Silverstone's Raven RV04 Case Pictured

[bystander]

@RedJaron: I believe the vapor chamber coolers do not work well at 90 degrees.

 

[bucknutty]

Whats the point of mounting an ATX board on the left side of the case rather than the right? Is this just for looks or does it serve a technical purpose. I have noticed almost all the HPs we have been using in the office for the past few years have been this configuration. They are not BTX , but upside down ATX?

temps/airflow. the hottest part in a performance gaming system is far and away the gpu(s). most gpus (even the blow types) leak a lot of heat into the case. in fact, the nonblowers basically blow the heat straight into the case.

heat rises... so you stick a few high end gpus in SLi, and the ambient air temps in the case will get very hot. by putting those parts under the cpu you're really gimping your air cooling for your cpu cooler. The ambientt air will be rather hot, raising the cpu temps as a result. lowering the overclocks you can achieve.

As a result, buy turning the board upside down they let "convection" (heat rises) work for them. now all that heat energy being vented into the case will escape up and out of the case, and not affect the air around the cpu, ram & nb too much... this will allow you to overclock on air more efficiently.

It's likely a change of only a few C, but it IS a more efficient design.

I find it hard to believe that the temp difference would be more than 1 or 2 degrees. Do you know of an article where they compared similar left and right mobo mounted cases? Couldn't one prove or disprove this theory by simply turning their computer upside down?

The way I see it I would rather have the GPU on the bottom in the cooler part of the case, cooling the gpu is often a larger challenge then cooling the CPU.

I have a dell on my work bench today that is the same thing, upside down ATX. Both Dell and HP would not be doing it if there was not a really good reason. I understand BTX but not really left mounted ATX.

 

[bucknutty]

The case does look slick though.

 

[chumly]

It's BATMAN!

 

[bucknutty]

I don't really get it. The point of the Raven case line was the vertical orientation of the motherboard, so they could pack that array of huge fans at the bottom for vertical airflow.
What does a 180 degree rotation get you besides making it so heatpipe coolers on graphics cards don't work? Silverstone had better have a big warning about using videocards with heatpipes.
Also, this new Raven is the ugliest one yet I think. The RV02 wasn't bad.

What makes you think heatpipe coolers on GPUs don't work with the fan pointed up? Is there an article or something you can link? The reason I ask is I have a 7850 in a custom case where the IO shield and connectors point straight down (completely wrong by all normal thinking). So you plug the monitor in the bottom. This card has dual axial fans which throw all the heat in the case anyway so I figured the vents in the io shield would act as intakes. It seems to work fine and does not run any hotter than when it was in a more normal configuration.

 

[g-unit1111]

Looks like a smaller TJ11 but I like it.

 

[nukemaster]

Nukemaster, what problems did past Ravens have with Video cards? The Raven 3 is one of the few cases that works equally well with centrifugal and axial fans on the GPU. Either way, the air around the card is getting blown up and out the case.
I agree with others, without the 90* rotation, this is NOT a Raven case. Looks like I won't be upgrading my Raven 3 anytime soon.

Some reports(i randomly saw some on the net) on the net stated that the heatpipes on some cards did not function properly with the 90 degree configuration leading to much higher temps.

Sorry, I can not find the links right now.....

Edit...

One such link
http://en.expreview.com/2010/11/15/90%C2%B0-rotationhow-to-install-heatpipe-cooler/11843.html

 

[ingtar33]

Some reports(i randomly saw some on the net) on the net stated that the heatpipes on some cards did not function properly with the 90 degree configuration leading to much higher temps.

Sorry, I can not find the links right now.....

Edit...

One such link
http://en.expreview.com/2010/11/15/90%C2%B0-rotationhow-to-install-heatpipe-cooler/11843.html

some heatpipes ARE orientation sensitive. Both on the cpu and gpu. Putting them in the wrong orientation can net as much as a 5c change in performance.

not all heatpipes/sinks are like this... but some are.

they don't stop working, they just don't work as efficiently.

and yes... though i get the upside-down motherboard and the general concept... i don't like it. the IO port should be on the top of the raven, that was the whole point of the series. to maximize airflow.

 

[shiitaki]

Sad that one of the best idea's Silverstone had has been abandoned. I have the RV03 version and love not having to dig behind the case to plug something in.. The changes I would have made to the RV03 to make an RV04 would have been to drop the 8 slot layout, the EATX support, Went with standard size 200 mm case fans for the bottom.
In my opinion, they ditched the best feature of the serious, and as far as the biggerwindow goes, smaller is definitely better in my opinion, having had a case with windows on both sides and top, trying to make the cables look good can be a pain.
Having a more conservative version of the RV03's plastic bits would be nice, and should be too costly, but I agree with the others that they broke was was right, and kept what was wrong.

 

[nukemaster]

Some reports(i randomly saw some on the net) on the net stated that the heatpipes on some cards did not function properly with the 90 degree configuration leading to much higher temps.

Sorry, I can not find the links right now.....

Edit...

One such link
http://en.expreview.com/2010/11/15/90%C2%B0-rotationhow-to-install-heatpipe-cooler/11843.html

some heatpipes ARE orientation sensitive. Both on the cpu and gpu. Putting them in the wrong orientation can net as much as a 5c change in performance.

not all heatpipes/sinks are like this... but some are.

they don't stop working, they just don't work as efficiently.

and yes... though i get the upside-down motherboard and the general concept... i don't like it. the IO port should be on the top of the raven, that was the whole point of the series. to maximize airflow.

