Antec Three Hundred Two Mid-Tower PC Chassis Review

[siopao1984]

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Antec Three Hundred Two Mid-Tower PC Chassis Review - eTeknix


Today we are taking a look at the very popular Three Hundred Two Mid-Tower Chassis from Antec, which is quite litterally the new model of the original Three Hundred chassis, as with any newer model you would expect new features, upgrades and general improvements, all of which have been applied here.

“Our newest chassis is built for gamers from the inside-out, from its aggressive front bezel, to its advanced cooling system. With tool-less 5.25” & 3.5” drive bays, a large cable management compartment and two front panel USB 3.0 ports with an internal connector, the Three Hundred Two is the rightful heir to the Gaming Series legacy.” – Antec.com

Antec have been making pc components since 1986 and have established them selves as one of the industry leaders as a brand name and in their various product fields, with a wide range power supplies, chassis, cooling solutions and now even computer cleaning products. With a long history of catering for everything from server solutions, gaming rigs and a whole lot more, they should no a few things about how to design a good pc case.
Having used the original Antec Three Hundred PC Chassis my self for about 9 months now, and that it is possible to pick up this chassis for under £50.00, give or take a few pounds dependant on retailer, which is obviously a very budget friendly and competitive price, I am keep to see what’s on offer with this new edition.

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Taking a look at the packaging we can see it comes sporting Antecs black and yellow colours, while a box is just a box, this one really stands out, given that even a lot of premium chassis come in a brown cardboard box, I was surprised to see a budget case come in a full gloss box, you can really tell they’ve gone the distance to make this product stand out and we haven’t even opened it yet!



Around the back of the box, we can see there are nine close up product shots of the chassis detailing its major features and components again keeping with the black and yellow colours theme.



There isn’t much in the way of extra with this chassis, but everything you need is there, with the instruction booklet, twelve hard drive bay clips, four cable ties and the usual array of nuts and bolts.

[siopao1984]

Starting on the left side of the chassis we can see there is a 120mm fan mount on the side panel, set at just the right hight for cooling your graphics card, you can also see on the right side of the picture the curve of the front panel.



Around the back we can see there is a second fan mounting point at the rear of the motherboard, which will hold a further 120mm fan, as is the same on the other side panel these fan mounts don’t come with air filters.



If you look closely at the bottom right hand corner of this panel you can also see there is an embossed ”Antec DESIGN” logo, which adds a nice little touch of style to chassis.



On the front of the chassis we can see there two USB 3.0 ports, headphone and microphone sockets, plus the usual reset and power buttons. Further down the chassis we can see there are 3 x 5.25″ optical drive bays and large grill section for air intake, behind which you can also mount 2 additional 120mm fans.



There are a few cool features around the back of this chassis, quite literally too, with two fan speed control switches at the top of the chassis for the two pre installed cooling fans, this is a great little upgrade from the original Three Hundred chassis, which had these switches on wires inside the chassis, meaning you no longer have to open the side panel to take advantage of this feature. Further down we have eight expansion slots, with are held in place with an extra locking panel, while this is a security feature in ways, it is only held on by two screws that are accessible from the out side of the chassis, but at least it helps to keep your components firmly held in place.



Flipping the chassis upside down we can see that it comes pre-fitted with four large rubber feet, which help reduce vibration and give a little clearance from the floor to help with cooling and a large filtered air intake at the rear for your power supply.



Along the top of the chassis we can see the 140mm cooling fan mounted near the rear of the chassis as well as two handy water cooling cut-outs, both fitted with rubber grommets.

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Now that we have the side panel off we get a look at what is going on inside this chassis, the nice black paint job doesn’t continue inside the chassis, but that’s more than acceptable given the budget friendly price range and the fact this chassis has no side panel windows to peek through. While at first glance there doesn’t appear to be much going on here, there are quite a few features to point out. The first thing being a large back panel cut away for installing your CPU coolers without removing your motherboard, very handy for future upgrades to your cooling, to the right of that we have 4 screw holes for mounting a 2.5″ drive vertically on the back plate, we also have some limited but very welcome cable management holes, something that was non existent on the original Three Hundred chassis.



