Enermax CS-31881TA-B3A Mid Tower Case

Reviews: Cases

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Bradford Day
Kurtis
Maxpoint
Feb. 19, 2004

Introduction

So, if you've read some of the other case reviews here at TheTechLounge, you will have noticed a few other Enermax cases. We have yet another one provided by Maxpoint. Maxpoint is the distributor of Enermax cases here in the States, Enermax being a Taiwanese company originally... MAXpoint... EnerMAX, you see the similarity? Good. Now that we have that sorted, let me tell you about the CS-31881TA-B3A. A rather lengthy product name I agree, but it must be to do justice to the many nifty little features this case is fitted with. If you are familiar with Enermax, you know that they tend to cram as many extra goodies in their cases as possible while keeping the prices low. This baby is no exception.

First Look

Now undoubtedly the first thing one notices about this case is the styling. If I had put a name to this styling, I would call it disco-styling. This case is totally disco. It is laden with bells-n-whistleage. The front bezel of this case is quite a sight. Enermax has really just ripped the old beige box a new one. What look to be "bubble cathodes' line the bezel top to bottom and all the bland bay covers have been thrown out in favor of sleek clear plastic layered silver covers with chromy rivets. The power and reset switches look like large fake jewels of some kind, almost like those candy suckers that you got in the grocery store, the kind that came on a plastic ring. Between both buttons is a LCD screen and below the reset is a small black knob. Enermax has also included silver stealth drive covers for both the optical and floppy drives. And, at the very bottom of the case is a small door concealing two USB 2.0 slots, a Firewire port, as well as audio outputs for headphones and a microphone.

On the Inside

Inside the case there are even more little bits of fun. One blue LED case fan is included as well as a 350W power supply. There are mounting holes for 2 80mm rear fans. An 80mm side fan finds a home in the pre-cut side panel AND there is room for 120mm up front as well. I particularly liked the blue LED fan that Enermax included. It is quite bright, pushes a good amount of air and makes almost no sound even at top speed. The included thermal monitoring LCD panel is able to keep track of temperature anywhere in the case. Left hanging, the thermal probe can monitor interior case temperature, or the lead could be fitted on your CPU heatsink. The LCD will display your thermal probe readings in Fahrenheit or Celsius. In order to make the switch from F to C, you will need to remove the front bezel and search for the small blue switch and press it (see picture below). Also included with the case is the usual compliment of screws and nuts, some plastic washers, a tiny wire tie, power cord and Enermax's fan card.

There is an average amount of workspace inside this case, so maneuvering your ATX motherboard in shouldn't be a problem. As expected with any budget case, there is no motherboard tray. Enermax didn't include removable drive bays either, again not a real surprise. The sides of this case are a bit difficult to remove at times and require you to pay attention to the insertion tabs when you replace the panels. It is rather easy to misalign the tabs and end up with a crooked panel. Also don't expect handy thumbscrews as a standard feature. I usually have a few spare sets of thumbscrews lying around to replace the Philips head screws that come with some of the cheaper cases. If you are getting into and out of your case regularly, they are a wise and inexpensive investment.

The included power supply seemed hearty enough for most needs. Voltage readings fell within the acceptable limits (between 12.524V and 12.646V). However, at 350W if you are planning on pushing a larger video card requiring an additional molex connection, you may be more comfortable with something a little more powerful. Currently I am able to run a FX5800 off of the PSU with no problems, but video card manufacturers might suggest some beefier juice.

The side window is cut in shape similar to that of the flower-like Enermax logo and covered with a single piece of blue tinted plastic. Chrome rivets hold the window in place, but could be easily removed with a Philips head screwdriver and reused should you wish to change the window. On the top corner edges of the case there are multiple small holes cut. I assume these are meant to help vent hot, rising air from the case. Although I would like to have seen an additional top mounted fan on this case. Several other Enermax cases feature a top vent fan and I think it is a good idea to help get rid of warm air from the upper portion of the case as it ends up there anyway.

