| Rosewill Blackhawk-Ultra HPTX Computer Case |  |
| Reviews - Featured Reviews: Cases | |
| Written by David Ramsey | |
| Friday, 09 December 2011 | |
|
Page 6 of 7
Building a SystemI build complete systems in most of my case reviews: many cases have design flaws or idiosyncrasies that are only obvious when you actually start installing components. However, the immense interior of the Blackhawk Ultra means that nothing less than an HTPX, or at least an XL-ATX, motherboard would elicit any potential problems! Still, I mounted a few components and took some measurements. Below you can see a standard ATX form factor motherboard (an ASUS P8Z68-V Pro) mounted in the case. You can probably tell that fitting a video card will not be a problem, but just in case you're wondering, I measured 16" of clearance between the card slot covers and the cooling fans on the 3.5" drive cage. There's 8" between the motherboard tray and the left side panel, and a whopping 21" from the bottom of the case to the top fans.
Should you feel the need to fine-tune your system's cooling, the included 230mm fan can be mounted in any of five different positions (the four corners or the center) of the mesh panel. Alternatively you can mount up to nine 120mm fans.
You won't have any problem with the clearance for your SATA power and interface cables, either: there's more than an inch of room behind an installed 3.5" drive. 
With no fewer than 13 rubber-grommeted cable routing holes, and plenty of space in the 3.5" drive bay area to stuff extra cables (if you don't use the lower drive bays, anyway), cable management is a snap. 
There's just as much space behind the right side panel as there is elsewhere in the system: a full 1" is available for your cabling needs. I wish more cases would provide this kind of clearance. 
I find it odd that this very plain, no-nonsense case is nonetheless fitted with five LED fans: both front fans, both top fans, and the side panel fan all light up when powered. The LEDs aren't nearly as bright as those in some other cases, though. 
In the next section I'll go into my final thoughts and conclusion about the Rosewill Blackhawk Ultra case.
|
|
Comments
I think my next build will be in a micro case. We'll see after I get one to review.
Of course for a micro case you need a mATX motherboard.
Otherwise, I think you mentioned in your HAF-X review that there are some cases that are so big as to be impractical ... hmm. This would be only good for somebody that doesn't want to move around a lot.
To be honest though, I'm not sure about who is to buy this case.
1. People who want a mobile case or something small are obviously going to skip
2. People who don't need an HPTX really don't need something like this. If you're getting something like the Asus ROG series XL ATX boards, there are other cases under $250 and many have a better build quality (ex: the power supply dust filter isn't so cheap)
3. People who can afford an HPTX probably can get something a bit ... higher end. At that price point, we're talking a motherboard that costs $600, 2 Xeons, and likely a lot of GPUs.
For that, there's cases like the Lian Li PC-P80N, the PC-V2120, or to go with something like the CaseLabs series of cases.
I guess it's for people that like big cases, but who don't want to (or cannot afford to) spend on something costlier?
Antec Lanboy Air
Of course, some people change around their fan setup. For example, many people install closed-loop water coolers. The manufacturers recommend using them as intake. So, you may find yourself taking what was an exhaust and making it into an intake for a rad like the H100 or H80. If you did that you may be looking for filters again.
There are a few companies that make professional intake filters for various cases. There is one company in South Africa that makes a great filter kit for the Corsair 600T so even if you use the stock top exhaust area as an intake (for the H100) you can still have an easily removable filter. I believe the kit comes with filters for all the fan spots including the side panel mesh that can mount 4 120mm fans.
If you give them dimensions they will custom make filters for just about any case. If you drop by overclock.net you can likely find them by doing a search for South Africa or 600T filters.
Also, the biggest beef in my opinion, only 4 5 1/4" bays on a full tower case? My 600T mid tower has four external bays. A lot of people with water cooling builds (a market this case is obviously aimed at) could fill up those four bays with just two duel bay reservoirs. Many water coolers will have two loops. If they did use two reses, there would be nowhere left for fan controllers, card readers, optical drives or any other 5 1/4 device. Even the Half 932 you showed beside it has more external bays and it's a smaller case.
I really like everything else about this case and I'm sure they will sell many of them to people who don't need the extra external bays.
$200 for this case + $270 for the cheapest 4-way SLI GA-X79-UD3 motherboard + $600 i7 3930k under a $90 phantek cooler overclocked as near to 5ghz as you can + four $600 EVGA GTX 580 Classified Ultra video cards voltage tweaked and overclocked beyond 1 ghz + two $220 Seasonic Platinum 860W PSUs installed in top and bottom and sharing the load + Memory and storage of your choice. Even if there is another case that can accommodate such a build I don't believe it will be as cool or as quite as this case.
Now get your choice of three 120hz 3d displays and hook them up to this rig. Play the newest games on the highest settings in 5760x1080 resolution without sounding like an air jet or exploding. The only item missing is $6,000.
Credit goes to Rosewill for this case. PC cases should do their simple job without asking too much $$$ in return for brand, looks and other stuff that a self-respecting money-earning gamer does not care about. I don't know who the original manufacturer is (some Chinese company) but this case has been licensed as two other models, Enermax Fulmo GT and Xigmatek Elysium but neither had multiple high quality fans as the BlackHawkUltra.
Luay: The PC-P80N is about half the weight and probably also half the noise - my AMD 8 core / Noctua NH14 / Giga UD7 / Corsair 16Gb 2000 Vengeance RAM (minus the insulating cosmetic only "heat sinks")and 950W PSU / 2 * Giga 6770 Silent (no fans!) / Adaptec 51645 / 2* Pioneer Bluray recorders / 16 * 1 Tb Hitachi drives combo is virtually silent (can sleep in the same room), and I can still lift it easily. Mind you, it is a lot dearer - you get what you pay for. Makes a good game machine plus an ERPS server at the same time.
Cheers
Arron
doggrell3000
new york ny
i love the giant size and plain appearance of the rosewill blackhawk ultra . having no brand label on the exterior is ultra cool . one thing though -- i like the red led fans ( and will probably add even more of them ) but is there a relatively easy way to mount a simple on / off switch on the red leds so that i can switch off the red leds without switching off the fans ? sometimes i would like the red glow but sometimes i just want no lights at all . did i notice in your review that there is some kind of fan plug in module ? could that be modded with an on / off switch that only turns off the leds ? i do not want or need multi colored fans - red is just fine with me - and i do not want a fancy fan controller with rheostats . i just want an on / off switch that will turn off the red leds whenever the mood strikes me . besides the omission of a red led light switch the rosewill blackhawk ultra is in my humble opinion the best computer case ever designed for around $150 usd street . thank you for your feedback and suggestions .
doggrell3000
frank doggrell
doggrell
Fans with separately powered LEDs do exist. For example, some are used in the Cooler Master Cosmos II case. But you'd have to buy them separately and mount your own switches somewhere.