Xigmatek Aquila Review

The Build

The instructions for the Aquila are scant in the extreme, so much so that the person who wrote them appears to have gotten bored and just stopped 5/6ths of the way through, leaving one of the fold out panels blank.  The online version, accessed through Xigmateks website is not additionally illuminating.  To add insult to injury, Xigmatek are also protagonists of the big "bag-o-screws" approach to accessories, and have for some strange reason included cable ties for use in a case that has no discernible cable tie points.

We've opted to mount an M-ATX board as its proportions better befit the case interior.  With the M-ATX board only slightly overhanging the HDD rack we can't help but think that a single, vertically oriented HDD bay would have sufficed, leaving ample room for front mounted rads without the need to sacrifice the HDD option entirely.  As always we've lobbed in out trusty antique 8800GT card, but as previously mentioned the Aquila will take GPUs up to 330mm in length.

We haven't however been able to use our usual Cooler Master V1000 PSU as it's simply too long to fit into the space provided.  Instead we've selected another Cooler Master PSU, the B600.  At just 140mm long the B600 fits just fine and although not a modular PSU, there's plenty of space available behind it in the Aquila for cables to be turned round towards their respective destinations.

Turning the case around to look at the reverse side and with all the hardware in we begin to get a sense of just how much unused space there is inside the Aquila.  In some ways this is good though as it will hopefully allow for greater water cooling options.  We're still optimistic about getting a 240mm rad up in the roof.