Thermaltake Tenor HTPC

Performance:

With everything installed, we’re ready to see the case in action. When we turned the system on, the first thing we noticed was how quiet it was. From across the room there is barely any noise. From close up, the noise level is still very low. The sacrifice however for silence is of course heat. The hard drive is the component we were worried about most, and indeed it was quite hot after running for a day. The RAM was also blazing hot, but that’s partly our fault for running UTT-BH5’s in an HTPC. The RAM got hot enough to actually slow down the system and crash programs. So, we set out to fix this problem without increasing the noise level by too much. The first modification we did was taping a Thermaltake X-Blower fan to the hard drive rack/support bar. The air from this fan is directed straight at the hard drive and should solve all of our HDD cooling problems. The next addition was a 120mm fan on the very right side of the case. This blew cool air across the extremely hot RAM and should also solve any RAM problems we were having before. As of now, the RAM and HDD are both being kept very cool and the system is extremely stable. The noise level also has not increased much because all of the fans were run at their lowest speeds.

Conclusion:

Everything was pretty well done in this case. Everything went pretty smoothly. Probably the only problem with the system is lack of cooling for hard drives and insufficient ventilation in the HTPC in general. However in this case, it is probably preferable to have a quiet hot system rather than a louder, cool system, as fan noise can greatly reduce enjoyment of music and movies etc... As it is from Thermaltake, this is a very good case for users looking for an HTPC case.

Pros:

· Good looks
· Sturdy build quality
· Sturdy rubberized feet
· ATX PSU
· ATX & microATX motherboard support
· Very quiet in general

Cons:

· Airflow is rather poor
· Hard drives are not actively cooled