What features do you want on your cases?

[oliverguy]

Hi, I'm doing a design project at school and I need to collect some information about computer case design.

 

What I'm particularly interested in is how you would design your ideal computer case. What is it made of? How big do you want it? Do you need support for water cooling or hard drives?

 

Essentially if you were going to manufacture your perfect computer case what would it be?

 

Thank you!

[The Sloth]

a air 540 is perfect for me, so something

roomy

good cable management 

good cooling support with aio and big air coolers

SLI support

lots of fan support

well made

simple design  

 

[King_of_Oz]

2 minutes ago, nerdslayer1 said:

a air 540 is perfect for me, so something

roomy

good cable management 

good cooling support with aio and big air coolers

SLI support

lots of fan support

well made

simple design  

 

Same!

[Noah Vega]

make something original never before done because if you don't then it will just be another ordinary case.

[oliverguy]

1 minute ago, Noah Vega said:

make something original never before done because if you don't then it will just be another ordinary case.

given the opportunity what kind of outlandish design or features would you have?

[knightslugger]

i want a case that is highly acousitically quiet and has thoughtful airflow designs in mind.

[Damascus]

I'm a huge fan of very small ITX cases but for a full ATX build I like to see

clean 2.5" ssd brackets on display

2x 280mm watercooling brackets (top, front etc)

a 90 degree GPU tray for display

Stark, angular design is very popular , as are clean straight lines

 

[Enderman]

The S340, but with less small openings especially on the back.

Sealed case = less dust.

Also, the top should be solid white instead of black with a fan hole.

[TidaLWaveZ]

Minimalist design, psu shroud/basement, good cable managment, 360mm rad support

[Damascus]

Think of a case that is this GPU incarnate.  sleek, gunmetal and carbon fiber with some very nice angular highlights

 

[Daniel644]

FULL ATX support, HDMI passthrough to the front, brushed metal and/or tempered glass everywhere, support for water cooling, a basement that hides the PSU, HDD's (supoort for several 3.5" drives) and a hidden full 5.25" optical drive bay, so I have it when I need it but it's not in your face when you aren't using it, basically for reference, something along the line of the Inwin 904 Plus but with a brushed silver color metal like the original 904, but with full water cooling support and a proper basement.

 

Another reference is basically a bigger Enthoo Evolve mATX, that hides the optical drive at the back of the case, but support for ATX motherboards and watercooling while having the 5.25" bay occupied.

[PCMasterDebater]

It would be nice to get one made entirely out of carbon fiber.

[kirashi]

3 hours ago, oliverguy said:

What I'm particularly interested in is how you would design your ideal computer case.

What is it made of?

How big do you want it?

Do you need support for water cooling or hard drives?

So I'm a wee bit biased toward HTPC cases that only support mITX or mATX motherboards, simply because I'm not into hardcore overclocking which would require a larger case to accommodate 280mm radiators, or even 240mm radiators for that matter. It's just not me.

However, I do have some things I'm quite picky about:

• Made of Aluminium, preferably non-brushed because that stuff stains
• Sizing no larger than a mid-tower, but ideally as space efficient as possible
• HARD DRIVE SUPPORT. Holy balls, I'm getting sick of cases that don't offer storage accessories.

There's nothing wrong with lack of storage if you'd rather use the space for a large radiator or custom water cooling solution, or flat out just don't need the extra hard drive trays. But what is with these mid-tower cases that have 2x 3.5" drive bays and 2-3x 2.5" drive bays?

They're basically an inefficient design even if you throw a 280mm radiator up front, since often there's still room for mounting hard drives vertically or even horizontally to the left of the radiator between the motherboard and rad. I'm not saying these things need to be included with the base SKU, but the lack of mounting accessories for mid-tower and smaller cases is astonishing, especially since we've got all these custom watercooling parts now.

 

I guess I'm just one of those storage enthusiasts (https://www.reddit.com/r/DataHoarder/) who manages to cram twice the number of supported drives into cases using cardboard and 3M VHB tape. Fractal Design has got this figured out though, since they're one of the only manufacturers who seem to know how to make mid-tower and HTPC cases with room for copious amounts of hard drives.

[TVwazhere]

Dust filters everywhere, Including the top (not enough cases do this). Captive thumbscrews everywhere. Support for water cooling OR hard drives, not necessarily both at the same time.  Modularity would be nice. The Vertical cable shroud idea is nice. "Show off" SSD's for the basement shroud. 

[Damascus]

23 hours ago, kirashi said:

Fractal Design has got this figured out though, since they're one of the only manufacturers who seem to know how to make mid-tower and HTPC cases with room for copious amounts of hard drives.

Lol, this is a bit off topic but I have a Node 202 and can barely cram a 2.5" ssd in there

[redtute]

Type c usb 3.1 front header.

[xDylanio]

My perfect case would have

 

1) Awesome options for cable management, including rubber grauments

2) Tempered glass side panel

3) Huge amount of options for cooling, from air to aio to water cooling'

4) 2 hdd drive bays and one ssd, preferably on the back. 

 

[maz]

I'm going for something like this;

Shoebox size ITX (DAN Cases A4-SFX is 7.2L)

fits a full length GPU

1 - 2 3.5" HDD's

1 - 2 2.5" SSD's

a 240 or JUST possibly a thin 360 watercooler

Full Length GPU support

4 x USB C 3.1 Type A at front panel

along with headphone/mic combo port at front

sleek, stylish, like the DAN Cases A4-SFX ( I might just get an A4-SFX and mod the front panel), preferably with a carry handle like the Lian-Li TU-100/200.

[Guest]

i will go with node 202 design but with all metal construction