NZXT Whisper Classic Series Case
Does a noisy PC get you down? If computer noise is driving you nuts, this offering from NZXT might be the right house for your computer parts.
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| If you’re the type who uses cutting edge components, heat is likely a topic you’re used to dealing with. Generally, you have two options. Either, you can invest in some sort of alternative cooling, which in general, are designed to be fairly silent. Your other option would be to load up your system with all kinds of high powered fans. Many of todays modern video card’s stock coolers don’t use the smallest of fans and are often times the loudest component in your PC. |
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Of course, provided you choose the second option, you are faced with two more choices. Either, choose to deal with a ton of noise, or wear headphones to surf the web. Enter the . This offering from NZXT is designed to be quiet, all the while allowing for all the expansion any enthusiast can possibly need. Before going further, here are some features .
- Silent Performance :: 10mm noise dampening foam pads both side panels and the top panel, rubber grommets reduce vibration noise on the Hard Drives, and a padded PSU holder dramatically reduce acoustic levels within the chassis
- Maximum Expandability :: Space for 9 hard drives and a total of six 5.25″ bays with ample room for large expansion cards
- Simple Installation :: Pre-drilled wire management system makes it easy to route your cables and the screwless installation means you won’t be constantly reaching for your tools
- Advanced Cooling :: Whisper includes 4 fans( 1 x 120mm Blue LED Intake, 1 x 120mm Black Rear Exhaust, and 2 x 80mm Rear Exhaust). Bottom mounted PSU separates the heat given off by the PSU and motherboard
- Case supports new 3.5″ SSD on all drives with brackets
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The NZXT Whisper Classic Series Case
We received a couple cases from NZXT, both the Whisper and Zero 2, but the latter we’ll focus on in the near future. However, it is worth mentioning since the first thing we thought when we grabbed the from shipping was “Dang! this is huge!”
The NZXT Whisper is packaged in a large black box, wrapped in a plastic bag and secured by a combination of foam and cardboard. To say it was very secure would be an understatement as we tore the primary box just getting everything out. Once we unwrapped everything, a quick examination told us all was well and there was no damage through shipping.
The Whisper is a full tower case, measuring 211.5 X 521.5 X 562 mm. The standard, and sole colour is black. The case is a matte black and constructed primarily out of steel. This makes the case very heavy, given it’s large size, and tips the scale at 12.3Kg without a power supply. Given it’s enormous size, the Whisper can accomadate a variety of motherboards, including E-ATX. Smaller boards fit of course, provided they follow the ATX specifications.
Inside the case was a small black contents package. Inside, there were case screws, PSU rubber insert as well as an instruction manual.
Looking directly at the front of the Whisper, there are not a whole lot of curves to the case. While most enthusiasts like a bit of flash and bang, the NZXT Whisper appears to go the more casual and functional look.
The majority of the case is steel, but the front facade is made of aluminum and plastic. The door’s purpose is to mask what some may say are unsightly optical drives and components, and given the marketing of silence, it also may help dampen some case noise from the front. Then again, given there are “slots” on this door, it won’t reduce noise that much but at least the slots will not reduce the effectiveness of the cooling.
This door serves to hide six external 5.25″ expansion bays. That’s a lot of optical drives, but for those of you with fan bay controllers, or other devices that fit in these slots, you should be well equipped here. The power button is near the top on the front facade, but you will be able to press it whether the door is open or not.
The front door does feature a slot for those of you with slot loaded optical drives. We don’t have any in house to use, so we did not take advantage of this.
Rounding out the front of the case is the large 120mm fan at the bottom of the facade. As with many of NZXT’s cases, this is no ordinary fan.
Hopefully, buyers of the Whisper like the colour of blue.
On the top of the case, we have a spring loaded compartment that houses some addtional connections. Moving from left to right, we have two USB 2.0 ports, an audio out and MIC jack and an eSATA connection. The eSATA connection is not powered, so if you are using some sort of eSATA storage device, you will require an additional power source. This isn’t a case limitation, but an eSATA specification issue still being addressed by the SATA standards committee. Otherwise, if you are not using these connections, simply press down on the compartment until it clicks shut.
Moving on to the rear of the case, there are several more punchouts. Obviously, we have the rectangular punchouts for the motherboard I/O and power supply, as well as additional grills for another 120mm fan and two 80mm fans.
A nice touch is the addition of pre-drilled cut outs for water cooling tubes. The rubber inserts serve to protect the tubes of course but we also found these holes usefull for some CCFL switches to be placed there instead.
To make your way into the case, you’ll need to loosen a couple thumbscrews. Once you take both of them off, you’ll have full access to the interior.
The main removeable side panel is lined with black noise dampening foam, not unlike those you’ll find in sound studios but not as thick, measuring 10mm. It has been years since we’ve used a commercially sold dampening material, but the clear advantages of foam is that it will be a lot cheaper and in most cases, lighter. Given the NZXT Whisper is quite heavy to begin with, the ligher foam is a welcome replacement. The picture above only shows off one panel, but both panels are indeed foam lined.
