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Moving in…

Making your way into the case is very simple, just remove the two black thumb screws on the rear and then the panel can be slid off easily. Immediately after removing the panel, the first part which stands out is the solid black chassis. This adds to the sinister look of the case and aesthetically, it looks a lot better than the dull grey found in most cases.

Flipping the side panel round, we can take a closer look at its construction. It appears, the acrylic side panel is screwed onto the inside of the panel, but the acrylic sits on the outside. This method of installation isn’t as strong as if the window was installed on the inside, but adds to the aesthetics… and aesthetics… we like. The acrylic which backs the perforated holes however, it mounted on the inside (with screws). Mounted in the middle of the acrylic is a 120mm dust filter. Fortunately, this dust filter can be removed simply by sliding it out. If you were to install a fan over this dust filter – most I would assume – the fan simply gets held in place by two clips which ‘latch’ onto the fan.

The first feature on the internals is the small rubber pieces which sit on the bottom panel where the PSU would be mounted. These act as a pedestal for the power supply and help to reduce vibrations from the unit throughout the Twelve Hundred. If you didn’t notice from the back of the case, when a PSU is mounted in the case, it can be mounted upside-down or upright. This means that the fan – if you have one – on your PSU can be facing upwards in the case and not at the floor of the Antec.

Another obvious feature is the long tower format drive bays at the front. Altogether there are a total of 12 drive bays; however, nine of them are taken up with three drive bays which can each accommodate three hard drives or 3 ½” drives. These drive cages are secured with eight thumbscrews (four on each side of the drive bays) for easy tool-less removal. When unscrewed, to remove the cages, they slot out of the front of the case smoothly and effortlessly- with their perforated drive-bay banking plates attached (by screws). Taking a look at each drive cage reveals a 120mm fan and filter which is mounted at the front of each drive bay – keeping your hard disks nice and cool – but dust free. Furthermore, the top drive cage comes with a mount allowing you to install a 120mm fan at both ends of the drive cage for ultimate hard disk cooling.

Another nice feature of the Antec is the motherboard plate. As the case is quite large, there is plenty of space around the motherboard plate for large graphics cards, easy installation and upgrading of components. For cable management, there are many holes in the motherboard plate which are useful for routing cables. All these holes seem to be in good positions for components – this shows some good thinking from Antec. At the rear of the motherboard plate, there are many cable tidies making securing cables effortless without having to use lots of zip ties and sticky pads.

Unfortunately every single fan inside the Antec just has a Molex connection; this makes it extremely annoying for people wanting to ditch Molex completely for just SATA connections – like myself. This could also be a bit of a pain in terms of cable management – it’s often a lot tidier if you can power fans from 3-pin connections on your motherboard. However, as all the fans are connected to a fan controller, it would seem pointless using a 3-pin connection, but it is, a lot tidier and could’ve easily been done as an extra.

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1. Cooler Master Cosmos S
2. Lamptron Noise Reduction Kit
3. Antec P190
4. Antec Fusion Black 430
5. Antec Sonata 550 Plus