Advice on which case to buy to match my next self built config?

[Garulfo]

Hi!

A friend asked me to get him a kickass machine, and asked me to build it for him, to save some on the purchase. I haven't kept myself up to date on anything too much, for the past year or so... but!

I did my homework on every single part and was about to order from newegg, when I realized I didn't know what case I wanted... duh! And cases are more confusing to me than any other part I have researched about... double-duh!

I have checked newegg, and I cannot seem to find a single case that doesn't have some serious "cons" in the reviews. Either the cooling "sucks even with hte 27 millions fans you can install on it" or mounting drives require an innership with McGyver. Even though the cases are quite pricy and are recommended on high end gaming computer websites (such as the thermaltake recommended on widowpc.com). I was going for the thermaltake when I read that the side panels was totally useless, and made mounting that much harder, as well as wasting some of the space...

My main concerns are, in order:
-Good cooling
-No noise whatsoever!
-Enough space/easy to mount boards/cards/drives
-Look (I never owned a cool flashy case. I don't find them that beautiful, but still. I'm aiming for a "you-can-n-ya-gonna-brag-about-it" machine so... :) )
-Price (under $200 including enough fans and a good enough power supply for the config below, if possible. I think $200 should be more than enough, but if I $200 is not realistic, please let me know).

The config. :


-Asus A8N-SLI Premium nForce4 SLI
-AMD 4800+ dual core
-ONE Geforce 7800 GTX 256MB (probably asus). I am going for SLI to upgrade later on. I assume a SLI mobo will let me put just one card for now and add a 2nd one later on, as long as I use the same 2 cards...
-TWO SATA 160go hard drives
-Creative Labs Sound Blaster Audigy 2 ZS Gamer
-2gigs of Ram
-a DVD+RW/CD+RW drive, maybe Lacie

I hope I gave enough information.

Thanks in advance, and Happy new year!

[Whyzman]

Welcome tohttp://www.pcguide.com/ubb/pcgubb.gif Forums!

Since quite seems to be the operative word, I would defer to one of our members who I think was using some time of insulated case. I'll PM malcore and see if he'll chime in...

[poppy]

Here's a cool case (no pun intended) to look at that Newegg just started carrying:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16811233002

Has 3 120mm fans and a lot of nice features plus it is "liquid cooling ready". A bit pricey though when you have to add a high quality PSU from saphalline's sticky (http://www.pcguide.com/vb/showthread.php?t=39018) , but it is a case I am seriously considering.

[Whyzman]

I did PM malcore, and also did a search here on the case I believe he mentioned. It was a Lian-li PC 6070. This was a while ago, so I did a search on the Lian-Li website looking for silent PCs.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16811112088

These are the latest insulated cases. I thought this dynamic airflow view from the site was rather interesting:

http://www.lian-li.com/Product/Chassis/M_V_S_PC-V1100plus.htm

I'm sure when malcore gets the PM that he'll report in on how his venture into insulated cases went. I seem to remember, though, that he was quite pleased!

[Garulfo]

Excelent, thanks!

I have another question about cooling, if you guys don't mind. With a SLI and dual core config., what kind of cooling should I aim at? I would hate to spend all my savings on that computer to see it burn the house down on the first day I switch it on...

Is liquid cooling better than regular fans? And, jsut as important for my clumsy fingers, is it hard to install?

I never heard of it before, I don't even know if it something that you put directly on top of the CPU or if it just cools down the air inside the case... :confused:

[Pharoah]

check these out
http://mountainmods.com/index.php?cPath=21&osCsid=a62b706e6cd47a86f641f9e225efcb2a

[rainmanva]

here is the case i used for a recent build. it's silent too!!
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16811119068

hope this helps!!

[capequahog]

You dont need this case unless you're building a server, I used it for a new build and although its a good case its way too big and heavy for normal use

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16811119093