The NZXT Whisper is sectioned off, for both heat management and noise management. There is a lot of room to work with in here and with the rolled steel edges, safe as well. We’re happy to report we did not cut our fingers during the course of this review. These features are nice, given that the motherboard tray is not removeable.
Above is an interior shot of the front expansion bays. There are seven in total, though the default configuration is six as the one on the very top is actually an expansion bracket for 3.5″ devices. As you can probably see, there is a lock of screw holes here.
5.25″ devices are held in place by sliding locks. The design is tooless, and by twisting the tabs on these sliders, it secures the optical drives or any other 5.25″ device in place.
Above is another interior shot, but this time the inner top of the case. The noise dampening foam is here as well.
The lower half of the case is the hard drive and PSU area. The NZXT Whisper is capable of housing a whopping 9 hard drives. Each bracket features 4 rubber grommets to dampen any drive vibration. Once the hard drive is installed into a bracket, one of the few times you need a screwdriver, you can slide it back into the appropriate hard drive rack.
Hard drives aren’t the coolest running components, so there are two 80mm fans included with the Whisper to keep the furthermost hard drives from the front of the case cool.
The last bit of cooling worth mentioning is the rear 120mm exhaust fan. In a traditional ATX design, this will assist CPU coolers by venting out the hot air in this area out the back.
The motherboard connections are of course a requirement for anything to actually work. Amongst the cables, there is a normal SATA connection which needs to go into the motherboard’s SATA slot and is pre-connected to the eSATA we pointed out earlier.
Setup and Performance
The Whisper was pretty easy to setup, and for experienced builders, referring to the manual will likely be unnecessary. The hard drive trays need to be removed of course to install the 3.5″ disk drive of your choosing.
The drives are bolted down via the bottom screw holes and once done, just slide the drive back in. As there is no motherboard tray, just ease your board into the case. If you have some sort of specialized cooler, that needs to be installed first.
The potential for installation issues lies here as you can see above the edge of the motherboard comes right up to the interior of the case. If your specific cooler passes the edge of the motherboard, you will not be able to install it with the whisper.
We tested with two different setups. The consistent components were an Intel E6750 at stock speeds, Seagate 7200.10 500GB drive, Samsung DVD-r, and an Asus Silent Square cooler and a Corsair 600W PSU. We used both a silent NVIDIA 8600GT and an AMD 4870. Neither video card impacted the cooling performance of the case much, but the noise was certainly something we noticed.
Compared to a Cooler Master Stacker’s 38C system temperature, the NZXT Whisper was 41C. Acceptable in our books considering the Stacker is perforated and designed more for cooling in mind. However, the noise difference was large as the Stacker was unbearable when on the desk while the Whisper was hardly audible, even with the 4870.
Final Words
The accomplishes the goal it set out to do. Conquer noise. With a quietly designed system, unless I looked at the case and saw the lights, I’d be hard pressed to tell you if the system was even on. When we put our performance system together, with the noisy AMD 4870, the system was still quiet, even under load. The whining noise of the 4870 can still be heard but at a much lower level. My girlfriend used to complain about my system when I’d be gaming as she sits less than 10 feet away when watching TV. This forces her to turn up the television which really doesn’t bother me as I wear headphones, but it irritates her.
She noticed the NZXT Whisper when it sat on my desk, but still asked if I purchased a new system. When I replied no, she seemed surprised as from where she was, she hardly heard anything while I was playing Call of Duty. Only when she muted the television, was she able to hear the now faint whir of the AMD 4870, so that alone has made her a big fan of the NZXT Whisper.
Aesthetics are solid, provided you do not like a lot of flash. Overall, I found the NZXT Whisper decent enough that I didn’t mind showing it off, but the design is not the most exciting. That said, access to the top inputs and outputs were simple to reach and the front facade door does hide what would normally be unsightly optical drives. For those who prefer to stow it away, it is a very large case and there was no way it would fit in the PC compartment of my desk. As my desk is quite sturdy, it held up to the NZXT Whisper’s weight, but this is easily the heaviest case I have worked with during my time here at Viper Lair.
Cooling is an important feature for computer cases as something stifling too much heat will not bode well for your PC. Overall, the NZXT Whisper was acceptable, but not great. We think the better than expected performance here was due to the spacious interior, which compensated for the quieter fans. The case doors did not feel warm to the touch, so it is our opinion that the dampening foam does not contribute to any heat being retained in the case. Again, we will have to point out that “fatter” coolers that extend past the case will not fit with the Whisper.
Anyone looking to build a silent computer should certainly give the a look. You still need to use silent components for a truly quiet to no noise setup, but just the alone will quiet down what would otherwise be a noisy setup.
