Cases
The case that your computer is housed in is an important consideration if you plan to add drives to your system or do a lot of work on it. Some manufacturers have well-designed cases that are easy to open and service, but others require you to remove 7 screws just to get them open! Then, you often have to remove components just to get at the system memory--probably the most common and useful upgrade. Tower cases have two types of covers, wraparound or side panels. Side panels are typically easier to work with, and wraparound cases can be painful to work with as they never seem to fit back on properly. Some side panel cases (the good ones) allow you to remove both the left and right panels, instead of just a single panel.

Case assortment

Wraparound covers

Side panel case

The normal computer case comes in four major varieties: full tower, mini-tower, desktop, and baby desktop (or slim-line). The full tower is always the most accessible and easiest to work with; however, it's kind of bulky. It's designed to sit on the floor and is usually about 2.5 feet (almost 1m) tall. The largest towers will have 8 or more exposed drive bays. An exposed drive bay refers to a standard 5.25" wide, 1" high area that's accessible from the front of the case and can hold a standard 5.25" drive with removable media, such as a CD-ROM drive. It's useful if you want the ability to install a lot of internal drives with removable storage capability or if you want to put your drives in removable cases. I even like the exposed bay just so you can have an LED plate attached to additional drives that you can use to easily monitor drive activity. You can also put your sound or other connections on the front of your case with the right hardware making connection easier. Then, there's that LCD temperature display... You can find a lot of stuff to fill up those drive bays, and not much of it has to do with actual "drives.".

3 exposed drive bays

8 exposed drive bays

2 hidden drive bays

One thing about towers is that you have to carefully consider where you are going to place components. The standard IDE ribbon cable is 16" (41cm) long, and has two connections for devices. You can't get longer cables, because that's what the standard is. So, if your motherboard is far away from the drive bays, you may have a hard time putting an IDE device in the top open drive bay. With SCSI, this is less of a problem, as 6' (2m) cables are fairly common.

Mini/mid-towers are also designed to sit on the floor, off your desk. They are smaller, harder to work with, and, in some cases, exactly the same as a standard desktop case designed to sit on its side. Mid-towers can fit nicely on the floor under a desk, however, and are fast becoming the standard for those that build their own boxes.

The desktop case is standard on many pre-built systems but it can be difficult to service, especially if you sit the monitor on top of it. A desktop case normally has three exposed drive bays and maybe one or two 3.5" bays for floppy drives.

The mini-desktop cases became popular with the 486 generation of computers when people (foolishly) thought that they'd never have to open or service their systems because their 486s were so fast and powerful that they'd never need to add anything to them! These cases are hard to work with and have one or no exposed drive bays. We're seeing the same type of thing with some new case designs. Only get a mini-desktop if you know what you are doing and don't plan to do much upgrading.

ATX case back

ATX features

ATX cases are standard nowadays, and you may have more options to pick from when if picking up a mini-desktop. Things to be concerned with on your ATX case are:
• 5.25" and 3.5" drive bays (exposed and not exposed)
• material (plastic, steel, or aluminum - a much lighter metal)
• size
• color (beige? yuck!)
• fan spaces (how many fans can it hold for additional cooling?)
• case accessibility (wrap-around, single side panel or double side panel?)
• front media connections (some cases have USB, audio and more connections on the front)

Like a car, your case will say a lot about you. Get one that has what you need. You can add all kinds of modifications to your PC. Check out this place to get an idea.

AT back

AT keyboard blackhole

Older AT cases weren't quite as friendly as today's ATX cases. Here's one with a few open ports and the infamous 5-pin DIN keyboard black hole! Building systems in those days was a lot more annoying.

Search