In the bottom of the chassis we can see there slide out air filter for the power supply as well as a rather basic, but again very handy set of screw holes on the right hand side for mounting a second 2.5″ drive.



On the right side of the chassis we have 3 quick release clips on the optical bays, with room for six 3.5″ hard drive below that, which can be installed using the included clip on rails, I like this system as the bay is left unobstructed which all helps with air flow coming in from the front of the chassis.



In the back of the chassis we can see the rear pre-installed 120mm fan and the eight expansion slot covers, which aren’t ventilated, but there are some extra ventilation areas on the left of these.



At the top of the inside of the chasis we get a better view of the 140mm pre-installed fan as well as the two water cooling cut-outs.



Now that we have the rear panel removed we can see my favourite feature on this chassis, the back panel has a “Z” shape to it, which means with the rear side panel attached there is still a vast amount of room for cable management.

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Now that the system is complete, we can see it nicely holds all our test build components with plenty of room to spare. The cable management isn’t spectacular, but given that most chassis in this price range don’t have any cable management, it still helps to providing better airflow and keeping things clear inside the chassis.



We removed the pre-installed 120mm fan, replacing it with the Antec 920 water cooler, which is a pretty hefty cooler, but I would have been stunned if an Antec product didn’t fit in an Antec chassis. One benefit of installing the Kuhler is that the 120mm speed controlled fan that came pre-installed could now be installed on the side panel.



In the bottom of the chassis you can see the 2.5″ drive is screwed to the bottom of the chassis. You can also see the bottom cable management cut-out which is just big enough to deal with all our cables.



With everything in place and the side panels back on it’s hard to tell that we’ve done anything with this chassis, apart from the DVD drive mounted in the front, it looks much as it did when we started, but at least everything still looks as presentable as it did when we took the system out of the box.

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Antec have really gone the extra mile with the Antec Three Hundred Two, improving on every aspect of the original Three Hundred and still managing to keep it within the same price range, which is quite an achievement in its self, with a slightly wider chassis allowing room for cable management behind the back plate and cable management holes being added being the biggest feature to be overhauled, which are both a welcome addition to this chassis.

While much of the looks are the same as the original, the gentle curve added on the front panel helps give the chassis that extra touch of style, as does the embossed Antec logo on the rear side panel, but over all the style of this chassis is clean and tidy, with build quality that is as good as we’ve come to expect from Antec and better than I expected within this price range.

Clearly Antec have listened to what their customers want with the features on this chassis, moving the fan controllers to the rear of the chassis is a big step up from the internal switches on the original Three Hundred, giving you two fan speeds to either maximize your cooling or minimise your PC noise levels dependant on your situation, add to that the water cooling capabilities, which are limited, but are certainly better than not having support for them at all.

The only problem I ran into with this chassis is the 2.5″ drive mounting point on the back plate, which became a little obscured by our motherboard rendering it useless, fortunately we only have the one SSD installed so it wasn’t an issue for us, but it’s something worth keeping in mind if you’re looking to purchase it, but overall this really is a minor issue, it’s still an improvement over the old design which didn’t have any SSD mounting points.

So overall then a pretty impressive chassis, sure its not the greatest case ever made, it was never designed to be either, but given that you can pick this chassis up for around £50, which is an amazing deal for a chassis that supports water-cooling, has pre-installed speed controller fans, USB 3.0 ports on the front panel, cable management, great build quality, plenty of room for additional fans and water cooling and comes fitted with quick release drive bays. So while I could easily give this chassis our Bang for Buck award, I am awarding it our Editors Choice award, if your looking to build within a tight budget, or if you’ve spent all your money on graphics cards and have little left for a good chassis, you’re going to have a hard time finding this many features on any other chassis within this price range.

[red03]

if only ila gibilin ang fan cage og removable filter. perfect na onta ni

[PagkahomotSAimongUTOToi]

idk about this but im not really a fan of white insides of a black outside.. looks "kind of" generic to me..

[acronis]

a nice value case...

[red03]

@Pagkahomotsaimongutotoi: pwd man nimo pintalan bro