Soldato
Hi all, so this is a tale of woe which is a mix my fault and a few design issues with the NZXT case which is just bloody infuriating! Plus there's no pictures as my camera failing was just another thing during this swap to serious pee me off!
TL/DR in spoiler
So, 6 years ago I bought an Antec 1200 v3 (as shown below) as part of an OcUK built PC. It was was full of LED fans, very loud etc-
So I then modded it by swapping all the loud LED internal fans to Noctua ones (great fans!) but after 6 years use it had seen much better days - the 20cm built-in fan at the top fell apart (the motor built is into the case so it's not swappable), the front surround panel snapped during removal (getting access to filters), the top panel was cracked etc, so basically it was a wreck.
I really didn't want to swap the case as it's been probably 10+ years since I last actually built a PC and, as I still have the scars on my hands, I didn't feel like revisiting that pain again but, after I fitted a new GTX1080Ti a few weeks ago and saw that case really needed pulling apart to be cleaned (6 years of dust).
During this exercise in "how many times can I cut my hands on a bloody pop rivet" I decided that as everything was taken apart it was probably the best time to just get another, more modern case. Now my PC sits in my living room as a media/gaming PC so my requirements were - Silent, no Lights (internal/external), plain looking and with enough airflow for a hot CPU & 3 HDD's - and the NZXT H630 (despite being a bit old) fir the bill perfectly for me with it being a windowless matt black rectangle with huge cooling capability.
So what went wrong then? Well basically everything
Once the case arrived next day from OcUK (plug!) I stripped it apart in seconds and marvelled at it's tool-less design with smooth surfaces everywhere meaning any form of finger-based self harm would prove almost impossible. I was actually very impressed by the built quality and the speed/ease of a complete strip-down. So once the case was stripped I just had to wait for my new fans to arrive!
New fans Ian? Doesn't it already come with a 14cm and 20cm fan? Well yes but they are reviewed as being a little loud so, as there's space for up to 4x 20cm fans, I went way OTT and bought four of the new Noctua NF-A20 FLX fans! I loved the silent but powerful 12cm versions I had in the Antec case and I'm sure the bigger 20cm versions should cover the Airflow + Silent side adequately. I also bought two 14cm Nanoxia Deep Silence fans (same airflow as Noctua 14cm but 3db quieter) for spot cooling (HDD's and GPU).
So now comes the tricky bit, the case swap! Too be fair the old Antec only bit me once with a small 7mm cut across a knuckle but other than that the Antec came apart very easily, although I spent a while dusting everything off!
Then came the start of my tale of woe! Once everything was out of the Antec I decided to fit my 20cm fans to the NZXT case which is where NZXT and myself had a big falling out! Nowhere, and I mean NOWHERE, on the NZXT website, manual or support site does it same that only circular cased 20cm fans will fit, as opposed to square cased fans like the Noctua's -
Circular
Square
Out of the 4 positions you can fit a 20cm fan only 1 accepts the square Noctua fan due to the fans square corners hitting the cases bracing points, so that's 3 wasted fans I'll have to end up re-selling. It also meant a re-evaluation of what fans I could fit in what positions vs what fans I had available. So now I've got the OEM 20cm in it's original front/bottom position with the OEM 14cm fan above it, a 14cm Nanoxia fan at the back and a Noctua 20cm/Nanoxia 14cm at the top, plus I've included an additional 2x Noctua NF-P12 fans from my Antec to the bottom the case, 1 to to cool the 3 HDD's and 1 for general case cooling (overkill I know).
So that's the fans all bodged around, what's next? Well because the 3 bay HDD cages sit facing the side of the case (rather than front to back) the cable connections are extremely messy. My mistake was fitting them with the connector facing the left side of the case rather than the right so I'll correct that later.
Then with the MoBo fitted I found the PSU-MoBo power cables, fit fit perfectly in the Antec, are now too short to route behind the case where they would be hidden so one is draped across the MoBo which I've no idea how to fix with trying to fit custom cables for the Corsair AX850 Modular PSU.
The SATA cables I had were right angled because the Case cut-outs of the Antec were right at the edge of the MoBo, only with the NZXT they are now 2in away, so the right angle MoBo end connectors don't fit! "But why don't you fit them to the HHD's instead" I hear you say - Well NZXT though of this and fitted the HDD trays in such a way that the SATA ports are blocked from using a right angled connector, so that's new SATA cables I'll need then!
Then the GPU backplate doesn't screw down fully and trying to starts to life the card out of the slot and puts the slot clip under lots of pressure!
So thats my very long and boring tale of woe caused by myself and NZXT!
I swapped a case and now I need new fans that fit, some modded longer PSU cables, new flat SATA cables, to sell my wasted 20cm Noctua fans and another 2-3 hours to sort everything out once the new parts arrive!
