Sunbeam Acrylic HTPC Case

[t_ski]

To read this review go to: http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/Sunbeam/UVHTPC/

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[Siren]

Hmm.. I don't think I would want this setting in my living room..lol

[PrudentPrincess]

Maybe as a LAN box.

[Firedomain]

my only complaint about a case like this is that the UV reactiveness will show every scratch when lit up!

i used to have a sunbeamtech led acrylic UV blue case & i could see all the scratches! now with my current PC i have a sunbeam led acrylic case thats not UV reactive.. but a lot of stuff in it is!.... dont get me wrong.. if u take all the care u can with this & keep it scratch free it will look awesome... but i dont like things beeing lit up in the lounge while ur trying to enjoy a movie!.... as a gaming/lan case, sure thing (but more likely to get scratched!)

[tkpenalty]

Originally Posted by Siren

Hmm.. I don't think I would want this setting in my living room..lol

I'd want it.

Probably do some mods, use some stuff to cover some parts (PSU cabling...).

Looks awesome anyway!

Did we do a review on their towers? They are like arcryic antec 900s, except for the difference in PSU mounting. I have to admit, the fan grille ruins it, i'd prefer not to have the fan grilles mounted on the fans.

[t_ski]

Originally Posted by tkpenalty

Did we do a review on their towers?

No, but I have built one for a project for someone else before. I thought it was a pain on how much it had to be taken apart to swap out the hardware (Motherboard, hard drives, PSU, etc.). It was this one:

http://www.sunbeamtech.com/PRODUCTS/ac9b/AC9B.html

[jbunch07]

This case looks really nice i would get it for like a lan box or something but i dont hink it would be all that great for a real powerhouse, there just not a whole lot of room for cable management and things like that,
does look pretty sweet though!

[OrbitzXT]

I know this post is a bit old but I just put together my new computer today using this case. One thing I learned is that pictures don't do it justice. It tends to look cheesy in every picture I've seen, even when I try to take pictures of it myself. Another user in a separate thread warned me that I would experience heat problems in this case, especially since I wanted to use fan filters. The two 80mm fans in front I have taking in air with filters on and one exhaust in the back, with the Zalman 9700 blowing out the case in the back as well. My E6550 at stock settings idle at about 25C, I haven't even begun to OC or stress the CPU at all since I don't have an internet connection on that computer yet.

I put in a E6550, Zalman 9700, 1 Seagate 250 GB HD, an eVGA 9600 GT and a Rosewill 550W PSU. I'll try to upload pictures once I can find a decent camera, I have a Samsung Juke which takes fairly bad pictures. It looks great though in my opinion, however I'm not sure if I'd go with this case again in the future simply because putting it together was annoying. By no means was it difficult, it was very easy. When you first take out everything from the box it can seem overwhelming with all the bags of screws and parts, but it is very easy to assemble.

One of the things I love the most is the amount of space the motherboard spacers give you, I forgot to put on the backplate for the Zalman 9700 and I had already screwed in the motherboard. In any other case I would have had to take the motherboard out but there was so much room that I managed to still get it on, it leaves a lot of room for cable management too which is very nice. Some people would say dust is an issue, but with fan filters it manages to stay cool still and clean. Assembly took me about 2 hours, but I wasn't rushing and was taking my time. So like I said, this was a fun experience doing it once, but I'm not so sure I'd want to have to assemble the case with every build I do...and I build computers every couple of months.

[Exavier]

Thanks for the user feedback, Orbitz; how is it durability-wise? Stable, or does it 'give' slightly? I just don't trust acrylic much from my Design Tech days..

[OrbitzXT]

It feels very sturdy and durable, its designed extremely to deal with the heavy components inside the case.

[OrbitzXT]

I took a picture, and I realize what the problem with pictures is, they make the brightness of the case seem very cheesy. The glow from the case right now in the middle of the afternoon is actually very nice sitting next to my HDTV, which I'm using as the monitor. The glow is much....softer I guess in person.

http://i65.photobucket.com/albums/h2...878841_0-1.jpg

The picture was taken with my Samsung Juke...which is awful too =) I'll try to get a better picture when I can.

[Exavier]

Still better than most pictures I've seen of it
Looks good, but I might go the Lubic way if I can get my hands on it..