Antec Nine Hundred Two: Second Generation Gamer Case
by Christoph Katzer on February 13, 2009 3:00 AM EST- Posted in
- Cases/Cooling/PSUs
Appearance
The Nine Hundred Two case is completely black -- inside and out. The main structure of the case is composed of steel, with plastic parts for portions of the top and front. As with its predecessor, there are nine 5.25" drive bays with perforated covers on the front to allow air to pass into the chassis. Like most other cases that have a bunch of 5.25" drive bays, Antec uses hard drive cages placed behind some of the 5.25" covers. Two cages are included, with each cage occupying three 5.25" bays and supporting up to three 3.5" hard drives. If you want to forego using any optical drives, you could purchase a third hard drive cage separately.
There are power and reset buttons at the top, along with audio, USB, and eSATA ports. The top panel looks similar to the Twelve Hundred, with a large 200mm fan serving as an exhaust. The top panel is largely composed of plastic, which does make the case feel a little "cheap" -- or at least not as nice as the expensive aluminum cases -- but it's thick enough that you won't worry about accidentally breaking it. The combination of steel and plastic does help keep costs down somewhat, although at ~$160 this certainly isn't an entry-level or even midrange case.
The left side panel has a large window that extends from top to bottom, allowing you to see all of your internal components including the power supply and the back of any hard drives. You will want to take some time to make sure your cabling is clean, which is one of the drawbacks of such a large window. The rear portion of the left side panel has a cutout where you can install a 120mm fan, which would blow air directly at any expansion cards -- great for keeping GPUs cool.
Antec includes eight expansion slot covers on the back of the case, which is one more than most computer cases provide. Thumbscrews are provided to secure any components installed in the expansion slots, and most people will end up with an extra expansion slot or two that their motherboard doesn't use, which would be a perfect spot to install additional USB, FireWire, or eSATA ports.
Antec is one of the few companies to include fan speed controls on many of their cases, and the Nine Hundred Two continues that trend. There are two small potentiometers that control the case fans on the two included hard drive cages. In addition, there are three-way switches on the rear where you can select low/medium/high fan speeds for the top and rear case fans. Another switch allows you to turn the LED on the top fan on or off.
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
56 Comments
View All Comments
JeBarr - Saturday, February 14, 2009 - link
This might have made sense on the full size 1200 and I suppose still useful for some, but still seems like a waste for the targeted audience. Thanks for the nice photos I don't always get that here and is appreciated.CZroe - Saturday, February 14, 2009 - link
Many people mount their HDDs backwards in Antec 900 cases. It certainly looks cleaner and it solves the problem with clearance behind the graphics cards. My older 900 required me to Dremel some holes under the motherboard to route the wires but Antec caught on quickly and pre-drilled them in later 900 cases. I'm sure that they didn't forget when making the Nine-Hundred Two.jjj - Saturday, February 14, 2009 - link
It's nice to see that you guys try to test cases with high end parts but I wish you would use some bigger CPU coolers too.I'm farely sure a TRUE on a DFI LP UT X58 or EVGA x58 wouldn't fit because there isn't enough space above the mobo.7Enigma - Tuesday, February 17, 2009 - link
That does seem like an omission. If you are going to go with 3 freaking GPU's in tri-SLI I would assume you would have a Tuniq Extreme or something on there that is massive.Mr. Katzer, please at least test this in the future to make sure large cpu coolers will fit. I understand you want to keep the setup the same for comparison purposes to previous reviews, but just pop a larger cooler on to make sure clearance issues don't cause problems.
Christoph Katzer - Thursday, February 19, 2009 - link
I am currently building a second system (i7) and Noctua sent us two different coolers that we can test different setups. First ones tested with two systems are the Thermaltake ElementS and Antec NSK4480II.poohbear - Saturday, February 14, 2009 - link
u guys say:"The drawback of course is that you can only fit a maximum of nine hard drives"
wow, so, their target audience might need more than 9 hdd?! lol that's hardly a drawback man. jebus.
yacoub - Friday, February 13, 2009 - link
Using dictatorial software, eh? :)
7Enigma - Tuesday, February 17, 2009 - link
Ha I wondered what that meant, now I just read it phonetically and see how Dragon misconstrued that. :)strikeback03 - Friday, February 13, 2009 - link
Glad to see they added a side filter to this. I built a system for by brother in law in a Three Hundred and we ended up having to tape cheesecloth to the inside of the side panel behind the side vent to filter dust. Has the standard fans at the top/rear, and a 120mm blowing in through the hard drive cage, all fans at slow.ianken - Friday, February 13, 2009 - link
...that's a pretty sloppy cabling job there guys.Alos, this might make a nice server box. Nine bays up front, I could fit three four disc traless hotswap cages there.