Gigabyte Poseidon Chassis

Testing

We look for a number of things when we test a PC chassis. We’ve already mentioned that we want enough room to get our hands in around the cables if possible, but other aspects of the case design are important too.

Heat and noise are the main concerns here; we want a case which manages heat effectively and sensibly and which also doesn’t get too loud. It doesn’t matter how it does it – crazily inventive heat-reflective and noise-absorbing materials are just as good as a good sized set of fans, but in order to win our coveted ‘Recommended Award’ it has to perform well in these categories. Ease of installation, heat performance and noise limitation – critical elements of any PC case.

To make sure we have a decent, consistently reliable benchmark we always install the same system into the case. This is the second outing now for our new motherboard, as our first was crippled shortly after the review of the Antec P190 case.

Oh, and just for the record; I’m still waiting for that damn pony you owe me. Don’t make me get mad, put on my leather jacket and get all Miami Vice on yo’ass!


Our test rig is as follows:

CPU: Intel Pentium XE 955 (dual-core, 3.46GHz)
Graphics Card: Sapphire Radeon X1600 XT Ultimate
Motherboard: MSI P6N SLI Platinum
RAM: 2x 512MB Corsair XMS2 DDR2-667
Hard Drive: 1x 250GB Western Digital WD2500 7200RPM

Installation of this system actually went surprisingly smoothly and our fears that the case would be too small for our massive man-mitts proved unfounded. We installed the motherboard and PSU without problem or complaint – as if we had reached geek nirvana and our fingers had become long shafted screwdrivers. The graphics card was a bit of a problem as, through repeated use the metal cover of the drive cover has become slightly twisted and the tool-less clip system had some trouble holding it in steady and generally proved a bit stiff to operate.


The tool-less lock system for the optical drives proved easy to use however and our DVD-RW slid in as if it had been greased before clamping faster and stronger than an angry Traffic Warden. Damn Traffic Wardens.