Well, I was just starting to think that every new case on the market was modeled after something you might find in a comic book. Today we're here to see a pleasant surprise, a new case from Vtech called the X-Focus.
Let's start off with an overall picture:
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The case itself is clean and simple looking, modeled after the successful Lian Li V1000 and Apple G5 designs. The name X-Focus is meant to imply that gamers should keep their focus on the game, not the case. I've personally never played a game and said to myself "Oh, look, there's a distracting computer case over there" and lost my focus, but whatever. I like to move it, move it.
Here are some specs:
Material: 0.8mm SECC Steel
Case Type: ATX
4 x 5.25" External Drive Bays (2 Stealth)
2 x 3.5" External Drive Bays
3 x 3.5" Internal Drive Bays
Optional 80mm Fan Mounting Positions:
1 x Front Panel
1 x Top Panel
1 x Rear Panel
3 x Side Panel
Front I/O: 2 x USB2.0, Audio
Expansion Slots: 7
Dimensions: 17.75" x 7.5" x 16.75 (D x W x H)
I couldn't find a weight spec for this case, so I weighed it myself and it came in at about 14lbs. Even assuming a 1-2lb margin of error, that's still fairly light (not that light though).
Moving on to the case itself, this case seems to have no shortage of mesh. Instead of a window, it uses a mesh side door. More on this later, for now let's take a look at the front of the case:
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To keep the front of your case looking neat and clean (especially considering that dark silver is a hard color to match, unless you use your own paint), Vtech has made the front panel contain two drive covers. These are nice, but unfortunately they aren't removable. Therefore, you can't put rheobuses, drive coolers, slot loading drives, irregularly-shaped drives, or anything else that you might fill a 5.25" bay with that isn't a normal optical drive. You'll have to use the bottom two bays for those.
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Towards the bottom of the case is a very nice display. Again, more on this later, but to briefly sum it up, it shows case temperatures and various status indicators. We have our power/reset buttons, as well as respective LEDs for each, on the right.
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Included in the bottom bay are the front USB/Audio/FireWire ports for easy access. Good location, I think.
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I took this one with the flash so we can get a good idea of what we've got at the top of this case. It's got an 80mm hole, for a top exhaust. Sounds like this case is going to be well cooled...are we right? Let's open it up and find out...
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