BTX-style ATX cases.. where are they?

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testbenchdude

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Mar 28, 2006
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Ok, my other thread is not generating a lot of responses (none so far lol) so I thought I'd ask one of my questions directly here. Aside from the TJ06, does anybody know of any other high-quality upside-down mobo cases? Ideally I'd like it to be an aluminum full tower.

I've been searching all the regular case makers' sites but I haven't found anything yet. So, thanks if anyone can send a few links my way.

Later all.
 
Thanks for the replies you guys. When I was checking out Lian Li earlier, I must ahve missed those. I'm not too fond of bezel doors, but that spiral one looks pretty good as well. I'll check it out.
 
Ok, I went to Microcenter, and after I politely trained their sales staff as to what a "reverse ATX" case was (and then pointed the TJ06 out to them), I realized that if they had more, I was going to have to find them. And they did; there was a decent looking Antec case (I think); it's front was clearly inspired by the CMStackers but it was made of steel so no thank you, and they also had a Thermaltake Armor with a an ATX/BTX convertible tray and such. Ugh. It's like they couldn't decide whether or not to make a fascia door, so they compromised and made those little "shutters" that do absolutely nothing for the asthetics or security of the case IMHO. Meh.

Oh well. I guess I'm going to shop for one online now and my old Kingwin will have to do for the moment. Thanks again for the advice.
 
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16811133149

The Thermaltake Armor series also has a BTX conversion kit you can get.
Click to expand...


please dont listen to him, noob (no offense to ya buddy but ur post if off by a mile)


anyways

look at the thermaltake circle?, thermalrock full circle, something like taht


here the danm link

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16811133149

Noob? You linked to the same damned case I did! :lol:

I was pointing out that the Armor series has a BTX conversion in addition to listing the TT Circle. 😀
 
ahh but ur post was mis leading saying that the Armor was what he was looking for when it really was the Tt Circle. :)

once again no offense intended, it was for comical relief
 
Not really... You just have to be under-rested and over-caffeinated 😀

Sorry to the original poster if that was misleading... The TT Circle is already BTX, and the TT Armor can be made to be BTX (though I wouldn't suggest it).
 
actually ur wrong again (sorry)

the circle is fully ATX but the mobo is backwards, thats all.



@vimka, congrats u have sucessfully made the orig poster confused, very much

***************************

to clarify, Thermaltake circle is NOT BTX, it is ATX but the mobo is mounted backwards
 
Me = pwned

You're right 😳 I thought all BTX entailed was mounting the motherboard on the other side. A little google goes a long way...
 
/pwned by vim and pen

lol!

Ok, I don't like the Tt armor case, plain and simple, but the boxes I saw at the store said they were convertible from ATX to BTX for what it's worth.

I'm not confused, but you two seem to be a little.

:)
 
I recommend staying away from cases that mount the board upside-down, as heatpipe chipset coolers are less effective that way.
Click to expand...

Have to ask why you would think that. I didn't think heat pipes were gravity dependant, and besides, my mobo doesn't have a chipset heatpipe so that's not a concern. I'm in it for the cooling and the aesthetics.
 
Original heatpipes were all gravity devices. They work like the cooling tower in a power plant, they get hot at the bottom, the vapor condenses at the top.

Improvised designs use a wick, or a powdered wick, to draw the liquid back. But gravity works better, even when the wick is in place. I keep track of a few forums, and several builders have complained about chipset heatpipe performance issues when the motherboard was inverted.
 
I recommend staying away from cases that mount the board upside-down, as heatpipe chipset coolers are less effective that way.
Click to expand...

Have to ask why you would think that. I didn't think heat pipes were gravity dependant, and besides, my mobo doesn't have a chipset heatpipe so that's not a concern. I'm in it for the cooling and the aesthetics.

Heat pipes are only really effective if they are vertical. To the best of my understanding heat pipes are filled with liquid and as it boils the gas takes away the heat until it cools back into a liquid then drops back down and the cycle repeats. They use some weird spirally technology inside heat pipes to make them work horizontally too but it has to be facing a particular direction it was designed for or something like that.

Now a question of my own; do upside-down case really make that much of a difference to cooling?
 
lol

yah heat pipes arent AS effective upside down.

i hafve an Abit AT8 and its mounted right side up but i dont think the ATi RD480 chip set gets very hot.
 
Ok, thanks for explaining that.

Anyway, I'm not using any pipes right now, so that's a moot point. As an update, I finally settled on a case, the Antec P180 (black) because it puts the PSU in it's own chamber on the bottom and has 2 120mm fans drawing air over the CPU cooler plus a third on the bottom to draw air over the hard drives. I bought the case, and another two 120mm fans, for a grand total of 5.

I never thought I'd have a PC case that was cooler than I am... sheesh.

:)
 
The effectiveness of the heatpipe in different orientations is also very dependant on the heat pipe. For instance you will only have a degree or two increase if you take a Zalman 9500 from standing up (non tower computer style) to on its side (as it sits in a tower), gravity helps but not much. Other heat pipes with less effective wicks may be affected more by orientation.
 
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