MGE Viper: Another Xtreme Gamer Creation
by Purav Sanghani on December 18, 2004 5:14 PM EST- Posted in
- Cases/Cooling/PSUs
External Design
The visual design of a chassis can be simple yet elegant or extremely detailed and heavily modified from the factory. No matter what the case is, personal preference plays a large role in whether the case will be accepted by each individual user. Many prefer that we review cases based solely on how they look instead of looking inside to the guts of a product to see how they perform. We ourselves at AnandTech have our own opinions when it comes to the looks of certain products, but we try to go deeper into it to see what makes the case worth investing in or else, what changes can be made in future models.MGE's XGbox line of gaming cases takes their reference designs and adds custom-molded bezels and custom-designed side windowed panels to give consumers various options from which to choose.
The Viper's front bezel is a custom-designed piece made of plastic that features a two-color combination of, in this test case, red and black. MGE carries on these colors throughout the chassis and we will seldom see a section of unpainted metal. At the top of the bezel, we noticed the sinister Viper logo, which is red on black at the center on the horizontal. The logo will light up when the system is powered.
Click to enlarge.
Towards the bottom of the bezel, we see a large rectangular LCD temperature display, which features a system up-time counter, an animated Viper logo, and a single temperature readout. The temperature lead can be attached to any component, but we prefer to attach it to the CPU, since it is the most critical component. We would have liked to see a full-featured temperature display, which could keep tabs on more than just a single component to get a better idea of how each piece of hardware is performing in the area of heat dissipation.
Right click hereto play video.
Below the LCD display is a grill that allows air to be pulled in. We hope to see an air filter to keep dust and debris from entering the chassis.
Click to enlarge.
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Denial - Saturday, December 18, 2004 - link
Wow, I'm at a loss for words. Who buy such a thing?Nice review :)
radx - Saturday, December 18, 2004 - link
Can't say i love the design of this case. But i do like one thing better with this case than my own Antec Sonata, that be the 120MM fan behind the hard drives. Rather than my case which has the 120mm fan infront of the hard drives.Other than that another cool review done by the guys at anandtech :)
Gatak - Saturday, December 18, 2004 - link
A few of them:http://www.mini-itx.com/projects/decobox/images/de...
http://www.mini-itx.com/news/images/story0363b.jpg
http://www.mini-itx.com/news/computex2004-4/images...
http://www.mini-itx.com/news/images/story0353.jpg
http://www.mini-itx.com/projects/gramaphone-itx-hd...
http://www.mini-itx.com/news/computex2004-4/images...
http://www.mini-itx.com/news/images/story0330.jpg
Gatak - Saturday, December 18, 2004 - link
How about looking for quality cases which are more pleasingly designed? Instead of monsters I would like to see something that would fit nicely in a modern home. Look on how expensive home cinema receivers are designed.Look on this page for many really nice cases: http://www.mini-itx.com/
A few of them:
Locut0s - Saturday, December 18, 2004 - link
To make it clear Purav I'm not saying that Anandtech should look at cases on their external merits alone as you suggest many who complain about style are suggesting. In fact I don't think many of us who are complaining about style are saying that at all. Instead we are saying in many instances "What a shame that such a good case is ruined by such ugly looks". Unlike the internals of a computer where I think looks truly don't matter the chassis is really the only physical presence of the computer that you are ever ware of on a day to day basis. As such many of us would prefer not to have our chassis making a statement such as "hay look how cool I am over here Look Look Look...!" That doesn't mean that the internals of a case are not the most important thing, far from it they are the most important aspect of any case. But that doesn't mean that the external design of a case can't almost completely offset all the goodies inside, it definitely can. No matter how good the internals of a case are I am not purchase a bright yellow Pikachu case for example.By the way I happen to really look forward to most of the case reviews here at Anandtech, they are very thorough and informative. It's not the reviews I have a beef with, it's the trend in the industry to this look that I don't like.
Just my 2 cents
GnomeCop - Saturday, December 18, 2004 - link
sickNovaoblivion - Saturday, December 18, 2004 - link
should be- External visuals wont appeal to anyone
lol
Kccdx2 - Saturday, December 18, 2004 - link
Too true #1shoRunner - Saturday, December 18, 2004 - link
yeah whats up with all the cases looking like they were designed by playschool. More funky colored plastic is not better. Its a computer not an action figureLocut0s - Saturday, December 18, 2004 - link
*sigh*The following needs to be in bold in "The Bad" section:
- External visuals may not appeal to some
Or maybe a label on the box "For ages 12 and under"