SilverStone Fortress Series FT02B-USB3.0 Black Aluminum / Steel Computer Case with 2 x USB3.0 ports (Black)

Pros: Best case I have ever used, by far.

The airflow is fantastic, and the filtering is good enough that after 9 months of having the case sealed, there was virtually no dust inside.

I love the rotation on the motherboard. Having connectors on top means I don't need to pull the case out from the wall to get to the connections. Brilliant!

Lots of space inside. Lots of access for running cords out of the way.

Cons: The drive bays, while being well positioned, are plastic, flimsy, and aren't well made. Only 1 drive connector was included with the case, and it was almost too flimsy to use. I ended up getting a 3 bay hot-swap drive set that took up 2 of the 5 5-1/4" external bays in front, and that has worked very well for me.

Other Thoughts: Cost is also high, but with the exception of the internal drive bays the build quality was exceptional, and I thought it justified the cost.

Despite the poor internal drive bays, this case was so much better in design and other build quality I felt that 5 eggs was still justified.

Pros: Silent - Quality construction - Big!
Love the case, everything about it screams quality. Really like the layout and cables coming out the top rear. Keeps everything clean. Everything runs very quiet.

Case does fit the Rampage Extreme IV /w Noctua NH-D14

Cons: None that I can find, Price is a little high, but you get what you pay for.

Pros: This case has a lot going for it. I'd been wanting it for a year or so. (I'm super stingy and slow to buy.) When my workstation died at work and the lead time to replace it from Dell or HP with a dual Xeon was over a month, we just got this and I built my machine.

I wanted a quiet machine and no fan noise in my office. I wanted something with a lot of drive bays for all of my 2 and 3 TB HDDs which store a lot of data for my signal processing work. It certainly has lots of drive bays and I love that.

The connectors on the top of the case made things a lot simpler for me. I frequently plug in various USB devices like development boards from TI and Xilinx and Altera and so on. This case is very accessible in that regard. I never have to climb behind it.

I like the heft of this case. It's not going anywhere. Definitely not the case you'd bring to a LAN party, but for my needs at the office, I love that.

It looks sharp. I know there's a plastic-windowed version available. I didn't get that. I'd never live it down at the office. As it is, it's a nice looking case that's very functional.

Cons: So, I have several issues with this case.

1.) Fan noise! This was sold as a "silent" case. I bought an H80 Corsair liquid cooler. The setup should be nice and quiet. Unfortunately, of the 3 180mm intake fans at the bottom, two of them "click" as they rotate. The rear one clicks as the fan blades hit the fan housing. The front fan clicks from vibration. One of these days I'll get around to buying 2 high quality 180mm fans and replace those. I shouldn't have to do that on a case that is as expensive as this one. So I've been stymied in my goal of getting a silent PC under my desk, and not due to rotational noise. Due to fans hitting the fan housing. i.e. low-quality fans or a low-quality build. I guess they never spun the fans up to check this before they shipped it.

2.) There's actually a bit of an airflow problem with this case. There is a TON of intake on the bottom of the case. That's great. In fact, those 3 180mm fans on the bottom pull air into the case very well. Unfortunately, the top of the case has very little ventilation for exhaust. The main design feature of this case is that "heat rises" and they blow the air out the top as it rises over the components. The problem is that there's only ventilation at the back top of the case if you put cards in all of your PCI slots. (Empty PCI slots have grates over them so air can flow out there.) Well, I have 4 CUDA cards that I use with MATLAB for image processing work. All of my PCI slots are filled. And those cards generate a LOT of heat. The only other exhaust for the rest of the case, including the CPU is the 120mm case fan which is where I have the radiator for my Corsair H80. It becomes obvious when I start using my machine for heavy number crunching. All of the fans start to spin up and the fan noise becomes significant. There just isn't enough ventilation to get all of that heat out. Again, my goal for a silent workstation goes poof. I would say something like "I'm the exception with the hardware I've put in there", but I figure gamers will have things like dual NVidia 690s and other monsters in there. I assume others have had this issue.

3.) The power and reset switches look cool, but I don't like where they're placed. I've inadvertently turned the PC off/reset it multiple times. They're very sensitive and I reach to plug things in and bump it, and the machine goes down. Now I'm hyper-careful about this and it doesn't happen anymore, but that's annoying.

4.) As another reviewer mentioned, it only comes with one hot swap connector for the drive bays. Additional connectors are $11. Well, I've got an SSD mounted on the back and then 5 magnetic drives spinning away in the normal drive bays. I'd be spending $44 more for all of the hot swap connectors I need. Just like the other commenter, I'd simply expect that to be included. I didn't know that until I was building the box. So I did without. :(

Other Thoughts: I know I've griped about a few issues that I've encountered with the case. I don't want to give the wrong impression here. I really like the case. I could deal with the power switches. It's a minor annoyance. I could deal with the heat buildup since I really do think most users don't have 800 Watts of CUDA cards in their boxes. (CPU I have is an i7 Extreme Hexacore. Didn't go with dual xeons since the HPTX+ Mobo wouldn't fit in this case.)

BUT, the clicking fans are enough for me to drop it to 4 eggs and to motivate me to logon to Newegg two months after I bought it and write this review. That's just unforgivable. At least the manual has suggested replacement parts. And at least I have an expense account where I can just go buy them. But the (again) annoying part will be taking my PC apart to get to them to fix it. Le *sigh*. And that means down time where I'm not working.

Off to buy some fans.

Pros: This is a solidly build case! Its quiet (with pads for noise insulation), the rotated motherboard design keeps the system cool at all times.

Its got an elegant design that I appreciate. Too often, with these premium cases, there are lights and cutouts, and odd angles, and strange plastic stuff on the case to make it look "edgy". The FT02 is a case that an adult can appreciate while still getting great performance.

Cons: The case is heavy!

Its also a bit bigger than I needed, but its better to have too much space than too little.

Pros: HUGE, top-quality, solid, heavy, silent. My last PC build used the infamous Antec P180. After a lot of research, and being swayed by SilentPCReview, and many other glowing reviews, I decided to take a chance, since this seemed like the new benchmark "silent" case. I'm definitely impressed with both the airflow performance and how quiet the case is.

Cons: High cost. 2 out of 6 of the pre-installed mobo standoffs were cross-threaded. I should have checked before installing, but this caused me to pull out the mobo twice, and replace the standoffs with non-stripped ones. Only one SAS/SATA hot-swap connector included, for this price I expect a "total package" without needing to purchase additional accessories. Additional kits are available for $11 each.

Other Thoughts: This is apparently a revised edition of the FT02. Some of the upgrades included: USB3.0 front ports, AP181 Air Penetrator fans, Tray for SSD, as well as mounting holes for SSD/notebook drives in all 6 drive sleds. Don't be afraid of the lack of reviews on this item. Just check the reviews on the discontinued version, and rest assured you're getting the evolution of the same great case: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811163161