The Up Sides

This thing looks impressive. Let's plug it all in and see what it does. Don't expect this case to be a simple job of plug and play. Those impressive buttons and bubbly strip things all require power...they light up after all...translating to uber-cordness. There are many wires in this case BEFORE adding your own. USB and Firewire headers, the typical array of speaker and HDD and power switch leads as well as the audio output wiring all spill out from behind the front bezel like Technicolor linguini on the run. Luckily most of the important wires (USB and Firewire headers, audio) are bound up neatly for quicker set-up and all are nicely labeled. Unfortunately, there is no HDD activity LED on this case. If you're fond of seeing when you hard drive is active, you'll be out of luck with the CS-31881TA-B3A.

So, once you have all your fans and components installed, your wires connected, and your fingers crossed, what does this case do? It lights up, if nothing else. The included blue LED case fan shines like a beacon of nerdliness. The power and reset buttons also glow a lovely shade of neon blue, as does the LCD screen. But, the bubbly light strips do the most impressive bit of glowing. They radiate blue...no green...no yellow...no purple. The crazy things change colors!hence the disco remarks earlier on, now it makes sense eh? Enermax has included color-changing light strips with this case. The bubbliness does nothing other than look cool. I was hoping for a more liquid bubble effect, like those old-style Christmas lights our parents had, but to no avail. The bubbles are artifactual, trapped forever in plastic stasis, but they still look pretty sweet. Should you want to turn the disco dance party lights off, however, there is a switch located under the front flip panel for just that purpose.

The case lights up, but what the heck does that little black knob thing do? It's a rheostat. Yep, a fan-speed controller. But in order to use the rheostat, all of your case fans (that you want to have control over) must be plugged into the included Enermax fan card. The fan card is a 1.25"x1.25" square which houses a 4-pin male molex connector, 4 male 3-pin connectors and a 2-pin male connector. The idea is for you to plug a free molex connection from the power supply into the 4-pin, the 2-pin connector gets plugged with a lead running from the front bezel (leading to the rheostat presumably) and the left-over 4 connections are plugged into your case fans. The only foreseeable problem I can think of with this type of set-up is that it may prove difficult to find a 3-pin 120mm fan. Enermax to the rescue!they sell very nice 3-pin 120mm fans, available from many fine online retailers. I have 2 of these 120mm fans in my gaming machine and they are top notch and relatively inexpensive. The Enermax fan card is a surprisingly effective solution to fan noise. Relatively easy to install, it eliminates the need for a bulky drive-bay mounted fan controller. It flawlessly tamed 3 LED fans and a 120mm rendering them silent!or completely motionless (depending on the RPM range of the fans that is). Unfortunately, it wouldn't be an ideal choice for controlling a CPU fan as all the fan speeds are linked. And since the CPU fan would need to be plugged directly into the fan card. I suppose you could MacGyver it, provided you had a 3-pin CPU fan with the RPM lead running separately to the mobo, but I wouldn't recommend it. Just make sure that all the fans you wish to control have 3-pin connections. As with any case now-a-days, multiple fans means multiple wires. Investing in some wiring loom or mesh sleeving will help tidy up wire mess.

The Down Sides

This case is stylish, but all that flash ain't cheap. Enermax understandably had to cut corners somewhere to keep this baby's price tag within the realm of reason. This case slides in at around $59 at directron.com, an authorized Enermax dealer. All told, a reasonably affordable price for a lighted case that includes a fan, built-in rheobus, temperature sensor and comes with a 350W power supply. Unfortunately, the case is a bit on the flimsy side. The case is constructed of relatively thin steel. I'm not saying it will collapse if you set your collectable "My Little Pony" play set on it, but it does flex a bit if twisted and the sides do give readily when pushed. For the most part all the interior edges of this case are folded and pose little slicing danger. Most companies have conformed to this handy safety standard, but there are 2 corner edges in this case that could tear you up a bit if you aren't careful!they aren't Ginsu-sharp, but could cause a bit of annoyance. The paint job on this case left a little to be desired as well... Once again, in keeping the costs low, the paint job had to suffer. Paint is easily liberated and the smallest scrapes and nicks will show up quickly. I easily scratched my test case down to bare metal by lightly running a metal pen cap clip over the painted surface.

