guys and girls, we think this is a first, and as such should be appreciated. If you're more of a fan of the 140mm fan, then you'll be pleased to know it'll take up to three of them in place of the 120s.
The base of the case reveals the now familiar false floor which coevers the PSU and HDD cages. This false floor actually stops 100mm short of the front fans, meaning that you've got space for a 480mm 100mm thick rad in push, or a 75mm rad in push pull. If you want something thicker than that, then the entire false floor can be removed. My god are we turned on by the rad opportunities here.
Also on the floor there are mounts for 3.5" and 2.5" drives, as well as cable management holes for GPU and potentially water cooling tubing.
The rear of the case has expansion points for 10 horizontal and an additional two vertical PCI attachments. Where have you ever read that before???
My god that's a lot of roof space, We've never seen so many slots in one place...What can we fit up here??? Well if you carry on reading, you'll find out...
Most Recent Comments
What kept distracting me was the Grommet cover and the lines (gpu holder) I'd have to replace that with a flat panel for a cleaner look also the extra HDD holder holes need to be coveredQuote
To start on the case... Manufacturers should decide on which consumers are cases targeted. To have options is good but too many options ruin the product.
Why is there 10 cm of space under the motherboard, and only 6 cm on the top? If you target your case for water cooling why reduce top radiator clearance? I don't remember seeing XL boards in any recent times. Why support them?
PSU shroud. Shrouds make sense only on budget builds. Then you have extensions and you want to cover default PSU cables. On expensive "flagship" models at least give the option to remove them.
Front fan mounts are disaster. If you have glass make indentation for fans, like on be quiet Dark Base 900 so there are no metal bars over RGB fans.
What the hell is going on with that "GPU holder"?
And those punch through holes for HDD cables... Cmon... Put some plastic plugs in them. It will at least look like you made an effort.
I will use the Top Gear analogy from episode when they reviewed Chinese cars. It is like someone described them modern cases over the phone, and they bogged something. It looks to me like they have tried to have all the features from the modern flagship cases, but they either lack the resources, or were done buy incompetent people. Everything is cramped, and rushed.
It is like they had a list from the accountants of the features they need to put in the case, and no one checked were they aesthetically pleasing, or actually functional. It just needs to say on paper that we have those.
The one thing I agree with Tom is that it could be a good project case. If the price is around 200 tokens you can dive right into it with dremel and drills. Not as much to make it yours, but more to correct the mistakes.Quote
In its default configuration of storage alone I am sold, 6 3.5" + 3 2.5" with this amount of water cooling support is rather amazing.
Amazon shows 210 USD for the fan-less version right now, so that is a 40 USD premium for 5 fans, again a good sale for those who might want to use the bundled fans and call it a day.
I wish, though, the fan controller up top would be completely gone from the lite version of the case as, is also the same with the non-software controllable rgb stuff, many people prefer software based solutions nowadays.
Little stuff though. Overall, I could very easily fit in a huge reservoir with extra fins on the pump in the bottom + vibration dampeners with a 360 + 480 rad setup. The case can easily store an HBA + battery bank + sound card + 2 graphics cards in there.
Huge, insanely huge and versatile. I like it and is rather well priced for a case that can store this much.
If there is a couple of things to modify, though; I would take that PSU cover out and mod it until just the farthest pump mount remained and the cabling grommet moved to align with the graphics cards. Not much else is there to do.
Great review guys, in depth as usual. This just might be my next case.Quote
CSS Valid