Antec P182

[Gunwitch]

Right here goes.

Recently upgraded my AMD system to an Intel system (pretty impressed so far), and bought a nice shiney Antec P182 case - what a mistake

I know this case has had good reviews, but what a pain in the rear it is to get everything in!!

The cable ties are a good idea - make sure your psu cables aren't too thick or the right hand panel bulges and is a bugger to get on.

The bottom fan that fits behind the psu doesn't like modular psu's like the enermax infiniti which being modular, means the old plugs stick out a wee bit and catch in the fan blades so that had to come out.

And theres no clips. screw holes for a bottom front bay fan.

So my question is this: How the hell did these things go unoticed in all the reviews?

On a good note it's a rather sexy case, keeps everything nice and cool, silent and looks the dogs nads. the drive bays are easy to fit and optics and hard discs went in easily.

So if anyone out there has suggestions on how to fit the bottom front bay fan, please let me know as it's driving me up the wall and my graphics card needs cooling and i've read the hexus review, and checked the Antec website

[Pob255]

The XSReview said

I hope you have a modular power supply otherwise this will be a lot harder.

Isn't this the pannel you need to remove to acess that fan?

[staffsMike]

I had no trouble with the corsair 520w HX which is modular. There are warnings about PSU's fitting in, in pretty much every review lol

the fan needs to be quite close to give the psu some air when the fans are on low. It's not prefect but its a cracking case

[Million]

The cable ties are a good idea - make sure your psu cables aren't too thick or the right hand panel bulges and is a bugger to get on.

The bottom fan that fits behind the psu doesn't like modular psu's like the enermax infiniti which being modular, means the old plugs stick out a wee bit and catch in the fan blades so that had to come out.

And theres no clips. screw holes for a bottom front bay fan.

Fair point about the modular PSU, I use an Xclio and have removed the bottom chamber fan and bracket, making it much easier to work with, but to be fair, is it really necessary to have a fan there? My PSU easily draws enough air through to cool HDDs (which don't really take much cooling in my experience) and itself - though admittedly it has a 140mm fan which moves a lot of air. I actually found the bottom chamber to be the best place to hide unsightly cabling - that and the mysterious space below the floppy caddy.

Regarding the bottom bay fan, do you mean for the lower chamber, or the main one? If you mean the main one, my P180 had a plastic bracket for sttaching a 120mm fan, as well as screw holes if you wanted to connect directly.

I just finished watercooling mine last night - it was quite a fiddly job, but worth it. I'm putting up some pics in 'modding' now...

[Gunwitch]

Aye its the bottom fan behind the PSU. With the modular psu it's because of the plugs that caused the wiring to hit the fan. I've taken it out and the temp is a pleasent 23c on cpu and 35c on the mobo with only the top two fans. Would of been nice to fit the 3rd one in the space at the bottom front, but theres no place to screw it in with or without the fan bracket.

It is a nice case, but i'm a perfectionist and use to a Chieftec Matrix which is nigh on twice the size lol

And now i've had chance to get used to it, it's grown on me.

Should have smaller hands i guess lol.

It is nice though

[vokesalex]

I've also just bought this case and i've had a few problems with it. Here are my thoughts.

The build quality is great. Everything feels good an solid and the gun metal finish is excellent.

I had no problem getting my power supply installed but as it's not modular the rats nest of cables is the problem. I had to remove the installed lower chamber fan as described in the hexus review so that I had enough room for my cables to fit.

The cut outs on the motherboard tray are a great idea. Unfortunately the cables of my psu are too short, so only the one that is any use is the cut-out opposite the mainboard psu socket. I have two drive coolers by coolermaster and unfortunately they wouldn't fit in the case with the rail mounting system as they stuck out too far for the front door to close. I was happy to use the installed drive caddies however.

I have a 8800 GTS and it's massive. With the PCIe power cable plugged in on the end it makes accessing the middle harddrive caddy very difficult. Pluging in the SATA and power cables is very tricky as everything must fit in the miniscule gap between the graphics card and the back of the harddrives.

If you have a floppy drive ( i know they are basically obsolete ) then I'd recommend installing this first as it is a pain to get in once you install all your other case equipment. Unless you have very dextrous long fingers or a very long floppy PSU connector then this can cause lots of stress.

My motherboard isn't really expecting to have things below it, so having the power supply mounted underneath the motherboard caused a few problems. My final PCI slot is the only one I can use for my sound card and unfortunately this means that it's very close to where the cables all come up through the divider in the lower compartment. My speaker/power switch/ide light cables are also attached to the very bottom of the motherboard, as well as the USB/1394 + front panel audio. So adding additional psu cables to this space makes it quite busy.

It can get a bit jam packed in there with cables so i recommend being very gentle when removing the harddrive caddies. I managed to shear off my SATA power connectors off the both of the two harddrives in my case and also destroyed the corrosponding power connectors from the PSU. I'm now forced to use legacy 4-pin molex on them.

