| Article Index |
|---|
| Antec VSK-2000 New Solution Series Case Review |
| The Exterior |
| The Interior |
| Installation |
| The Tests |
| Conclusion |
| All Pages |
The Exterior
The Front
When I first glimpsed upon the front of the VSK-2000, the first and most obvious thing to my eye was the bulge, sitting right at the top and in your face. It comes out by about 1 centimetre and is strictly flat, deviating from the lower pattern. It seems very out of place and a very strange shape for a case front.
The lower, more impressive perforated front bezel gives the case what it needs, a nicely textured look and metallic feel. Behind that is a plastic frame creating some sort of pattern that looks somewhat like a sergeant’s insignia from the US Army, perhaps the designer was trying to make this look superior among other cases by giving it a rank, but most likely, it was just a pattern they used to make it look a little fancy.
The bulge in this case is able to mount three 5.25” drives and at the bottom of these drives lies a small inward “doggy flap” to mount a single 3.5” drive. My first impression was that this was the flap to some sort of trash disposal lid for unneeded floppy drives. But it does look neat and is also useful as a removable bay for perhaps a portable 3.5” HDD.
The Perforated Bezel area is nicely trimmed and is the only metal component on the front of the case, the rest being plastic. It is this part I enjoyed examining and it’s here where air flow enters and is filtered for the case.
At the top of the bulge is a small but neat and tidy input/output panel. From left to right you have: the Reset, Green & Red LED, 2 x USB2.0 Ports, In & Out Audio (AC'97 and HDA compatible) and lastly the Power Switch. As you can also see, there is nothing special on the top of the case, which is good as it’s an extra place to put your books.
Here you can see the back of the front panel where there is the washable air filter mesh. It looks and feels somewhat like a sponge with really big holes, held down by a centre screw and parts of the metal perforated front. It’s easy to remove, but a little hard to put back in.
The Back
The back of the case is standard, you should notice the top mounted PSU missing which leaves a good open path for you to find what you feel is the right PSU. The already supplied 120mm Tri-cool fan is centred above the motherboard drawing airflow above the whole board and out then end of the case. Below lies 7 slots for optional motherboard expansions.
The Side
The sides are very ordinary and nothing special, you will notice the front bulge a bit more from side view. The left side panel has a 2 window grill as air intake points positioned optimally about the CPU area, this is part of the case’s TAC2.0 airflow requirements . The top window measuring 50mm by 105mm and the second 100mm by 105mm. Unfortunately there are no screw mounts to put an extra fan on the grills, it relies on the 120mm Tri-cool and CPU’s heat sink to get air in, but I suppose it could be modified to hold a fan to draw more air in.
The Bottom
Nothing spectacular here, just some plastic feet to keep the VSK-2000 standing. You will notice the front points somewhat like an arrow, but I don’t think it’d get much in aerodynamics being shot or thrown though the air.
The "Bulge" didn’t bother me, and I thought it lent an edgy look, along with the Sarge pattern. The front 3.5" trap door is awkward, and I can’t think of a real use for it, but fun to flip when you're bored - lol. Did you note the front indent that looks like an "Eject" button to the left of the trap door? Has no use, just a 'shape' on the face... could confuse lame End Users (aka customers).
I miss the silicon drive mount option to reduce vibration, but it's a budget case.
I used a full size Gigabyte ATX MoBo so the standoffs were not an issue. I had an extra Antec 500W PSU lying around from another build, and used it here... fit perfectly.
Finally, my only let down, was th...