Antec Studio Take 4

Examination:

Beginning the tour of the Antec Studio Take 4 it is of course designed to serve its owners in an IT department or studio for handling there rugged and stringent tasks. With that said, the exterior of the 4U chassis is certainly simplistic. On the front of the Take 4 is the front panel door, which is colored blue while the rest of the case has a very nice textured matte black finish. The two handles on both sides of the Take 4 are certainly expected due to the sheer weight of the unit and for easily sliding it in and out of a 4U compatible rack. These handles are composed of metal and are screwed into an L-bracket, which is ultimately reinforced by the sides of the chassis. On the sides of the chassis are the various mounts for use with such a rack. There is certainly no disputing the quality of the case in this area. A lock, with a set of keys being provided, protects the front panel of the chassis. While this lock is not strong enough to prevent a dedicated thief from opening the system, it did appear to be much stronger than past locks, which were famous on older Antec and Chieftec ATX products. Of course, the purpose of the lock is to largely prevent the system from being mistakenly turned off or reset. Opening up the door, the four internal 3.5" HDD drive bays are accessible as well as the two external 3.5" drives. In addition, there are two 5.25" bays, two USB 2.0 ports, one Firewire IEEE-1394, two blue LEDs (power and HDD), and two rocker switches (power and reset). With the door and the front cover, there are a series of holes to assist in the ventilation process. The four 3.5" bays each have two thumbscrews, which hold a metal plate in place for which there are also rubber grommets for absorbing hard drive vibrations.

On the sides of the chassis is an array of holes for allowing additional cool air to reach the innards of this beast. There are also various holes to comply with 4U mounting specifications. Towards the rear of the chassis on one of the sides is a 92mm fan for additional airflow. All of the included fans with the Take 4 are Antec's TriCool, which are high-performance no-LED fans that ship with a three variable switch for ensuring appropriate airflow and noise depending upon the system's needs. At the rear of the chassis are the motherboard's I/O panel, 120mm exhaust fan, PSU interface, and seven expansion slots. With the Studio Take 4, the ATX PSU slot is positioned below the motherboard. With the internal design of the Take 4, there is a dedicated air passage to provide fresh air to the power supply. This innovative design with segregated airflow should yield improved efficiency when it comes to the operating temperature and noise.

Opening up the lid for the Antec Studio Take 4 involves removing two thumbscrews at the rear of the chassis and one screw on each side. With the case open, we were quite impressed with the internal layout of the various structures. At the front are the four 3.5" HDD bays, two vertical 3.5" bays, and two 5.25" optical bays. Below the 5.25" drive bays is the segregated air channel that is fed to the Antec power supply. Running the width of the case is a horizontal support beam. Towards the rear of the case are the 92 and 120mm fans as well as the power supply. This included power supply is designed to be top-notch, as Antec has always put their best foot forward when dealing with their ATX PSUs. This 450W ATX12V v2.0 (SP-450) features one 20/24-pin motherboard, four Serial ATA, five 4-pin molex, one floppy, one 4-pin ATX12V, and one 6-pin PCI Express power connector. While this does not supply enough wattage if doing a dual CPU setup, or even dual GPUs for workstation rendering, it should be a great power supply for the average server or audio setup.