mrk Reviews Posted September 5, 2006 Reviews Share Posted September 5, 2006 (edited) I've been after a new case for a while now as my current case has had a broken side panel for almost a yer and was showing its age on the inside! I wanted something like a Lian Li PC7B but I wanted something that looked cool too - Thermaltake seemed to have some nice cases and I;ve built my mates pc from a TT Soprano before which had many positive sides to it. I decided to pick up the Aguila from seeing it in a popular store today for ?72 - not cheap monies for a cae but I wasn't going to buy another cheap case this time round and the Aguila fit the bill nicely for my needs! Lets begin... The box it came with reminded me of TV boxes, it was huge, I was quite lucky to just about able to fit it in my Civic 3 door to drive it home! First impressions face to face with the case is good feelings allr ound, the front fascia is very nice feeling, heavy duty yet light - the cold when you touch the alluminium bezel is exciting and the brushed matt finished feels nice. I like the air filters fitted to every drivebay vent too. Now moving onto installing the hdds... You have to remove the drive tray to fit the hdds, they sit on rubber washers to eliminate vibrations and noise - this really does work, I can hardly hear my hdds now during boot or seeking compared to my old cases direct screw to the chasis. Thermaltake did a nice job labelling each of the holes for mounting yout mATX/BTX/ATX/etc mobo - Other cases I have built systems in had no such thing so you had to keep on checking that the right holes were being used. My Hiper Type-M 530watt had no trouble fitting in. Neither did the mobo! The whole process of getting everything just how I like took me 4 hours, I made sure wiring was tidy and everything was AOK before powering up. A shot of the rear view. You really do have to feel the finish to see how good it is! The door opens twice, once to get to the power/dvd drives and twice to get to the fan/air filters The TT badge is there to stay, not going to work loose anytime soon. I'm used to only 80mm case fans so seeing 2 of those 120mm silent fans cooling the innards was quite a sight. TT also did a good job properly labelling and moulding the USB2 headers compared to other makers - easily matched them to my Abit KW7. There's also TT naming on the window itself. This is going to be a user preference thing but I like the LED, it keeps my room at night ambient with a blue glow but some people may not like this. I had some spare cable tidy left over and luckily it was just the right size to fit between the mobo edge and the drive bay cage. Likewise the 7800gs (slightly longer than my 6800GT) was also a nice fit with enough room to plug in the power connector. Quite a nice case, it will stand out in any room and it does look more than just a standard PC hiding in the corner or under a desk. People will notice it:)) Edited September 5, 2006 by mrk Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matrix XII Posted September 5, 2006 Share Posted September 5, 2006 Yeah my room has a blue ambient glow too, I love it (Thermaltake Tsunami Dream) :p Good review and pics btw Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Badtz-Maru Posted September 5, 2006 Share Posted September 5, 2006 i wish my room had a glow. nice review. not too fond of the feet tho. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mrk Reviews Posted September 5, 2006 Author Reviews Share Posted September 5, 2006 Thanks guys! i wish my room had a glow. nice review. not too fond of the feet tho. The feet can be folded in so they are not visible :) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cosmin Posted September 5, 2006 Share Posted September 5, 2006 very interesting . looks great :) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chconline Veteran Posted September 5, 2006 Veteran Share Posted September 5, 2006 Those are nice photos, what camera did you use? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mrk Reviews Posted September 5, 2006 Author Reviews Share Posted September 5, 2006 I have a canon 350d :) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Noveed Posted September 5, 2006 Share Posted September 5, 2006 nice review mate, i have the kandalf supertower, which is better thought, this or the kandalf? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
