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Looking for a case with handle (i.e., something portable)

107K views 23 replies 10 participants last post by  Carniflex 
#1 ·
I have CoolerMaster Storm Scout atm. Good case, I'm reasonably happy with it but its not particularly suitable for water cooling, it seems. The top 140 mm slot is only 30mm from RAM slots and CPU fan header and the rear exhaust 120 mm is only 50 mm from 8 pin CPU power connector on my motherboard. Only spot where dual 120mm rad would go without modding is a side-panel and thats not particularly comfortable spot if I want to open the case from time to time or have large GFX cards. So as it stands I could do a 120x25 mm rad with 25 mm fan or a 120x38 mm rad with 12 mm fan plus 140x25 rad without fan (or if it exists a 140x20mm + 12mm fan).

So I'm looking around for portable cases with space for dual 120mm rad, preferably two of these. But for a start I'm listing all the portable cases I'm aware of and asking if I'm missing any ? I know that there exist carrying harness for cases but if possible I would prefer handle. I carry mine around daily and messing with harness would be somewhat hassle it seems to me.

If you know some case with handle or carrying strap please point it out to me
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The ones I'm aware of are:

Full tower
CM Cosmos II - http://www.coolermaster.com/product.php?product_id=6792
CM Cosmos S - http://www.coolermaster.com/product.php?product_id=3947
CM Cosmos 1000 - http://www.coolermaster.com/product.php?product_id=2584
CM Cosmos PURE - http://www.coolermaster.com/product.php?product_id=6600
CM Storm Trooper - http://www.cmstorm.com/en/products/chassis/Trooper/

Mid tower
CM Ammo 533 - http://www.coolermaster.com/product.php?product_id=5
CM Storm Scout - http://www.cmstorm.com/en/products/chassis/scout/
Antec - LanBoy - http://www.antec.com/Believe_it/product.php?id=NzA0NDUzJjE=
AeroCool RS-4 - http://www.aerocool.com.tw/index.php/products/chassis/31-pgsr/113-rs4
Corsair C70 - http://www.corsair.com/vengeance-c70-mid-tower-gaming-case-military-green.html

Small
Thermaltake LanBOX - http://www.thermaltakeusa.com/Product.aspx?S=1200&ID=1428#Tab2
Silverstone SFF - http://www.silverstonetek.com/product.php?pid=234&area=en
NZXT Vulcan - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811146065

Edit: Apparently after taking a closer look a Antec Lanboy does not have handle, although considering the flexibility of the case adding a piece of rope to the case for dragging it around should be easy enough. I'll leave it into the list for now, just cross it through.
 
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#2 ·
i am pretty sure the trooper will be bawss for this, i will be getting it in a few weeks so pm if you need a full review
 
#3 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by Carniflex View Post

....I carry mine around daily and messing with harness would be somewhat hassle it seems to me.
If you know some case with handle or carrying strap please point it out to me
smile.gif
I recommend Lian Li Tu-200. One is on display in a local store and I inspect it and find it to be very sturdy and well constructed for traveling. Obviously you will have to downsize your motherboard to Mini-ITX and you can only use one beefy graphics card.

600

Product link
http://www.lian-li.com/v2/en/product/product06.php?pr_index=585&cl_index=1&sc_index=25&ss_index=64&g=f

3 other cases with handle:-
1) BitFenix Survivor
http://www.bitfenix.com/global/en/products/chassis/survivor/

2) NZXT Vulcan
http://www.nzxt.com/new/products/crafted_series/vulcan

3) Thermaltake Level 10
 
#6 ·
I myself was looking for a portable pc but at the moment dont have money to scale down to Mini-ITX so will be transporting my current rig to Bitfenix survivor and changing PSU to Corsair AX 850 and adding either 6950/70/90 depends on the amount of money i can scramble together >_>
I probably will Change the parts around 2013 summer to Mini ITX and get myself GTX 780, prolly Ivy i5 3570K or Haswell i5 if its out by that time.

But the point I am making is go for Bitfenix Survivor, IMHO best case with a handle that does not need modding to be superb. Unless you really need a side window ( which i am going to add). I did my fare share of research on cases with handles and this one comes out on the top no matter what.
 
#7 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by StormXLR View Post

I myself was looking for a portable pc but at the moment dont have money to scale down to Mini-ITX so will be transporting my current rig to Bitfenix survivor and changing PSU to Corsair AX 850 and adding either 6950/70/90 depends on the amount of money i can scramble together >_>
I probably will Change the parts around 2013 summer to Mini ITX and get myself GTX 780, prolly Ivy i5 3570K or Haswell i5 if its out by that time.
But the point I am making is go for Bitfenix Survivor, IMHO best case with a handle that does not need modding to be superb. Unless you really need a side window ( which i am going to add). I did my fare share of research on cases with handles and this one comes out on the top no matter what.
Yeah its a solid case if you dont have to mess around inside daily (as its a bit hard to open). I'm more a man of bang-for-buck and functionality than looks, but having a good looking case, everything else being equal is ofc bonus. The smallest I would be able to get away with is mATX though - as I need all the RAM I can get for the stuff I do and ITX is usually a bit limited as far as available RAM slots go. The case has even water-cooling holes so it might be possible to bolt few rads on externally if internal space is not enough. Although the top 200 mm fan location seems ideal for rad. A 200x200 mm rad is 40 000 mm2 which is almost the same as tripe120 mm (43 200 mm2).

