the decline of the desktop case

Dankoozy

Why has everyone decided to start using tower cases now instead of the oldskool flat, desktop cases. it is almost impossible to find a good desktop case these days, and most of them arent even real desktop cases - they are HTPC, and are very media-oriented that almost look like an oversized dvd players.

for some reason i never liked the tower cases. they would be too big to put on my desk. but the desktop case is nice, i got all the drives and USB ports beside me. also the desktop cases now have very small power supplies for some reason. as low as 200 watt that wouldn't power anything unless you bought like a VIA motherboard

melekalikimaka

air flow, expansion etc. towers are better, in the old days upgrades werent as easy so manufacts didnt need to worry bout space for extra stuff, try sticking in 3 hd's, a gfx card,soundcard,raid controller card, wifi, psu, tv tuner etc in a pizzabox case

BostonB

Sometimes it like was melekalikimaka said, but I don't believe that the main reason. Most people don't upgrade and a lot of tower cases have pretty poor cooling and expansion.

Its a compromise. A desktop unit might be neater and up off the floor. But its used to be a pain to lift monitors off them, (before TFT's) and they took up a lot of desktop space. I stick my tower on the desk!

Dankoozy

melekalikimaka wrote:

air flow, expansion etc. towers are better, in the old days upgrades werent as easy so manufacts didnt need to worry bout space for extra stuff, try sticking in 3 hd's, a gfx card,soundcard,raid controller card, wifi, psu, tv tuner etc in a pizzabox case

I got 4 hd's in mine, but i got a PSU that was way too big for it so thats sitting outside it. i could have kept the 400w that was with it cause it doesnt use too much power. if space is the problem why cant they just make a bigger desktop case?

Bradidup

Thats what skips are for!!!!!!!!

Pizza boxes pcs are fine for da civil service, Fas & schools. But not for anyone who wants to tweek about with them. Dell pawned a heap of MMX pentium 2 flat pcs to Ennis during in the informtion age package 10 years ago, they were a nightmare to work on, daughter boards holding the pci cards!!! some unfortunitally are still in use !!!.

Dankoozy

Bradidup wrote:

Thats what skips are for!!!!!!!!

Pizza boxes pcs are fine for da civil service, Fas & schools. But not for anyone who wants to tweek about with them. Dell pawned a heap of MMX pentium 2 flat pcs to Ennis during in the informtion age package 10 years ago, they were a nightmare to work on, daughter boards holding the pci cards!!! some unfortunitally are still in use !!!.

i had one of those once, but it broke. my primary school used to have one of those, i even think i done my leaving cert on one because my writing was so bad nobody could read it.

my other desktop cases never had the daughter boards, so the PCI cards are just arranged as normal. HP still makes them but they are low spec crap, and mini-atx or something. for some reason someone decided that just because the case isn't standing up the computer has to be crap

BostonB

A lot of workstations (CAD & engineering) are desktops.

leeroybrown

I think that the final nail in the coffin of the standard desktop case was the mass market move from CRT to LCD monitors. They hogged enough desk space when everyone had a CRT but now you have all that extra free space left by an LCD monitor to waste too. At work I keep my tower on my desk off to one side which is probably more convenient than having a desktop case.

8T8

As you pointed out the desktop form factor has had a resurgence in the HTPC market but you can find some cases which still look nice while not totally conforming to the media PC look.

Silverstone in particular makes lots of media PC cases but some of them would pass for nice desktop cases in particular some of the LASCALA series some are full ATX and some are mATX.

Take a look at the LC10 or LC13 both of which can be gotten at Pixmania.

Old fashioned beige desktop cases are a rare creature though & specialist sites like X-Case's are one of the few places that still sell those kind of cases.

Dankoozy

8T8 wrote:

As you pointed out the desktop form factor has had a resurgence in the HTPC market but you can find some cases which still look nice while not totally conforming to the media PC look.

Silverstone in particular makes lots of media PC cases but some of them would pass for nice desktop cases in particular some of the LASCALA series some are full ATX and some are mATX.

Take a look at the LC10 or LC13 both of which can be gotten at Pixmania.

Old fashioned beige desktop cases are a rare creature though & specialist sites like X-Case's are one of the few places that still sell those kind of cases.

nice.. theres a few nice cases on that site. the LC13 isn't bad either