Intel's Long Awaited BTX Form Factor

First Look: AOpen B300 BTX case cont'd

Internal Design cont'd

At the front of the case is a rubber surround which the thermal module will fit into to provide insulation and to keep warm air from seeping back into the case. To the left of that we see a support bar which spans the depth of the B300 from front to back. As we will see later this bar provides support not only for the structure of the case, but also to hold the PCIe riser card in place. To remove this bar there is a screw at the front of the case that needs to be removed. We then lift the bar from the front, pivoting the backside in its slot and pull up.


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To the left of the bar is the auxiliary port module which is home to the internal USB, audio, and FireWire connections. This module is designed with headers so unused ports can be unplugged from the inside to reduce clutter. We also notice that the front panel connections (power/reset buttons, power/HDD activity lights) are also grouped into a single plug to make things easier. It looks like motherboard and case manufacturers are finally working together to standardize more than just the location of the CPU.


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The backside of the case consists of 3 vertical half height expansion slots and one full height slot which is positioned horizontally. This, we can safely assume, is where the PCIe x16 VGA card will reside. The I/O backplate is positioned beneath this full length slot.


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To secure expansion cards in place there are devices in place on the outside of the B300. Each device, one for the single PCIe x16 slot and one for the other three expansion slots, can be undone by removing a single screw and then pivoting them off the cards' brackets. This feature reduces the number of screws needed but, unfortunately, does not make it a tool-less feature.


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Installation

Installing the motherboard was simple since there wasn't much to get in the way if it. We placed the D915GMH on the stand-offs and applied the included screws. We did notice that the tool-less optical mounting device on the inside of the drive bay could not be opened once the motherboard was in place. Luckily the lower HDD bay can be removed by undoing a single screw and sliding the bay back towards the power supply.


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There was still an issue with those tool-less devices interfering with the thermal module's fan power header on the motherboard. Unless we plugged in the power cable before replacing the drive bay, it would not stay in place on the motherboard header. We again would need to remove the HDD bay to plug the cable back into the motherboard.


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Besides those issues all other parts of the installation carried on smoothly. Our optical drive installed without a hitch since there was nothing to get in the way of the tool-less mounting devices. However, we ran into a clutter problem with the cabling behing the drive bays. As we mentioned earlier the 3 inches of clearance was just not enough to work freely with drive cables, and if it weren't for SATA, there would have been no way to run an IDE ribbon cable to the IDE header on the motherboard. For those that only have the IDE option, we suggest sticking with rounded cables if dealing with this combination of hardware.