For my purposes Storm Trooper seems to be best fitting if I dont want to mod anything although it adds extra 5 kg to carry around over my current setup. On the other hand I'm seriously considering just getting a 10 euro white box case and do some cutting plus bolting an handle on top. I think I might get away with mounting two dual 200mm rads on one side of the case which is large enough surface area to be really quiet (either passive or very low rpm 200 mm fans) but I'm still thinking about it - I'm not particularly skilled as far as doing stuff with my hands goes
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so going with something that does not need modding would be probably both cheaper and also safer. As just flat out putting bare rads on the side of a case I carry around daily might be pretty expensive unless I come up with some good plan how to protect the rads from bumping around my car trunk when I drive over the railroad or something like that. And it probably would look like steampunk gone wrong
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The second option I'm considering is getting HPTX motherboard tray from mountain mods and building my own case around it (or getting the 24x24'' case from mountiain mods and seeing about getting the handle added on top) but first one is a lot of work and second one would get pretty damn expensive(although the mountain mods cases look awesome for portability as they are aluminium and such very light when compared to CM scout or trooper). The HPTX motherboard tray looks pretty attractive as it can take anything from mATX, ATX, E-ATX, XL-ATX (and probably also SSI CEB and EEB) to the massive 13.6''x15'' HPTX size.
 
#8 ·
#13 ·
#14 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by StormXLR View Post

well thats a lot more cases with a handle then I have imagined.
BTW I ordered the Survivor should be arriving tomorrow or day after tomorrow latest, here is the build log so check it out if you are interested,
http://www.overclock.net/t/1243744/build-log-railight-le-portable-midtower-wip-bitfenix-survivor
Indeed. There has been considerably more cases with an handle than I imagined that there would be. I stumbled upon the china wholesalers page yesterday and after staring at it for a little bit I decided that there is more of these cases than I can keep up (especially considering that almost none of these cases is available locally or with reasonable shipping cost to me).

Survivor, btw, is pretty high in my "like" list but its unfortunately a bit too wide for my purposes. If I would bolt an rad and fans to the side of that thing it would end up approx 15 mm too big and would not fit in the trunk of my rather little citycar. And I'm not that keen of upgrading to bigger car atm, considering the fuel prices. I need a case that is max 200 mm wide (Survivor is 230mm) before I start adding rads n stuff.

In the end I will probably get a regular case (for example, Revoltec Fifty 3 which is 430x430x185mm) and add the handle on top myself - as so far I have not managed to find anything fitting exactly all my criteria.

I wish someone would be doing a regular case with 7x to 9x 5.25'' bays, top PSU or even better a PSU that is installed the old fashioned way sideways on top of CPU socket (as I will be water cooling anyway), capable of taking EATX motherboards (regular ATX is 12''x9'', EATX is 12''x13'' so just a bit longer) and with good solid handle and locations where to attach carrying strap. Would be awesome portable server/enthusiast case (considering that SSI EEB, which is often used for dual socket server boards is also 12x13'' just few screw holes in other locations than on EATX). As an added bonus such case would be capable of taking pretty huge GFX cards without issues (up to 13'' or even up to 21'' long if 5.25'' bay would be removable).

I did consider building my own case capable of taking EATX and as small as I can manage to make it (you can make EATX case as small as 310mm high, 560mm long and 160mm wide) but I'm not sure if I have the time for such undertaking. I'm not that good with doing stuff with my hands
wink.gif


The ultimate portable case would be "Small from factor" HPTX (i.e., XL-ATX and even the famous SR-2 compatible). You could pull this off as small as ~ 350mm high (~440mm if you mount PSU on top or bottom and +25..30mm if you want to have fans), ~610..625mm long and 160mm wide. Lets say 450x650x185.
 
#15 ·
Are you sure you want to carry 30Kg of PC using the cosmos II?
rolleyes.gif
 
#16 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by 3930K View Post

Are you sure you want to carry 30Kg of PC using the cosmos II?
rolleyes.gif
I sure did consider it. It would have been a bit more than 30 kg tho as chassis alone is 22 kg. I have many hard disks and these add the weight rather fast with the mass of approx 700g per unit. However, it was a bit too big and expensive. At that price point you are in the same ballpark as MountainMods and LianLi so there is plenty of pretty solid cases to pick from. My current setup is approx 20 kg out of which case is approx 9 kg.

I went atm with Revoltec Fifty 3 - it's blatantly ordinary mid-tower case without an handle. 430x430x185 mm, 4.8 kg, 9x 5.25'' drive bays for approx 40 euros. I will have to mod it though for adding the handle and making the motherboard side side-panel rigid enough for taking the 9x120mm rad. I had to go for something smaller as I measured what would fit in my trunk (Toyota Aygo is a very small car, not feeling like chaning that though with current fuel prices as they are).
 