I recommend setting aside a good afternoon to install your stuff in this case. I found I constantly had to rethink how I was going to organise cables and the order in which I needed to install stuff so that it wouldn't cause me problems later. There are probably loads of you out there that are much better than building pc's than me but I found that it took me a good 4-5 hrs to get everything in this case to my satisfaction.

Overall I'd recommend this case, even though I had problems I want to finish installing my pc in it as it looks cool and should prove to be very quiet.

[master811]

Is it possible to use a different fan where the PSU is, possibly one that is thinner to avoid the cable problems?

Also would a 8800GTX fit in with the top hdd bay being used, as its mentioned that a GTS is tight, and I think that the GTX is a few cm's bigger isn't it?

[Gunwitch]

You'd have to remove the top hard drive bay to fit the GTX, there just isn't enough space.
As for a different fan, i think the thicknesses of the 12cm fans are all the same. Because i'm using a modular psu you have an extra inch to 1 and 3/4 inches of plug and cable that extend out. You could fit the botom fan on the other side of the psu bay before putting the psu in though. I couldn't be bothered doing that after i'd fitted everything though.

[n00dey]

You'd have to remove the top hard drive bay to fit the GTX, there just isn't enough space.
As for a different fan, i think the thicknesses of the 12cm fans are all the same. Because i'm using a modular psu you have an extra inch to 1 and 3/4 inches of plug and cable that extend out. You could fit the botom fan on the other side of the psu bay before putting the psu in though. I couldn't be bothered doing that after i'd fitted everything though.

But if you did move the fan before hand, would the PSU with the modular cables be unobstructed? I'm thinking of sticking a Decathlon 750W in a P182.

[Pob255]

Can't you mount the fan on the other side of that virtical rail?
Although that would probably make the bottom caddy unuseable.

[sitalchauhan]

I have got an antec p180b and my corsair hx-620 pulls enough air to easily cool 3 hard drives in the lower section no problem without the middle fan. If I had 4 hard drives in the lower section I would use a fan though just to keep the air constantly moving around the HD's.

My 8800gtx fits with the upper hard drive tray still fitted. However, the upper hard drive tray is not useable because the edge of the 8800gtx is so close to it.

[Gunwitch]

But if you did move the fan before hand, would the PSU with the modular cables be unobstructed? I'm thinking of sticking a Decathlon 750W in a P182.

You remove the fan easily enough before fitting your psu. It comes fixed to a plastic fan holder.

Can't you mount the fan on the other side of that virtical rail?
Although that would probably make the bottom caddy unuseable.

Fitting the fan on the otherside wouldn't make the bottom caddy unusable, although depending on the length of the plugs on the back of the psu might make it a bit tight. Doable though.


sitalchauhan: you can leave the caddy in if fitting a 8800gtx, but no drives would fit.

[Sprite]

You cant actually fit an external radiator on this which is a a bit retarded as it's got holes for the tubing...

[oranges&lemons]

I have a P182 and have had all the problems mentioned, the corsair hx620 I'm using fits in with all my cables connected just about missing the fan, my 8800 GTS also just about fits but its tricky to reach the upper drive bay drives, especially the top one.

However on to my point, and this really is a rather amusing thing to fail on, has anyone else had any problems trying to install the 5 1/4" drives? I just cant seem to fit mine, they dont click into place as stated, I've currently given up and left them half in half out xD, I've never had this problem with any other case and I have no idea how its possible to fit them, a walkthrough of what anyone else did would be appreciated, even if it is just:

1. slide in
2. they click

xD

[sitalchauhan]

I didnt have any problems at all with my drive rails. I just attach the drive rail so that the tip of the Metal part is level with the front of the drive as in this pic:
http://www.francisshanahan.com/image...s_IMG_4756.JPG

And then just slide it in like in this pic:
http://www.nonessential.org/wp-conte...0619/rails.jpg

Then when fully inserted, they click in place and lock flush with the font of the case

[Mutley]

I just got the Antec P-182 case and I love it. I've put an Enermax Infiniti PSU in, and it powers an Abit IP-35 Pro, 500GB Samsung SATA HDD (in the lower chamber), SATA DVD writer, and XFX 8800GTS.
Being modular, it does mean the fitted cables stick out, but I've had no problem fitting them so they don't touch the fan at all. Also, I have NO cables running through the plastic cable seperator thing that sits between the upper and lower chamber. All my cables either run behind the mnotherboard (what a great idea that is!), or round the lower fan. EVen the SATA cable connecting to the HDD in the lower chamber runs behind the motherboard. Its sooo clean. Got a few extra cable ties to keep the DVD write cables clear, and the front panel cables - those sticky cable clips are a good idea too.

I'm thinking of removing the fan case in the lower chamber, and just screwing the fan in place. One thing that is odd about the case is that with all the effort gone into noise reduction, such as rubber mounts for the PSU and drives, there are two fan mounts which just plug in quite loosely and can really rattle around.

I might also replace all three fans with some I can plugin to and control via the motherboard.

I think its a great case, and good looking. Its not perfect by any means though.