Zalman HD160

Manufacturer:	Zalman
Price:	£220 inc VAT
Reviewer:	Josh Blodwell
Review Date:	Jul 2006
SCORE	4/6

Verdict: Simple and stylish, but at the expense of airflow

If you're building a PC for the lounge, the last thing you want is eye-catching bling. The TV should be the focus, while the media PC should be as inconspicuous as possible.

Zalman has certainly made some attention-grabbing cases in the past, such as the monolithic TNN 300, but the HD160 is much more discreet. Clothed in dark, brushed aluminium, with a simple green VFD and volume knob, it looks little different to a high-end Teutonic amp.

The VFD and volume knob are both compatible with Windows Media Center Edition 2005, and the VFD contains an integrated IR detector that will work with the Microsoft MCE remote, so you won't need to position the ugly external detector on top of the beautiful case.

Although Zalman has taken the trouble to make sure there are no wires spewing forth from the HD160, it's pretty easy to thwart this intention, because behind a flip-down front panel is a handy range of ports and plugs: two USB 2 ports, a FireWire port, a 7-in-1 memory card reader, as well as headphone and microphone jacks.

Contrary to popular belief, a good media centre is also a relatively powerful PC; at the very least, it needs a great deal of disk space and a powerful processor to keep the video running smoothly - in terms of media centre perfection, think of a dual-core CPU and more than a terabyte of storage, and you won't be too far off the mark.

The HD160 has plenty of room for drives, with four bays for 3.5in disks. Three are contained in a cage that's fiddly to assemble, but, as is often the case with Zalman kit, it's certainly clever. The drives are mounted on their sides, so as not to trap hot air. They'll get warm, but not dangerously hot. The bays in the cage all have anti-vibration pads, which can be attached using grommets, to keep the clicking of accessing disks to a minimum. The fourth 3.5in bay sits in a tiny area over the 5.25in bay, and suffers from a lack of airflow, so we wouldn't advise using it unless you've filled the cage.

Although the HD160 is big compared with cases such as the Hiper Media Chassis, it isn't massive, so the interior can be quite tight on space. There's only the bare minimum of space between the front of the motherboard and the drive bays, which may make it tricky to plug in EIDE cables if you have a board with its EIDE ports pointing forwards. However, the HD160 is tall enough to accommodate a big, quiet CPU cooler such as the Zalman CNPS9500LED.

Lots of hard disks and a speedy CPU mean heat, so while a media centre case should look good, it also needs good internal design to keep everything cool and quiet. Zalman has entrusted the task of cooling the HD160 to two 80mm exhaust fans, positioned at the rear of the case, near where the CPU HSF will be situated.

Normally, we demonise the 80mm fan, but here, it's a moot point, as the HD160's dimensions mean there's no space for anything larger. The supplied fan cable will power them at either 12V or 5V. Running at 5V, there was no buzz or rattle, and the only sound they produced was a subdued whooshing, which we found to be perfectly acceptable.

However, you might need to bump them from 5V to 12V to get air flowing through the case. The HD160 has no intake fans, so it relies on the two exhaust fans creating enough negative air pressure to suck a sufficient quantity of cool air in through the vents to keep all your components cool. The case is meant to be used with a PSU with a 120mm fan, as the intake of the PSU will line up with a vent on the side of the case, so the PSU will draw in cool air directly from outside the case.

There are lots of vents dotted around the case. One is located underneath the 3.5in bays in the hope of convective cooling, while another is situated by the PCI slots at the back; there's also another adjustable vent on the lid, which can be opened to help the heatsink below, or closed to reduce noise.

CONCLUSION

If the HD160 were a desktop case, we'd be forced to lambast it for its lack of intake fans. As a media centre case, though, the emphasis must fall more on the level of noise it generates, and we feel that Zalman has made a good compromise between noise and heat by using two quiet 80mm fans, lots of well-placed vents and a clever intake for the PSU.

The HD160 looks good, and little touches, such as the VFD with integrated MCE IR sensor, show real attention to detail. In fact, the only niggle with the design is the placement of the 3.5in drive bay cage. There's no direct airflow, so we'd think twice about putting more than two drives in there.

The HD160 commands a price that matches its upmarket looks, and it's significantly more expensive than either the APlus GL2 or the SilverStone Lascala. There's very little to choose between the three cases in terms of the space they offer, so the decision will probably come down to more personal factors such as aesthetics. The HD160 is just as good as the GL2 or Lascala, and personally, we think it's worth the money.