The stealthed drive bays look quite sharp but take a little finagling to install. The CD-ROM drive required a little maneuvering to get the eject button properly aligned with the stealth cover button. The spring-loaded stealth door tends to get in the way when the CD-ROM tray closes. On my Plextor drive it wasn't enough to keep it from closing, but it did give the tray a slight bump as it shut. The floppy drive also required a fair amount of manipulating for proper usage. I had to get the drive tightened in just the right place so that not only would the stealth drive button eject correctly, but also position it so the disc would slide out with zero resistance. Once everything was fitted in the proper places, all ejections were quick and easy.

My biggest gripe with this case is the lack of attention paid to cooling. The available dual 80mm rear fans and single side fan are nice but are little more than window dressing as the massive front 120mm is given next to no room to breathe hidden behind the front bezel. An array of circuitry and wiring block any chance of having front intakes, they would have to be placed where the rhoebus and thermal readout LCD are located anyway. To that end, there is not a port for fresh, cool outside air to enter the front of the case save a church mouse sized hole at the very bottom edge of bezel. And that intake quickly gets clogged with dust bunnies if the case is placed on a hard wood floor and is almost entirely blocked if placed on shaggy carpet. When I placed my hand in front of the 120mm fan, I could barely feel any breeze. This isn't really a problem per say, as the hard drives mounted behind the 120mm fan don't really require any cooling, but it would be nice... My XP2100 CPU with a massive all copper Coolermaster heatsink idled at 41°C (105.8°F) with an interior case temperature of about 24°C (75°F) with the all the case fans turned up to top speed. I had expected the big 120 to help cool the case a little more efficiently. My previous, and far crappier, el cheapo case performed equally as well in the cooling department with two fewer fans.

Conclusion

So, in keeping with their reputation, Enermax delivers a rockin' case suitable for hot boogie nights at home or on the dance floor for less than the cost of a of white polyester jumpsuit. This case is also available in a silver finish for that added bit of variety or if you're just sick of black cases. A bit weak on the construction end yes, but most likely this would only pose a problem if you were a movin' and a shakin' your machine back and forth to LAN parties. I would recommend this case to anyone who would like a non-standard looking set-up, but doesn't have the need to open it up every other day. I have to admit I'm not the biggest fan of the rainbow lights. But, they don't look bad in my living room and I always get compliments on the case. One warning: if you have small kids crawling about, the dazzling lights will attract their prying little fingers like moths to flame (trust me, we found this out the hard way).

Pros

Disco style
Affordable
Included LED fan
Included power supply
Built-in fan speed controller
Lighted Temperature display
Front I/O interface
Stealthed drives

Cons

Just okay airflow
A bit wobbly
"Uh oh, better get Maaco" paint job

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4 User Comments

1 - Posted by Taxus on March 19, 2004 - 1:41 pm

I Purchased this case. The review is extreemly accurit and complete.

I wanted to add the contact points that hold the entire front pannel to the case are plastic and a bit weak. I have one that was broken when I got it. (wasn't enough of an issue to send it back.)

I disagree with one point.
I also have a two year old and it attracts her more like a bug zapper :)

2 - Posted by Guest on April 18, 2004 - 7:52 pm

I bought this case and I am having one heck of a time finding out where all these connection are suppose to go. My mobo a MSI KT4AV series dosn't have a place for the group of wires labled TPA,TBAVP, and VG.
Also what is the flat wire for?
This case started out with a lot of hope, but is given me lots of problems.

3 - Posted by Guest on January 6, 2005 - 5:26 am

I purchased this case and I'm absolutely satisfied. For the money it's just amazing case. Highly recommended. No problems with the front panel mic + headphones + USB + FireWire cable connections. Just look it up in your mobo manual and you'll figure it out.I agree more or less with this review except one thing - there is HDD activity light on this case and it's the reset switch which serves both purposes.

4 - Posted by Guest on July 23, 2005 - 6:44 pm

Just a quick heads up: Both the clear plastic on the front of the case and the side panel window are also UV-reactive. They can make for some pretty sweet looking effects when combined with a black light. Could be an issue if you get UV cold cathodes for the inside, but I mounted mine immediately above and below the window and they work great.

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