A couple days ago I reviewed the Antec EarthWatts 500 Watt power supply, today I have another product from Antec, the Nine Hundred Gaming Case. The Antec Nine Hundred Gaming Case is a bit off the norm for Antec products, most of their products are very stylish, subtle and elegant looking, something I could easily see in an Executives Office. Don't get me wrong, the Nine Hundred is very nice as well, but it is aimed at the gamer segment of the market, it's flashy, bold and definitely makes a statement. The Nine Hundred case is unlike any other I have seen, it combines the best of Antecs' designs and experience into a well made, functional and great looking chassis that will be hard to beat…
Antec Nine Hundred Gaming Case
Reviewed by: Kristofer Brozio AkA Dracos
Sponsor: Antec
Tech Specs,Features or the Basic Info:
Antec Nine Hundred
Ultimate Gamer Case
The most versatile gaming case EVER!
Introducing the Antec Nine Hundred hardcore gaming case. Now you can own any noob ever spawned with this ultra-mean case in classic black finish. We know your gaming hardware produces a lot of heat, that's why the case is built for maximum cool with a perforated front bezel, three 120mm fans with mounts for even more fans, and a monster top-mounted 200mm fan that's right, we said 200mm! The versatile Nine Hundred is maximally customizable to fit your needs. The modular design lets you modify the placement of the front fans and hard drive cages. There's even a tray on top for your mp3 player, digital camera, or that spare illudium Q-42 explosive space modulator that you have lying around. Be the envy of everyone at your next LAN party, impress your friends, and just generally show everyone that you are the ultimate master of all time with the Antec Nine Hundred!
Features:
Unique Top mounted 200mm TriCool exhaust fan to cool the hottest system
Perforated front bezel for maximum air intake
Two front loaded HDD cages for up to 6 hard disk drives
The HDD cages act as air ducts to take air in more efficiently. Optional middle 120mm fan bracket to
cool the hottest graphic cards or CPU
Two 120mm TriCool blue LED front fans to cool hard disk drives
Window side panel comes with an optional 120mm fan mount for maximum VGA cooling
Top mounted I/O ports for easy access
Top tray for your MP3 player, digital camera, etc.
Power supply mounts at the bottom of the case (power supply not included)
Dimensions: 19.4” x 8.1” x 18.4" (L x W x H)
-49.3cm x 20.6cm x 46.8cm (L x W x H)
Advanced cooling system:
– 1 top 200mm TriCool fan with 3-speed switch control
– 1 rear 120mm TriCool fan with 3-speed switch control
– 2 front 120mm special black TriCool blue LED fans with 3-speed switch control to cool HDDs
– 1 side (optional) 120mm fan to cool graphic cards
– 1 middle (optional) 120mm fan to cool CPU or graphic cards
9 Drive Bays:
– External 3 x 5.25"; Internal 6 x 3.5" for HDD, or
– External 6 x 5.25"; Internal 3x 3.5" for HDD, or
– External 9 x 5.25"
Motherboard: Fits micro and standard ATX
-7 Expansion Slots
Top I/O:
– Power & reset button with blue LED
– 2 x USB 2.0
– 1 x IEEE 1394 (FireWire i.Link)
– Audio In and Out
A Better Look at Things
:
–
–
–
–
–
–
–
–
–
As always we start with a look at the packaging, the packaging for the Antec Nine Hundred is very well done, with a black theme to it. The front of the box gives you a glimpse at the Nine Hundred.
The back and sides of the box of course list all the specs and features of the Nine Hundred.
Opening the box we find the users manual right on top with the case, packed very well underneath.
The Nine Hundred is padded on the sides with formed styrofoam and wrapped in a plastic bag as well.
Unwrapping the packaging we find that Antec also has plastic protecting the side window.
A Better Look at Things
Continued:
–
–
–
–
–
–
From the side view we can see the interesting shape of the window, the optional 120mm side fan mount and into the case a bit. The window let's you basically see into the case to show off your motherboard and video card, but not to see the hard drives etc.
Pretty much the entire front is on big fan grill, you can see two 120mm fans come pre-mounted for cooling. The entire front can be re-arranged for any configuration of drive the user would like.
The right side of the Nine Hundred is plain, nothing to see here, move along…
I really like the overall look and shape of the Nine Hundred, it has that sort of industrial feel to it, but yet user friendly.
The first thing you will notice about the back is that the power supply mounts on the bottom of the case, this has become popular with many case manufacturers lately.
A Better Look at Things
Continued:
–
–
–
–
–
–
–
–
–
The motherboard mounts near the top of the case, Antec included a Universal I/O plate, ad 120mm exhaust fan pre-installed. There are also thumbscrews used to hold the sides on, this allows them to be much easier to access, the thumbscrews are also just for the side panels and cannot be mixed with the ones used inside the case.
I really like the PCI slot covers that Antec uses, the covers allow for more ventilation, and they are the reusable/replaceable type.
The power supply mount is compatible with any type of power supply configuration, inside we'll find that Antec also supplied silicone vibration dampeners to place the PSU onto for installation.
Moving to the top of the case we find the main cooling fan, the 200mm exhaust fan, or 'Big Boy' as Antec is calling it.
The top of the Nine Hundred is where you will also find a small compartment to place your 'things' in.
A Better Look at Things
Continued:
On the top of the case is also where the USB, Firewire, and Audio ports are located. The power and reset buttons are here as well, along with a tiny blue LED to indicate HDD activity.
Behind the buttons and ports is where the tray is located, Antec included a rubber, textured insert for the tray as well, that we'll see soon.
The 200mm exhaust fan is covered by the common honeycomb fan grill to allow for optimum airflow to exhaust the most heat from your case.