»X« Posted September 5, 2006 Share Posted September 5, 2006 You have the same lg dvd drive I have. does it give you any trouble with reading disks? Or taking ages to read anything? Excellent pictures btw Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mrk Reviews Posted September 5, 2006 Author Reviews Share Posted September 5, 2006 The Kandlaf lookslike it has better cooling but I do prefer the Auila styling :p You have the same lg dvd drive I have. does it give you any trouble with reading disks? Or taking ages to read anything? Excellent pictures btw no issues at all here mate, firmware updated to latest and riplock rmeoved :) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Smigit Posted September 6, 2006 Share Posted September 6, 2006 doesnt look to bad a case. My next PC will probably be a lianLi 2001B+ which is expensive, about the cost of a low end video card but it's something I'm preparred to fork out for. The one thing I really do hate with thermaltake cases is the way they splash the company name everywhere, namely the window but also seen in the unneccesarily large badges on the front doors. Personally I prefer no or minimalistic branding. The worst case for that is the kandalf but with its vertical lighted strip. But yeah, looks like a nice case overall, hope you enjoy it. Certainly one of the top 3 cases I'd get if I had to go thermaltake (Id probably go Tai Chi or the armour and remove the doors) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mrk Reviews Posted September 6, 2006 Author Reviews Share Posted September 6, 2006 I can remove the door on this too which is quite nice! might try it without the door too sometime :p This is what it looks like in an average room Has a nice presence :D Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Smigit Posted September 6, 2006 Share Posted September 6, 2006 That rooms far to clean and organised to be considered average Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mrk Reviews Posted September 8, 2006 Author Reviews Share Posted September 8, 2006 Just installed and man what a difference! they push ~44cfm and now my temps are even lower than before! (before / after) - I was also able to ditch the stock cpu fan that ran at 2400rpm with a 1800rpm akasa silent one I had 2 spare of. The noise is very low too, a tiny bit more prominent than the thermaltake 120mm fans but less obtrusive, more of an ambient hum than a gush of "fshoooooooooosh" if that makes sense. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Smigit Posted September 9, 2006 Share Posted September 9, 2006 Might I complement you on the pictures, youve taken some blinders there mate. well done. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mrk Reviews Posted September 9, 2006 Author Reviews Share Posted September 9, 2006 Thank you very much Smigit! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
da13ro Posted September 9, 2006 Share Posted September 9, 2006 Lovely, looks nice, thanks for the insight! Thermaltake make some great gear, there cases are high quality, i have a Xasier V, great case, bloody heavy. They now make lighter cases i se :p Built a computer yesteday that had another thermaltake case, sorta looked like yours but more server version! Ill get some pics later! Cheers, Brodie J Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mrk Reviews Posted September 9, 2006 Author Reviews Share Posted September 9, 2006 SOunds like the Armour! also a good case and would have been the one I got had it been in stock! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
noroom Posted September 9, 2006 Share Posted September 9, 2006 No pictures of the air filter slots? I'd really like to have a look at those :) Good review otherwise! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mrk Reviews Posted September 9, 2006 Author Reviews Share Posted September 9, 2006 No pictures of the air filter slots? I'd really like to have a look at those :) Good review otherwise! The filters just slot into each bay panel as you can see! washable too :) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
virgo89 Posted September 9, 2006 Share Posted September 9, 2006 You take really nice pictures, cool camera i bet. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PiracyX Posted September 9, 2006 Share Posted September 9, 2006 Thats nice pictures taken. I am considering replacing my 120mm fans that can with my case as they dont seem to push much air really on my armor. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mrk Reviews Posted September 9, 2006 Author Reviews Share Posted September 9, 2006 The front fan pushes nice air but the lit up back one that came with it did not so I just replaced that with the akasa and all is good :) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andrew Lyle Global Moderator Posted September 9, 2006 Global Moderator Share Posted September 9, 2006 thats an amazing case man (Y)... i have a thermal take tsunami, and i am currently installing a motherboard into the same case, and i noticed the labelling in the back where the screws go. there isn't very much change from my tsunami from 2 years ago, to todays model. I really like how clean your cables are, mine arn't so neat, but i did the best job i could possibly do.. All my cables are strapped together, but thermaltake didn't leave much room between the right side of the motherboard, and the back of the HDD's to hide the wires. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PiracyX Posted September 9, 2006 Share Posted September 9, 2006 Where did you get your 120mm akasa fan from since you live in hampshire. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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