bobmon@iuvax.cs.indiana.edu (RAMontante) (12/26/90)
Back in November I posted a request about pc cases, and promised a summary. I got some four replies; here they are. BTW, I ended up with a "Baby AT" desktop (i.e. horizontal) case, 90% for cost considerations and 10% because I can use it as a monitor stand. The place I got the case from wanted $77 for a "baby tower" and power supply, vs. $66 for the horizontal case & P.S. Thanks for everybody's input (although it wasn't strong enough to compell me, when the credit card came out...) - bob,mon. _________________________________________ >Subject: pc cases - comparisons? > >Greetings, all. I am contemplating a new 386 system, and I'd like to >hear any opinions about cases. Specifically, mini-tower versus "horizontal" >(or "taraditional" or whatever they're called) cases. I'm not after >convenience, footprint, or esthetics arguments so much, mostly I'm curious >about things like ventilation, RF leakage, etc. > >Any comments appreciated. E-mail or post, I'll summarize if it seems useful. > >bob,mon. _________________________________________ From white@csvax.cs.ukans.edu Sat Nov 10 18:54:45 1990 Organization: KU CS Dept Date: Sat, 10 Nov 90 17:50:40 CST Hmm. "convenience, footprint, [and] esthetics" are about the only non-trivial reasons for choosing a case. As far as ventilation and RF leakage, most vertical cases are really slightly reworked desktop models. If it is an FCC Class B design, then it is good for home no matter. The only thing that I might add is that, like many others after me, I was worried about the tower tipping over. After I bought it, I realized that I was being foolish. Sure, my 4 year old daughter could tackle it if it wasn't in a corner, but she could abuse any computer if she thought she could and be allowed to live! With your mini-tower, you might be a bit more cramped than a desktop, so maybe a full tower is your best bet. I look forward to your summary. -- Kevin White (white@csvax.cs.ukans.edu), University of Kansas _________________________________________ Date: Sat, 10 Nov 90 16:08:42 -0500 From: Pete Beckman <beckman@copper.ucs.indiana.edu> Actually, I gave no compelling reasons [in previous mail] to get the tower over the desktop version. I think that no matter which you get you may have to make some fan changes. I like the tower because of the swing open door, and out-of-the-way-ness. The huge AT size desktop I had under my monitor at home was just gross. I moved it to the floor and like it there. One problem, the floor is dirtier, and sandwiched between the couch and desk it gets a little warm. The tower also offers a much more natural disk placement setup. With floppies stacked over optional tape and hard drive bays. On the other hand, given the price differential, one can always flip their desktop case on its side like I do at home, but changing jumper settings or boards, etc. is just a little more difficult. Half a dozen one way, int( sqrt(6) * PI - 1 ) the other. -Pete _________________________________________ Date: Tue, 13 Nov 90 11:56:06 EST From: Jim Williams <williams@nssdcs.gsfc.nasa.gov> Organization: NSSDC Greenbelt Md. When I bought my 386AT (generic clone, made by a local system house) I asked about that. They told me that very few of the tower cases are FCC Class A, which I wanted. So I got the old style AT desktop case and a floor stand. All the advantages of a tower, plus FCC class A rating. -- Spoken: Jim Williams Domain: williams@nssdcs.gsfc.nasa.gov Phone: +1 301 286-4405 UUCP: uunet!mimsy!williams USPS: NASA/GSFC, Code 633, Greenbelt, MD 20771 Motto: There is no 'd' in "kluge"! It rhymes with "huge", not "sludge". _________________________________________ Date: Sun, 11 Nov 90 22:37:17 PST From: Rich Wales <wales@CS.UCLA.EDU> Bob -- Replying to your article <71024@iuvax.cs.indiana.edu>: I'd suggest a full-sized tower case. This will give you plenty of ventilation and room for disk drive expansion. One thing to note about a tower case is that there will probably be more air-flow room on the edges of the expansion cards opposite the motherboard. Make sure you get at least a 200W or 220W power supply. You should easily be able to get such a case as this for $200-250. Finally, remember that if you transfer an existing hard drive from one case to another, in such a way that you change the orientation of the drive (e.g., moving a hard disk card from a horizontal to a vertical case), you should do a new low-level format on the drive in its new orientation. If the drive was horizontal before, and will be horizon- tal now, this is not required. Rich Wales <wales@CS.UCLA.EDU> // UCLA Computer Science Department 3531 Boelter Hall // Los Angeles, CA 90024-1596 // +1 (213) 825-5683 "The universe is a spheroid region, 705 meters in diameter."