They still have other cases with that idea such as the mentioned TJ11 and the fortress series(the FT03 mini is an SG05 if its front ).

I have an FT03 and DO like it, just honestly not sure if I should go with a blower style card for my next video card or not. It is not the air flow machine the Raven and FT02 are, so removal of heat "may" be an issue one way or the other.

Thoughts on this?
Current setup
http://imageshack.us/a/img39/1358/dsc0458s.jpg

 

[bystander]

Thoughts on this?
Current setup
http://imageshack.us/a/img39/1358/dsc0458s.jpg

Now that is compact in depth, yet very tall. It looks like it would be tight in Crossfire.

This is mine: http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/26/computerh.jpg/ (I have 680's now)

 

[RedJaron]

@RedJaron: I believe the vapor chamber coolers do not work well at 90 degrees.

Some reports(i randomly saw some on the net) on the net stated that the heatpipes on some cards did not function properly with the 90 degree configuration leading to much higher temps.

Sorry, I can not find the links right now.....

Edit...

One such link
http://en.expreview.com/2010/11/15/90%C2%B0-rotationhow-to-install-heatpipe-cooler/11843.html

some heatpipes ARE orientation sensitive. Both on the cpu and gpu. Putting them in the wrong orientation can net as much as a 5c change in performance.

not all heatpipes/sinks are like this... but some are.

they don't stop working, they just don't work as efficiently.

and yes... though i get the upside-down motherboard and the general concept... i don't like it. the IO port should be on the top of the raven, that was the whole point of the series. to maximize airflow.

Nuke, sorry, but I have a hard time taking that link seriously given the very poor grammar, formating, and spelling.

Ingtar beat me to it. Yes, some heat pipes / vapor chambers have very specific orientation needs, but those are generally the ones without any sort of wicking system inside. Consider how CPU tower coolers often support both Intel and AMD mounting, but end up in different orientations depending on brands. I'd hate to think those manufacturers don't take orientation into account when designing. As for GPU cooling, considering that 90% of cases today have the card hanging upside-down, which means gravity keeps the liquid from contacting the side closest to the heat source. I can't believe that card manufacturers don't take that into consideration too. If anything, having the card mounted right-side-up in a Raven 4 would mean the heat pipes should work even better.

If you look at most cards, the cooling fins run the length of the card while the pipes run crosswise. This alignment means the majority of the heat pipe length is orthogonal to the mboard. So as long as the mboard isn't laying flat, the heat pipe will be horizontal to gravity and able to work fine. Some aftermarket coolers have the pipes running lengthwise, so yes, using a Raven case with those means the wick will be fighting gravity the whole time.

All in all, my 6870 Vapor-X ( axial fan, not blower, ) runs swimmingly in my Raven 3 case. With case fans on low, and throwing LuxMark and Folding at it, the card tops out at 58 degrees, only 36 above ambient. My 2600K won't go above 53 in Prime95.

 

[5teviewonders]

I don't how there would be an advantage of having the motherboard the other way around. The cpu cooler would be at the bottom of the case which would surely be a disadvantage as heat rises.

 

[nukemaster]

I have an old 5770 with a vapor chamber so that would be easy to test.

While the review looks strange on its own, I have seen other forums that users had similar issues on. It was just something that I have notices mentioned over time. Without EVER using those kinds of cards at 90 degrees, I can not comment with 100% certainty. In my case(FT03) I think i would be more limited by the cases low air flow.

I have a 650ti in what is considered to be the BAD way to have its cooler without any issues either.
http://imageshack.us/a/img198/6500/dsc0503rl.jpg

@ bystander, It is not taller then most average cases. crossfire/sli would work they have and extra space for air intake on the lower(side card), but I would not personally do it. I do like the space savings this case offers.

 

[pocketdrummer]

I wonder when Silverstone will start making high quality, Lian-Li class chassis again. All this plastic makes me ill. Don't get me wrong, Silverstone is a fantastic company. I wrote them an e-mail just giving them feedback about how much they've been disappointing me with all the plastic and they responded with a 5 paragraph message outlining all the reasons why. I get why they're doing it, I just wish they'd allocate more funds toward a top-tier offering in each form factor.
1 all aluminum Full-Tower
1 all aluminum Mid-Tower
1 all aluminum SFF of some sort.
Or, better yet, follow Lian-Li's business model by creating a daughter company to handle affordable cases so as to not tarnish the brand.

 

[RedJaron]

I have an old 5770 with a vapor chamber so that would be easy to test.

While the review looks strange on its own, I have seem other forums that users had similar issues on. It was just something that I have notices mentioned over time. Without EVER using those kinds of cards at 90 degrees, I can not comment with 100% certainty. In my case(FT03) I think i would be more limited by the cases low air flow.

I have a 650ti in what is considered to be the BAD way to have its cooler without any issues either.
http://imageshack.us/a/img198/6500/dsc0503rl.jpg

As I said, I also have a vapor card right now and I never see thermal problems with it hanging vertically. I imagine a cooling solution like this would have the worst problems hanging vertically since gravity is fighting almost every inch of heat pipe.

I would think cards such as yours shouldn't be too bad since you don't have long sections of heat pipe / vapor chambers that would hang vertically. The working fluid only needs to make it back far enough to hit material hot enough that will flash boil it. Considering how thermally conductive copper is, I don't imagine that's only by the CPU/GPU die.