Rant Over
TL/DR in spoiler
Square shaped 20cm fans don't fit, PSU to MoBo power cables now too short, right-angled SATA cables don't fit, GPU backplate won't screw down fully, SSD/HDD's wrong orientation for cables
So, 6 years ago I bought an Antec 1200 v3 (as shown below) as part of an OcUK built PC. It was was full of LED fans, very loud etc-
So I then modded it by swapping all the loud LED internal fans to Noctua ones (great fans!) but after 6 years use it had seen much better days - the 20cm built-in fan at the top fell apart (the motor built is into the case so it's not swappable), the front surround panel snapped during removal (getting access to filters), the top panel was cracked etc, so basically it was a wreck.
I really didn't want to swap the case as it's been probably 10+ years since I last actually built a PC and, as I still have the scars on my hands, I didn't feel like revisiting that pain again but, after I fitted a new GTX1080Ti a few weeks ago and saw that case really needed pulling apart to be cleaned (6 years of dust).
During this exercise in "how many times can I cut my hands on a bloody pop rivet" I decided that as everything was taken apart it was probably the best time to just get another, more modern case. Now my PC sits in my living room as a media/gaming PC so my requirements were - Silent, no Lights (internal/external), plain looking and with enough airflow for a hot CPU & 3 HDD's - and the NZXT H630 (despite being a bit old) fir the bill perfectly for me with it being a windowless matt black rectangle with huge cooling capability.
So what went wrong then? Well basically everything
Once the case arrived next day from OcUK (plug!) I stripped it apart in seconds and marvelled at it's tool-less design with smooth surfaces everywhere meaning any form of finger-based self harm would prove almost impossible. I was actually very impressed by the built quality and the speed/ease of a complete strip-down. So once the case was stripped I just had to wait for my new fans to arrive!
New fans Ian? Doesn't it already come with a 14cm and 20cm fan? Well yes but they are reviewed as being a little loud so, as there's space for up to 4x 20cm fans, I went way OTT and bought four of the new Noctua NF-A20 FLX fans! I loved the silent but powerful 12cm versions I had in the Antec case and I'm sure the bigger 20cm versions should cover the Airflow + Silent side adequately. I also bought two 14cm Nanoxia Deep Silence fans (same airflow as Noctua 14cm but 3db quieter) for spot cooling (HDD's and GPU).
So now comes the tricky bit, the case swap! Too be fair the old Antec only bit me once with a small 7mm cut across a knuckle but other than that the Antec came apart very easily, although I spent a while dusting everything off!
Then came the start of my tale of woe! Once everything was out of the Antec I decided to fit my 20cm fans to the NZXT case which is where NZXT and myself had a big falling out! Nowhere, and I mean NOWHERE, on the NZXT website, manual or support site does it same that only circular cased 20cm fans will fit, as opposed to square cased fans like the Noctua's -
Circular
Square
Out of the 4 positions you can fit a 20cm fan only 1 accepts the square Noctua fan due to the fans square corners hitting the cases bracing points, so that's 3 wasted fans I'll have to end up re-selling. It also meant a re-evaluation of what fans I could fit in what positions vs what fans I had available. So now I've got the OEM 20cm in it's original front/bottom position with the OEM 14cm fan above it, a 14cm Nanoxia fan at the back and a Noctua 20cm/Nanoxia 14cm at the top, plus I've included an additional 2x Noctua NF-P12 fans from my Antec to the bottom the case, 1 to to cool the 3 HDD's and 1 for general case cooling (overkill I know).
So that's the fans all bodged around, what's next? Well because the 3 bay HDD cages sit facing the side of the case (rather than front to back) the cable connections are extremely messy. My mistake was fitting them with the connector facing the left side of the case rather than the right so I'll correct that later.
Then with the MoBo fitted I found the PSU-MoBo power cables, fit fit perfectly in the Antec, are now too short to route behind the case where they would be hidden so one is draped across the MoBo which I've no idea how to fix with trying to fit custom cables for the Corsair AX850 Modular PSU.
The SATA cables I had were right angled because the Case cut-outs of the Antec were right at the edge of the MoBo, only with the NZXT they are now 2in away, so the right angle MoBo end connectors don't fit! "But why don't you fit them to the HHD's instead" I hear you say - Well NZXT though of this and fitted the HDD trays in such a way that the SATA ports are blocked from using a right angled connector, so that's new SATA cables I'll need then!
Then the GPU backplate doesn't screw down fully and trying to starts to life the card out of the slot and puts the slot clip under lots of pressure!
So thats my very long and boring tale of woe caused by myself and NZXT!
I swapped a case and now I need new fans that fit, some modded longer PSU cables, new flat SATA cables, to sell my wasted 20cm Noctua fans and another 2-3 hours to sort everything out once the new parts arrive!
Rant Over
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