discussion NZXT Panzerbox Mid Tower Case Review

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Cooling Performance

Cooling Performance

The Panzerbox does quite well when it comes to CPU cooling. It falls just a degree shy of the potent Cooler Master Storm Sniper, and bests the Scout and Antec P183 by a healthy margin. We’ll see if our choice of PSU impacts CPU temperature shortly.

The motherboard sensor in the Asus M3A78-T is located between the two PCI-Express 16x slots, so lower temperatures read by this sensor usually equate to lower GPU temperatures. Thanks to the massive 190mm intake fan flowing 150CFM of air, the Panzerbox shoots right to the top of our charts. Clearly, a lot of air is making it to this area of the case.

Since our two HD 3850s are not identical, GPU1 is always a few degrees toastier than GPU2. Please note that this has more to do with the cards themselves than their relative positioning in the case.

Once again, the Panzerbox continues to impress and proves to be an excellent case for keeping video cards cool. During testing, we were able to feel a constant flow of warm air exhausting through the vented expansion slot brackets thanks to the healthy amount of front-to-back airflow produced. This is especially good news for those with video cards that do not exhaust hot air directly out of the case.

We see a very similar pattern emerge at idle. The Panzerbox is clearly an excellent video card cooler.

 

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Cooling Performance pg.2

Cooling Performance pg.2

Hard drive cooling is an often overlooked aspect of case cooling, but it is perhaps one of the most important. It is a fact that hard drives kept cool outlive hard drives that run at higher temperatures. This becomes even more important with high-RPM drives like the Western Digital Raptor series. As you can see, the drive in the open bench configuration received no active cooling, and quickly exceeded 40°C.

Thanks to the large amount of intake airflow, the Panzerbox does an excellent job keeping hard drives cool. Even in the top mounting location, we were able to realize a full three degree decrease over the Storm Scout.

The Panzerbox does very well at keeping our Antec Signature PSU cool. Thanks to the large amount of intake airflow, the PSU is constantly being fed cool air through its front intake grille. We’ll take a closer look at PSU cooling shortly, as very different behaviour is realized with PSUs with bottom mounted fans.

In order to see what kind of an impact a bottom mounted fan PSU would have on the Panzerbox, we threw our trusty Corsair TX-750 into the case. As you can see the additional exhaust flow from around the video cards made a fairly significant improvement in GPU temperatures.

Even the CPU temperature decreased a full degree simply by swapping out the PSU for one with a bottom mounted exhaust fan. Although the PSU does not directly provide extra cooling to the CPU area of the case, the overall internal temperature is decreased thanks to better GPU exhaust flow.

All of these great cooling benefits do come at a price, unfortunately. It’s no secret that the PSU is drawing in awfully toasty air from around the video cards and as a result, we saw a fairly high PSU exhaust temperatures. Noticeably warm air was flowing out of the case through the PSU exhaust grille when we used the Corsair unit in this orientation. Please do keep in mind that these two power supplies are very different, and that their temperatures should not be viewed as an apples-to-apples comparison.

Most modern PSUs should ramp up fan speed if things begin to get too hot, but exposing a PSU to high internal temperatures is not going to aid in its long term reliability. Although using a high quality PSU is always our recommendation – regardless of the case being used – we’d definitely stress its importance if you choose to mount the PSU to draw in hot GPU exhaust.

Thankfully, those with bottom mounted PSU fans are not forced to intake warm air from the expansion cards. Simply mounting the PSU in the opposite orientation lines up the fan with the vent on the side panel and the PSU can draw in cool air from outside of the case. You simply won’t get the added benefit of improved GPU exhausting.

 

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Conclusion

Conclusion

So there you have it!

From an aesthetic perspective, the Panzerbox is a nice and simple looking enclosure with some subtle “aggressive” hints, like the semi-transparent mesh top and front providing a view of the very large 190mm fans. Beauty is always in the eye of the beholder, but we think that NZXT was able to strike a nice balance, and create a case that just about anyone will like the look of. The aesthetic touches don’t just end at the exterior either. NZXT was thoughtful enough to provide some nice extras like a painted black interior and other “dark” components, like fan grilles and even case screws.

Although we think the Panzerbox is a good looking case, its absolute best feature is it’s excellent airflow characteristics. We’ve seen so many oversize fans pass through our labs, but they almost always seem to be tuned for low RPM and quiet operation. It’s nice to see a company finally break out of this mold and let these behemoths spin beyond 1000RPM. The result is well over 300CFM of combined air movement. Our performance results really speak for themselves with the Panzerbox topping our charts with ease in almost all of the tests we conducted. If cooling performance is high on your list of priorities, then we think you should definitely give the Panzerbox a serious look. When you combine this excellent cooling performance with some healthy watercooling options, like out-of-the-box dual 120mm radiator support, this is a very enthusiast friendly case. Now, although the Panzerbox is a real winner when it comes to cooling performance, we do need to make it clear that this is not a quiet case. Those interested in silent PC operation will need to look elsewhere. With that said though, we’re pleased to report that the 190mm fans let out a very bearable, lower pitched “rush” of air movement and that the rear 120mm fan is fairly quiet. Had that same amount of airflow been provided by smaller 120mm fans, the noise level would undoubtedly be much higher.

About the only negative thing we have to say about the Panzerbox is that it’s build quality could have been better. We encountered two minor manufacturing defects in our sample and we weren’t overly impressed by the case’s somewhat flimsy mesh panels and other light-weight aluminum components. We’d much rather have seen a pound added to the case and the price increased a tad if it meant strengthening the case up a bit and giving it a more sturdy feel.

We’re also a bit torn on the unique PSU mounting location in the Panzerbox. On the one side, we see that it allowed the Panzerbox’s height to be cut down pretty significantly while still allowing for some healthy radiator clearance up top. On the other side of that coin, it causes some real cable management challenges and creates some interesting thermal conditions due to the PSUs proximity to the expansion cards. If you’d be willing to sacrifice a hotter PSU for better video card temperatures, this may be considered a pro. None the less, we can’t help but feel that the pros do not outweigh the cons, and vice versa, so it really just comes down to personal preference.

We should also note that availability seems to be a bit of a problem right now with the Panzerbox. Although quite a few retailers carry NZXT products, the Panzerbox is surprisingly absent at many of the larger retailers like NCIX, Direct Canada, Tigerdirect and Newegg. We’re hoping that some of these retailers will add this case to their line-ups, as it’s certainly got quite a bit to offer in its price range.

Overall, we think that the Panzerbox is a good little case that provides excellent cooling potential, simple good looks at a very reasonable price of $129 Canadian. We’re pleased to offer the NZXT Panzerbox with Hardware Canucks’ “Damn Good Value” award.

Pros:

- Excellent cooling performance thanks to high-CFM 190mm fans.
- Very light at only 13 pounds thanks to all-aluminum construction.
- Very short and compact full-ATX design
- Good watercooling potential and included brackets for a dual 120mm radiator
- Removable motherboard tray
- PSUs with bottom mounted fans can further reduce GPU temperatures.
- Good price


Cons:

- Build quality and sturdiness could be better
- Cable management difficult due to PSU mounting location
- Not a quiet case
- Availability

Thank you to NZXT for sending us this sample​

http://www.hardwarecanucks.com/forum/cases/19496-nzxt-panzerbox-case-review-comment-thread.html​