Taking the panel off we can get a better look at the inside of the Nine Hundred to see what's going on.
All of the 120mm fans and the 200mm fans are the Antec Tri-Cool variety, with three speed setting, high, medium and low. We can see that Antec already installed some of the motherboard standoffs for us, and at the bottom of the case is the accessory bag as well.
A Better Look at Things
Continued:
Taking a look at the inside from an angle we can see there is another optional fan mount for a 120mm fan, this mount is attached to the hard drive cages and can be moved to either cage or removed altogether if need be.
The accessory bag contains all the mounting screws, 5 1/4” to 3 1/2” bay adapter, front cover for the 3 1/2” bay device and the rubber pad for the tray on top of the case.
As I mentioned the power supply mounts on the bottom of the case, Antec has provided a bracket for that and silicone vibration dampeners have been pre-installed on the bottom of the case as well.
Also inside we find the standard motherboard header connections, Firewire, USB, and Audio. Antec also included a wire management system in the form of a plastic 'belt' and twist fastener at the top of the case. You'll notice in the following picture that the fan power connectors are also the pass though type so you won't loose any connectors.
The 200mm fan is probably the most important part of the Nine Hundred, this fan is basically the main exhaust fan, we all know that heat rises and the Antec 'Big Boy' will certainly pull it all out as it comes off your components. I really like the idea of having the 200mm fan mounted on the top of the case as it is, but if you are like me, then you are used to setting things on top of your case, can't do that anymore obviously…
–
–
–
–
A Better Look at Things
Continued:
On the bottom of the case we find four, textured rubber feet to not only keep the Nine Hundred from sliding around, but they will also help to quiet the case through dampening any vibrations from it.
Here's a picture of the PCI slot covers I mentioned earlier, not much more to say about them that I already didn't say.
The hard drive cages are fastened with thumbscrews for easy access to install your hard drives.
The hard drive cages slide out from the front of the case, I like how Antec designed the front so that your devices are sort of inset into the case and not flush with the front like most cases are.
Oh, here's a picture of the rubber mat installed on the top of the case, the rubber mat is textured to prevent things from moving as well.
Before we move to the next section, I wanted to take a look at the hard drive cage, each cage holds three drives, and comes with a 120mm fan pre-installed as an intake to make sure your drives remain cool.
Installation, Testing and Comparison
Since I closed the last section with the hard drive cage, I'll start with a pic of a hard drive installed in one of them. Installation is easy, for the most part, as long as you have a magnetic tip screwdriver handy, it was a pain to drop the screw into the hole and get it to go into the hard drive mounting hole.
Next up I installed the power supply, an Antec EarthWatts 500Watt PSU to be exact, hey Antec case, Antec PSU, great combination…
No problems with installation, actually it's easier to install the PSU on the bottom of the case, you don't have to hold it in place while screwing it in.
The motherboard tray does not come out, some people complain about that when the trays don't come out, but it really doesn't matter to me either way, to me it seems like and extra step actually, install mobo to try then install tray, why not just install mobo to tray?!?! To each his own I guess…
For the most part there is ample room inside the Nine Hundred for everything, of course some cable management will be needed to make optimum use of the 120mm fans for good airflow. One thing that I would add are fan grills to the fans though, I feel that all fans should include fan grills..
There seems to be ample room for everything inside the Nine Hundred, even larger sized video cards should have no problem fitting, but the extra internal fan mount may have to be removed for them to fit. I did find having the power supply on the bottom a bit of a challenge for routing wires, you can see in the second picture I have on of the power wires going over top of my video card.
Installation, Testing and Comparison Continued:
To wrap up this review I have a few pictures of the case all powered up and lit up.
The Nine Hundred seems to keep everything very cool, and with the fans on low speed it is very quiet, even the 200mm 'Big Boy' fan is quiet on low speed.
Of course turning them up to high speed they will get quite loud, and annoyingly so, at least for me anyway, other may not care about the noise level.
Overall I could not find any real problems with the Antec Nine Hundred Gaming Case, except for the fact that it isn't exactly portable as they make it seem to be. Maybe including a built in handle, or even a separate carrying strap would help quite a bit, but as is, with everything in it, it is quite heavy and not too portable.
I really like the blue and black color scheme, but I would have liked to have seen the 200mm fan with blue LEDs as well, it would have made it much brighter inside the case to really show off all your 'stuff' that you have in there.
Originally I wasn't quite sure of this case, but it sort of grew on me, I was expecting it to be quite loud with all the fans running but it is surprisingly quiet and keeps things nice and cool. After I finished the review I actually decided to move my main rig into the Nine Hundred which has four of the 5.25” bays occupied, and one HDD cage full as well. I also have my 7900GT's installed in SLI as well, I moved on of the 120MM fans from the HDD cage to the side of the case for more airflow on my video cards and they are kept nice and cool, even under full SLI load. Overall I am very happy with the Antec Nine Hundred case, so much so it sits right next to me as I right this review and is very quiet, except when the fans of the video cards kick into high speed, need to do something about that….
Summary:
As I mentioned I really couldn't find anything wrong with the Antec Nine Hundred Gaming Case, maybe a few improvements could be made, but as is it is a very well made and well designed case. What more can I say really? I like the case so much my main system is now in it and I am very happy that way.
DragonSteelMods gives the Antec Nine Hundred a 4.5 out of 5 and our Recommended Award as well.
Pros:
-Functional, stylish and yet hardcore
-Excellent cooling
-Quiet
-Well made
-Antec quality
-Configurable to fit any needs of the user
-Innovative design
-Nice extras
Cons:
-A bit bulky, and heavy when full to be a Lan Case, not very portable
I would like to thank Antec for the chance to review the Nine Hundred Advanced Gaming Case and for their continued support of DSM.