Buyer's Guide - Entry Level to Mid-Range, March 2005

Case and Power Supply

Now that we have all the internal components picked out, it's time to find them a nice home. If you're not too choosy about the appearance of your computer, you can probably just head over to the local computer shop and pick up the cheapest case that you can find. Some may be more or less durable, but the vast majority of the steel cases on the market will manage to work just fine once everything is installed. You may cut a finger or scrape a knuckle if you're not careful with some of the cheap cases, but if you don't plan on upgrading often - or ever - such considerations don't matter a whole lot. Buy what you like, whether that's a boring case or something with 60s era sci-fi theme. More important than the case, however, will be the choice of power supply.

Many of the sub-$50 cases that include a power supply could potentially have stability problems, so for peace of mind, we would strongly encourage you to pick up a better PSU for your system. You can always keep the original generic PSU around as a backup in case you have problems. If you're going to get a motherboard with PCI Express support, you will probably want to look at separate power supplies with the new 24-pin power adapter. As far as quality goes, Enermax and Antec continue to be the most recognized brands. They are also priced such that getting them into a budget system may be difficult unless you purchase a case with an included power supply. That would be our recommendation, with the Antec SLK1650 continuing to offer decent looks and performance for a reasonable price. But some people like to see what else is out there, so we've searched around to come up with some new options.

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Case Recommendation: Rosewill ATX with 400W PSU, model TU-155
Price: $59 shipped

Rosewill is a newer brand on the market, but they've really manage to impress a lot of people looking for good values. Their cases have managed to catch our eye, and while we might question the reliability of the PSU, $61 for a case with a window as well as front USB and firewire ports is pretty impressive, and the PSU is pretty much gravy. You can find similarly priced offerings from Apex, Aspire, Codegen, In Win, Logisys and RAIDMAX, among others, but we like the overall look of the TU-155 as something different from the "boring" cases.

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Case Alternative: Antec SLK1650B with 350W PSU
Price: $65 shipped

As we've so often pointed out, once you factor in the cost of shipping and a reasonable power supply, it's difficult to beat the Antec cases, particularly the low-end SLK16xx models. They are good, cheap cases with a reasonable quality PSU along with a single 120 mm temperature controlled rear fan. The one flaw is that the PSU is a standard ATX model, so adapters would be necessary if you want the full 24-pin power supplied to the motherboard. It is not strictly required to have a 24-pin power connector, of course, and when paired up with a relatively low-power PCIe card like the 6200TC, you should be fine. Down the road, however, it may become necessary to upgrade the PSU. With shipping adding almost $20 to the cost, however, it does hurt our overall budget. If you're willing to take the risk of a cheaper power supply, you can easily find cases at a local shop for under $50.

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PSU Alternative: Enermax Noisetaker 370W, model EG375P-VE-SFMA
Price: $51 shipped

We've mentioned the quality of Enermax power supplies many times in the past. For this Guide, we felt it was important to make sure that the alternative PSU included a 24-pin power connector. [Unfortunately, we got bad information from Enermax's web site - this is not a 24-pin PSU! See note below.] While there are 20-to-24-pin adapters available, they are not guaranteed to work with upgraded video cards. 370W may seem on the low end of the scale, but remember that this is a quality 370 Watts, and it will certainly outperform most 400W to 450W competitors. The Noisetaker line is also one of the quieter power supply options out there, although it certainly isn't silent. For $50, though, you can't complain too much. As always, you can look at Antec, Fotron Source, PC Power and Cooling, Tagan, and ThermalTake as generally good quality options, if you want something other than the Enermax that we've suggested.

Updated Information: Have you ever had difficulty tracking down a reasonable choice for a component, based on a specific price range? If so, then you've probably built quite a few PCs, or perhaps written a guide such as this. Trust me, I searched for quite a while trying to find a reasonable 24-pin PSU for this Guide. I figured that if I'm going to recommend an alternate PSU, then it ought to have some longevity. Sure, $100+ Antec, Enermax, OCZ, etc. PSUs will provide you with everything you might need, as well as a 3 to 5 year warranty in many instances. However, $100 is a lot of money for a power supply, even in the mid-range sector.

The Enermax pages have images showing 24-pin compatibility on their web site for the above 370W PSU. While we still feel it's a very good PSU and it does include dual 12V rails, it does not have a 24-pin connector. The most reasonably priced PSU that we could find with a 24-pin connector is the A+ GPB/Athena Power 500W, model AP-P4ATX50F12. It costs around $60 shipped and appears to be a good quality PSU, but we're not sure about noise levels. Most other 24-pin PSUs cost substantially more, unfortunately. If you have any better suggestions for this price range, drop me a line. Thanks, and sorry for the confusion!