Value Case Roundup: A Look at the Affordable

Raidmax ATX-268WSP (cont'd)

We've taken a look at the features of the 268WSP including the internal design, but all of that can come to a halt when we see flimsy constructions and inefficient cooling systems. The 268WSP does not have much of a problem with that as other cases might.

Construction

The 268WSP is constructed of 0.7mm steel, which, in many cases, poses somewhat of a hazardous issue. The thinner we go with steel, the sharper and more dangerous those sharp edges become. Raidmax, on the other hand, has done a good job of folding over those sharp edges to prevent cut wires among other things.

The front bezel is, of course, a combination of acrylic and plastic, which gives the 268WSP a higher end look.

Cooling

The potential of the cooling system in the 268WSP is extraordinary! First off, even though the case comes with only two 80mm fans mounted on the left side panel, there is room for a total of four more 80mm fans and a 60mm fan. The four 80mm fans can be mounted in a 2x2 array at the front of the case, which will cover all four of the HDD bays.

The last 60mm fan can be mounted at the rear above the expansion card slots. Though the extra fans will definitely help cool the 268WSP extremely well, the noise produced by the extra fans will probably be intolerable.

We recommend using, at most, four fans to even out the noise produced and the temperature control.

The 268WSP is listed on New Egg as well as a few other retailers, which includes a 350W power supply. Our test model, however, did not include a PSU.

Installation

Since there were no special features in the 268WSP, the total installation time for our test bed consumed the standard 15 minutes for the motherboard, video card, HDD, and power supply.

We noticed that the motherboard connectors for the USB ports on the bezel were not the modular 7-pin type, but the 4-pin+GND type, which we have found in the past to be slightly confusing when using motherboards that do not have proper listings of certain pin headers. We'd like to see more of the 7-pin motherboard connectors to decrease this confusion as well as for added compatibility and standards.