While computer cases may not have much to do with Linux, they still afford mentioning.
The ChiefTec Dragon is a large case, with both good room, and good possibilities for cooling. There is room for 2x 80mm fans in the front of the case and 2x 80mm fans in the back. The fans are very easy to install, as ChiefTec provides "fan holders", in which the fans are mounted and then the fan holders, with the fans, are placed in the case. One nice thing about the fans in the front of the case is that they are located in such a way, that any installed hard drives are cooled with cool air from outside the case. The hard drives are also easy to install as they are mounted in removable cages. No tools are needed to remove/install the fans or the hard drive cage. 5.25" drives are fitted with "rails" so they just slide into the drive bay. My only wish was that there was a standard for these rails, so I could remove a drive from this case and placed it in a case from another manufacture, like Antec's Sonata.
This case originally housed my
HTPC so attributes like good looks and low noise components was very important for me when I looked for a case, and the Sonata has both. It's spacious (for it's size) and has good airflow. It has a nice big and slow spinning 120mm fan in the back of the case, and Antec's low noise Truepower 380W PSU. To further cool the case, I have installed another 120mm fan. This fan is not located at the very front of the case, but right behind the hard drives, which are cooled by air passing them.
Hard drives have gotten special attention in the Sonata. They are hold into place by vibration dampened screws, and they are mounted sideways so they can easily be accessed by opening the side of the case.
I use this case for my
Home Theater PC, and I bought it mainly because of its looks. The case has a large door in the front covering the DVD drive and USB/FireWire connectors.
Although I really like this case, there are some minor details that I think Silverstone could have done better. The front is not machined 100% even, and the quality of the use materials could have been better.
Another thing that should be standard in a HTPC case, is hard drive vibration dampening (The Antec Sonata has it). The front of the LC-13 resonates in sync with the vibrations from the hard drive, such that it produces a deep humming sound. I solved this by buying a anti-vibration kit to mount the hard drive. The problem with this solution is that the hard drive now takes up one of the 5.25" bays, and really does not have a not of space around it because it's mounted right under the DVD drive, so it gets a bit hot. Another step I had to take to remove some noise has to place two small plastic knobs on the front behind the door to remove the last bit of humming.