Aluminum cases have taken the computer community by storm. Over the past couple of years, such cases have become more and more popular among custom PC builders and gamers all over the world. Although there are considerable advantages of an aluminum case, suffice it to say that price is the only thing holding the common computer user from purchasing these cases.
  |
|
Today, well be looking at a case from a company at the front lines of aluminum case development, Lian-Li. The case, Lian-Li PC-50 sports many of the features that users have come to appreciate from a Lian-Li case over the years. These being removable motherboard trays, intake and blow fans, thumbscrews galore, and of course the exquisite brushed anodized aluminum exterior. One thing that confused me was that the PC-50 isnt exactly a mini-tower or a mid-tower, its somewhere in between. So this mini/mid tower can offer the advantages of a small, easy to handle portable mini-tower while maintaining the expandability of a mid-tower.
Before I continue, Id like to thank our friends at CrazyPC.com for providing this case for review. Theyre friendly people with a great selection for all computer users so definitely check them out.
First Impressions
When I first saw the PC-50, noticed that it was very long from front to back. But as I looked at it closer, I was just fooled by its height as a mini/mid tower. In actuality, its length just about the same as a PC-60 albeit the PC-50 is indeed about half an inch longer.
I have come to enjoy the comfort and space of my Lian-Li PC-65 so my next concern was whether or not Id have enough room to work inside this case. But as you will read later, installation was rather simple.
Next, I noticed the power and reset buttons. If there is one thing that I find exceptionally disappointing about Lian-Li cases its their use of flimsy plastic buttons. The rest of the case is metallic, why change that? I cant expect everything to be perfect.
Features
We already mentioned most common features of all Lian-Li cases so lets get a closer look at these features as well as the others for this case.
The PC-50 has 3 x 5.25 external, 2 x 3.5 external and 4 x 3.5 internal bays. So you can easily fit your CD-ROM, CD-RW, ZIP and still have lots of room for hard drives and other devices.
The front USB are not only high speed USB 2.0 compliant, theyre a handy feature at LAN parties. Connecting them to the motherboard involves 9 one pin connectors (4 each USB port + 1 shield)
Also, as you can see above, the PC-50 has one 80x80mm intake fan in the front. I was surprised because Lian-Lis usually have 2 fans in front but this is because the PC-50 is actually 2cm thinner than the PC-60. So I figure that space limitations would have limited the possibility of a second fan.
Lian-Li decided on a sideways mounting power supply. This is quite a smart way of saving space. However, because the PSU is now immediately above the motherboard and possibly the CPU, Lian-Li strategically placed a 80x80mm top blow fan above the PSU for extra cooling. At first I thought this along with the CPU fan would greatly accelerate the removal of heated air from the case but since my PSU has 2 fans, I was a little concerned about having 3 fans blowing and sucking air in different directions within 5cm of each other. But everything worked out fine.
forums
send article 
hardware newsletter 
article comments (10)
Digg this!
del.icio.us