Lian Li's PC-V1000: A Case Exclusive
by Purav Sanghani on April 29, 2004 12:05 AM EST- Posted in
- Cases/Cooling/PSUs
External Design
When first looking at the PC-V1000 out of the box, it seems like an ordinary chassis with a few custom touches. The entire front bezel as well as the bottom and a small section at the back of the chassis are covered with small round holes, which allow for increased air flow during system operation.
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There are a total of five 5-1/4" drive bays exposed, where the 1st bay is occupied by a matching CD-ROM bezel and the 5thbay is occupied by the 5-1/4" to 3-1/2" drive bay converter/bezel. This leaves three 5-1/4" drive bays free.
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Directly below the drive bays are the Power button and the power and HDD LEDs. Lian Li decided to leave the reset button out of this design, which will limit that functionality. The internal connector for the power button is also mislabeled as "reset sw", which could be confusing to some. The power and HDD LEDs are a bit small compared to those on their previous cases, but are bright and easy to see.
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At the bottom of the front bezel are the auxiliary connections for audio (headphones and mic), dual USB, and Firewire. They seem to blend in with the rest of the face quite nicely.
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The PC-V1000 also has aluminum wheels that allow users to roll the case forward and back. Since the wheel mountings are screwed on, they can be removed easily with a Philips head screwdriver if preferred. The back wheels can be locked to keep the chassis from rolling.
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The side panels are made of the same thick aluminum as the rest of the chassis and have rounded corners to fit the shape of the case. The edges of both panels also have a saw-tooth style cut to give the PC-V1000 an industrial look.
The minute we turned the PC-V1000 around to look at the backside, we noticed something different about it. It looked like the case was turned upside down, and this is where the realization of the new design came in to play. If you can visualize a standard case, the power supply is mounted at the top with optional case fans directly below it and the add-on card openings below that. With Lian Li's introduction of this new design, everything from the motherboard back is turned upside down: power supply mounted at the bottom with the motherboard above it.
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The panel to access the PC-V1000's internals is now on the right panel. To remove either panel, we unscrewed what looked to be traditional thumbscrews, but were surprised to find them attached to the chassis. We found that Lian Li has designed a locking mechanism for the side panels, making them easier to remove and replace than the traditional sliding panel design. We pulled on the thumbscrew to release the mechanism and remove the tray.
Click to enlarge.
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32 Comments
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beachbum86 - Tuesday, September 27, 2005 - link
this case both looks and performes GREAT. the only problem that i havnt seen anyone point out is...dust.. with all those holes your bound to get dust build up... but this case is great. everyone posting obvioulsy just slappes in components to a case and calls it good.if you dont like the look...change it. add a front blowhole. put some lighting behind those holes to make some glow effect. alot of you guys that are complaining about looks, are what i like to call "lazy builders". so who cares if it looks like a G5. what about all the other cases that look like ...well, all the other cases. lian li helped break the mold of the normal case look that you guys are so intent on sticking with..your bunch of fallowers is it...learn to be a leader.
the case performes great (better than the rest) and it looks exactly how lian-li wanted.
racolvin - Monday, July 26, 2004 - link
Personally I'm ok with G5-copy look to it (aluminum, lots of hole .. you can't tell me this isn't "inspired by a G5). I'm even ok with the price for it.However ...
I will not now nor will I ever buy a tower case with the USB/Audio/Firewire ports on BOTTOM of the friggin case! As much as I would love to buy a new tower case and build a new system, this floor placement of the ports it totally unacceptable. Heck, the cable for my headphones would never reach from the floor to my head! Much less the task of plugging/unplugging my digital camera or iPod. No, I'll keep my $200 thank you very much
melgross - Sunday, May 9, 2004 - link
This case seems to be ok. The one thing it tends to prove is that off the cuff ideas of what is correct is often proven wrong by real engineering. Just looking at a case and thinking,"I don't know, it doesn't look like the cooling should work", is meaningless.By the way, having holes all over the front is not a new idea. Dell's servers have a fully perforated front just like Apple's do.
Most other servers I have seen over the years either have a mesh front, or a completely open front with the hard drive cases constituting the front panel and such. The idea isn't to create a tornado, but a constant flow over all areas with several fans in the rear. I've never seen these servers using filters, as that just cuts the air flow. Usually these are in conditioned, and filtered rooms to begin with, and aren't on a dirty floor. Vacuum once a week!
MajorKong - Wednesday, May 5, 2004 - link
How do you manage to review a case, complete with a dozen or more pictures of the empty case, but then provide NO pictures of the case with installed motherboard and other components?MWWInc - Saturday, May 1, 2004 - link
#9 - I would like to see pics of the assembled system as well. I bought one of those floppy bezels on my PC69 and happen to think they don't look good when there's an actual drive installed there.#13 - I agree that they could be more creative with the placement of the USB/audio ports, especially with the new "upside-down" layout where the extra USB headers on the board will probably be closer to the top of the case anyway.
And speaking of the layout, it seems like if you install hard drives in that bottom cage, your ATA cables are going to go on forever. (Pic: http://www.overclockercafe.com/Reviews/cases/Lian_...
It definitely borrows from the G5 look, but I have no problem with that, and seems to perform pretty well. But no removable motherboard tray, no reset button, no 2nd 5.25" bezel, and the cabling nuances mentioned above keep it from being the perfect case. And I would only consider spending $200 on a perfect case. ;-)
Brucmack - Saturday, May 1, 2004 - link
Something tells me the case would look better in black. Then the holes wouldn't be quite so loud, if you know what I mean.At least they put a filter over the intake fan, since that's where most of the air would come into the case, I would think.
Eug - Friday, April 30, 2004 - link
This is definitely a knockoff of the G5 externals, except that it doesn't look anywhere near as good.I like the G5 case, and I like Lian-Li's other cases, but this one is just Meh.
KristopherKubicki - Friday, April 30, 2004 - link
jdepew:It is pretty simple; the case isnt a G5 knock off (thats why it wasnt mentioned). Please check this out:
http://www.apple.com/powermac/design.html
Besides the little ventilation holes, there isnt a single resemblence between the two cases.
Kristopher
LoneWolf15 - Friday, April 30, 2004 - link
One more thing. Thanks Purav, for clearing up that power supply question. Much appreciated.LoneWolf15 - Friday, April 30, 2004 - link
I think it'd be a decent case, but it falls short on several things. Number one is price. That's ridiculous, and I'm not willing to pay it.The second issue I have is the cooling design. Separation of the hard disks from the rest of the system is a good idea in my mind provided it actually separates their heat from the CPU compartment, but both areas have to have ventilation systems dedicated to cooling them separately. I don't see that this case is really well designed for that. I was surprised by the cooling results being as good as they were, while the holes probably allow for good circulation, I was sure they would hamper adequate suction for the fans.
Finally, most serious enthusiass now have both a CD/DVD-reader, and a separate writer. A second CD-door faceplate ought to come with this, especially at that price..