Upon unpacking off the cold cathodes I noticed two distinct things.

1. They have unique triangle shape ends, unlike other cold cathodes I have seen
2. These ends are loose and can fall off

As you can see in the picture above one of the cold cathodes is missing an end. That is because is was rolling around loose in the box. Upon further inspection, I realized all the ends were loose, so this is one thing to watch out for. I little CA glue or tape should fix this problem right up, but should be a step that the manufacture takes, not the consumer.

The triangle shaped ends make for a nice stable platform to mount the cathodes to various surfaces inside the case. They also may hinder you from putting the cathodes in tight places.

The speed controller is a very attractive and functional unit. The aluminum face tone, along with the green accent lighting looks really good, and is a welcome change from the blue accents we are seeing on most speed controllers today.

There are four knobs on the front of the unit. Three of them control fan speed from 0-12v, and the forth is a control for the lighting. The lighting control has a off, on, and sound sensitive setting. Fan speed can be adjusted from dead off to full on. I like this feature, as the other speed controller I have right now does not let you turn a fan all the way off. The knobs are low profile, but you still may have to mount the controller recessed a bit if you are putting it in a case with a door.

Vantec includes a nice package of cables making it possible to connect up to any standard 3 pin or molex fan connection you may have. They also serve as extensions since they are nice and long. The cathodes cables on the other hand are too short in my opinion. This will limit where in you case you can mount them, especially if you are using a large tower.

Now that's Blue!

*click on any picture to enlarge

Here I have hooked the cold cathodes up on the bench and turned them on via the controller. All I can say is "WOW". The brightness of the vantec cathodes is quite stunning, quite possibly the most brite I have ever seen. These will make the inside of a case ultra bright and should really turn a few heads.

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