Chieftec AX-01BLD W/Side Window

Have cases ever come a long long way. Remember the days of those blah beige cases? Those days are over for good. Now days we have cases in all colors, with windows, in steel or aluminum and in all shapes and sizes. Today we'll be taking a look at one of the newer breed of cases, the Chieftec AX-01BLD Case with a large side window. This one is Blue and made of aluminum.

The case comes in a typical thick cardboard box with styrofoam on the top and bottom, and has plastic covering the entire case and additional plastic covering the window on the inside and out. You have to simply peel the plastic off. That is to help prevent the window from being scratched.

Features~

• Light weight Aluminum Chassis
• Screwless, lockable side cover (large window optional)
• Sliding, external drive assembly
• Tool-free internal drive bays for convenient assembly
• Ability to install up to 4 cooling fans
• Front USB
• EMI shielding designed to support FCC requirements

• Case Type: Entry Level Server
• Color Choices: Blue, Green, Purple, Red, Yellow or Black
• Case Dimensions: 8.1"W x 20.6"H x 18.6"D (205mm x 522mm x 473mm)
• Main Board Size: ATX Up to 12" W x 13" L
• Power Supply: ATX, PS/2
• Expansion Slots: 3 short, 4 full length
• Cooling System: 4 x 80mm fans 1 front (optional) 2 rear (optional) 1 HDD (optional)

• Front Accessible: 4 x 5.25", 2 x 3.5"
• Internal: 4 x 3.5" HDD

Above you see the case from a side view, and on the picture on the right, notice the rails on the bottom. If you are not familiar with Chieftec, Antec Chinming cases then those are for installing drives like CD-Rom, CDRW or DVD drives. You do need to screw in the rails on each side of a drive, but afterwards removing and replacing drives is a breeze. And much quicker. Once you get use to this way, you will be hooked. Also in the pic on the right, I had removed the drive bays.