#18 ·
CM Storm Trooper/Stryker
CM Storm Scout/Scout2

Can really not go wrong with these, they have more than enough space and are relatively easy to carry around.

But considering you want something to carry around every day I would not look at the Trooper/Stryker (They get pretty heavy pretty fast
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) but the Scout/Scout2 are definite winners in my opinion
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EDIT:
there is also this: http://www.coolermaster.com/product/Detail/case/mid-tower/k550.html
Slightly smaller that the Trooper/Stryker but it is on the other side of the ugly scale in my opinion
tongue.gif
 
#19 ·
NZXT Vulcan is the best one for this choice!
 
#20 ·
Bitfenix Prodigy cases if you want to go mini-ITX. Very aewsome cases!
 
#21 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by afallickwang View Post

NZXT Vulcan is the best one for this choice!
Added to the list. Although in the end I ended up getting a case without handle and modding it. http://www.overclock.net/t/1262095/soliton-dispenser-an-atx-portable-watercooled-case-with-external-9x120mm-rad - it was very small case, 430x430x185 mm so comparable to mATX cases but able to take full ATX. It was a bit too small tho - no space for cable management. So i Ordered yesterday a new case to mod it. 460 mm high 540 mm long and 205 mm thick and able to take EATX mobos. Some kind of chieftek home server case.
 
#23 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by FTWxxMODZxx View Post

I've thought about the CM Storm Sniper, but now after searching, im in love with the bitfenix survivor, well i will be after a window mod
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Modding can do a lot for a case
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Revoltec Fifty 3, for example







does not resemble the original a lot after some drilling and cutting and adding little pieces here or there. That was the case I picked at first, but it was way too small - basically mATX size but able to take ATX mobo. So I had to upgrade and are now with ATX size modded case which can take EATX mobo (one of the chieftec home server cases).




 
#24 ·
When googling for something I stumbled upon this thread I started few years ago.

So I would like to add few comments in case anyone else is asking the same question and stumbles upon this thread. In a nutshell - if you have a perfect case already in mind and only problem with it is that it lacks the handle - just add it. For vast majority of cases this is quite trivial and involves only drilling few holes and bolting the handle to the case. Second comment - be mindful of the weight. If possible try to stay under 12 ... 15 kg. After that weight every extra kg adds an considerable amount of uncomfort for lugging one around. If you go above approx 16 kg I would strongly suggest adding also a shoulder strap.

By now I have gone through a number of iterations with my quest for a "perfect" portable case.
(1) CM Storm Scout - heavy steel case which just happens to have an handle. Did not really like it - far too heavy, did not take long gfx cards.
(2) "Soliton" - Revoltec Fifty 3 with heavy mods - Nova 1080 monster radiator, HDD and SSD hotswap bays, very tight packing - but .. it was heavy and I needed more room. Total weight 23 kg. In retrospective it was pretty decent but could have been a bit more rigid. It's the green one in above pictures.
(3) "Soliton stretcher" - the black EATX case from above pictures, same nova 1080 rad, 3 gfx cards, hotswap bays - disregarding the question of weight altogheter bcos of POWEEEER ... but apparently 32 kg is enough to leave bruises on ones shoulder even with the shoulder strap - it had to go eventually - mainly because of weight. It was a server chassis made of 1mm steel so the dry weight alone was like 16 kg or so.
(4) "Kohver v.3" - Some modded sharkoon case, the other end of spectrum, 12.5 kg strictly air cooled, no hotswap bays - making it all as light as possible. Served me fine until I got 390X but it was such a howler in that case that wife walked up from the first floor from watching the TV to see what is making such howling when I put it in and started gaming. So I had to watercool that thing and, unfortunately, that meant some added weight and again a new case. It had also some issues with rigidness and construction quality - had to mod a displayport cable to be able to plug it into 390X in the top slot bcos some edge of the case was apparently not strictly following the ATX spec.

(5) "Kohver v.4" - Some ancient aluminium case from ebay with heavy mods including new lasercut front panel, reinforcement plate for handle, etc. To be honest if not the horrible howling of 390X I would probably be still on the previous iteration. But the new one is better now that I have done it - much better airflow and CPU is sitting at ~75 C under load compared to hitting as high as 90C on hot days in the Kohver v.3. I did not consider price anymore really when picking a case for Kohver v.4 - LianLi, MountainMods, anything was on table as long as it would fit what I'm looking for exactly ... and none of them did so I had to mod. With laser cutting, painting and everything I ended up in the same price ballpark as these mentioned plus ungodly amounts of elbow grease. If you find a case that hits the tickboxses just go for it even if its a 300+ EUR one - it will be cheaper than what you will end up if you have to do a proper mod if you count your work-hours price fairly. But when you will have to rebuild the case anyway then it no longer really matter that much with what are you starting with as what was there in the beginning will not be what you will have once you finish with it.

 
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