Palo Alto Products ATCX Mid Tower/Desktop ATX

Of course, there is also the 80mm exhaust fan built into the power supply, which is actually optional from Palo Alto, and may not be included by every distributor. The model Palo Alto includes is a Delta Electronics 235W model that is fully ATX 2.01 compliant, FCC/CE approved and includes 5 standard and 1 mini power connector. Just like with the exhaust fan mount, the slots for air to flow into and out of the power supply are cut as large as possible. Unfortunately, the power supply does not feature a physical power switch on the back that many other units do and that can come in quite handy at times.

The ATCX case itself also meets all ATX 2.01 requirements, including a standard cutout at the back of the case for a standard ATX I/O shield. Yet again, Palo Alto has gone the extra mile with the ATCX by increasing the EMI shielding in this area to a practically unheard of level (as shown here).

With drive bays are configured such that an extended ATX motherboard should fit fine as long as the front right corner is cut out as the extended ATX specification calls for (similar to the Tyan Thunderbolt). An impressive feat considering many cases this size can't even hold the ABIT BX6 Revision 2.0, much less an extended ATX board. This is actually the reason that the upper two 3.5" external drive bays are included - a 5.25" device in that space would run right into many ATX boards. With the vertically mounted hard drive in front, there's plenty of room to work inside, despite the fairly small external dimensions.

As can be seen in the pictures of the interior, there is a bar that attaches the front to the rear approximately half way up the case. This bar snaps in places and is then secured with a regular case screw. It gives the case added rigidity, but you are warned to not use it as a handle.

The ATCX's front bezel snaps in place and features two orange LED's for power and HDD access as well as power and reset buttons. Both buttons have good tactile feedback and are small enough that they won't accidentally be pressed, but aren't so small that they are unusable. Fairly large holes are cut in the front of the bezel to allow for unimpeded air flow. Front panel connectors are all standard connectors with the appropriate labels on the connectors. One minor issue with the connectors is that the power LED connector has the middle pin blocked off (as shown below), which is OK for some motherboards that don't have a pin there, but requires bending away a pin on others (like our test bed ABIT BX6-2).

With the rest of the case so well built, it's no surprise that all metal edges are carefully rounded and not sharp at all.