The current crop of higher-end video cards are, in a word, gigantic. I have an Antec P180 case and an eVGA GTX 260 that fits snugly-- after I sacrificed a drive bay. Are there any recommended cases out there that can accommodate these larger cards without requiring a super tight fit or the removal of drive bay enclosures?
Are mid-range cards really bigger than high-end cards of not that long ago? I crammed an 8800GTX into the (comparatively small) Antec Sonata case last time I built a computer, and I would have imagined that 260s and 4850s and such were significantly smaller than that.
They aren’t. They should fit… just barely. I know I’ve got a 4850 in my P182, and while it’s quite a snug fit, I didn’t have to remove the drive bays. From what I’ve seen of 8800/9800/260/280’s, you shouldn’t have to do that, either, but meh, whatever.
The 200 series is an inch longer than the 4850/4870. I just replaced my 4870 with a 285 and had to relocate all my drives. The 4870 was already pushing the boundaries… the 285 is just long as hell, and I have the same problem - finding a case with enough room is difficult, even if you upgrade to good case brands and get one of what would generally be considered their premium cases.
I have an NZXT Tempest, which is basically an upsized Antec Nine Hundred. Pretty roomy - I’ve currently got a pair of HD 4870s in it - but I suspect a jumbo-sized video card like the HD 4870 X2 would block (or at least cramp) the HDD bays.
Sidebar: why the hell is it always so hard to find the physical dimensions for video cards? They’ll throw a bazillion meaningless specs & benchmarks in your face to dazzle you like so much lens flare, but not the ones which will tell if their titanic power-sucker will fit in your goddamn case…
Anyway, I don’t think any of them are more than 10.5" / 27cm long, so you can think of the 8800 GTX as representing the upper bound on card length.
EDIT: this old MaxPC thread might help.
I use a Lian-Li full tower case, similar to this although I remember mine ran me about $180. I also have a Lian-Li mid-tower case where the drives are located away from the video card area and again, it works fine. I know there are other vendors that have used that similar design style, what you want to do is get more room behind the video card, and that’s typically where drives are located. If you can find cases with the drive cage in a different location, you are all set.
I have two Cooler Master 690s, which are mid-tower cases and seem to fit pretty much everything I can shove in them and then some, and are pretty economical. A lot of fans will fit in without the entire case being constructed out of jersey mesh like with the Antec 900, which is why I couldn’t use that particular model in my dusty house (new subdivision construction zone and a house that’s less than two years old - lots of dust in the air).
Yeah, this is probably more what I mean – not necessarily a giant case, just one where the drive bays won’t crunch up against one of the big video cards like the GTX series. I’ll take a look at the ones you and Brian have suggested, thanks!
It does make me wonder what the future of video card design is. They’re about as big as they can realistically get at this point without redesigning motherboards/cases to accommodate them. Will the high end ones remain behemoths but just get increasingly denser in chip count, etc? Is there any tech on the way that could actually make them smaller without sacrificing power?
on a side-note, i was thinking of going the opposite way: http://www.anitec.ca/pages/silent3/