Unfortunately,
this does not appear to work as planned. The mechanism never snaps
in my particular scenario, I doubt that it is the ASUS graphics
card itself, so I also attempted an ABIT card just to make sure.
As I suspected, on both cards the mechanism would not secure to
the point of me trusting this solution when one of the main reasons
for the case is to carry it to a LAN party.
Now that everything is mounted, it is time to put it all back
together, connect all of the cables and see how everything
fairs. As you can see, the side window blow hole just misses
being directly over top the CPU fan on our ECS KN1-SLI Extreme
motherboard. It appears to be sufficient to bring in a good
amount of fresh air from outside the case to cool the CPU
adequately.
The
XG Dragon comes with one intake 80mm fan, one 85mm side window
blow hole, one 130mm X 85mm rectangle mesh on the side panel
and one 80mm exhaust. There is also an 80mm exhaust on the
PSU. This design gives the ability to have more air brought
in then is expelled, and depending on the positioning of the
side window blow hole over your CPU fan, and the strength
of that fan, this could be the case. In a typical scenario,
I would think that the intake and exhaust would match nicely
due to the passive breathers on the side. It would have been
nice to place an 80mm exhaust on the top of the case, where
the heat builds up, however, I can see where that might get
in the way of the overall design flow of the case.
Testing
Test
Components: ECS KN1 SLI Extreme, AMD Athlon64 3200+ (Venice
Core), Hitachi 80GB 7200RPM 8MB Cache SATA Hard Drive, ASUS Silencer
Extreme 6600GT
|
|
HTPC
Tech Station
|
MGE
XG-Dragon
|
|
CPU
@ 100% load
|
43C
|
44C
|
|
Motherboard
|
37C
|
39C
|
|
Hard
Drive
|
28C
|
31C
|
|
Video
Card
|
41C
|
45C
|
Some
may say that measuring a case against a wide open Tech Station
is unfair but I feel it’s a good baseline of what an air
cooled system can achieve without the restrictions in airflow
by a normal enclosure. The results show that the XG Dragon does
a decent job at getting air through the system, allowing the
components to keep themselves cool. The only glaring difference
I could see is the Hard Drive, but then the Tech Station has
a nice 120mm fan blowing directly across the ‘open to
air’ HD, which puts the MGE XG-Dragon numbers into perspective.
Final
Words
MGE
has delivered an inspiring design in the XG
Dragon offering. As much as I am not an enthusiast when it
comes to heavily modified cases, this one struck me when I first
opened the package, and has continued to grow on me since. Its
simple building blocks that offer almost an entirely tool less
solution with looks that will make you proud to bring your system
to a party with 300 of your closest friends because as we all
know, it’s not just your gaming skillz on display.
The
front display is of obvious use and unlike most aftermarket high
end gaming cases, you also get what looks to be a decent 500w
PSU. I would have liked to have seen a side facing hard drive
rack, and I have no idea why the Firewire connector came as individual
wires. This is further compounded by the fact that the USB, something
that other cases have often supplied as individual wires (and
again, there is no reason for it, it is an industry standard)
is supplied as a proper block, so I do have to wonder why the
Firewire connectors are individual wires. Still, these are relatively
minor in the scheme of things and the overall result is a case
I’m very happy with. The overall exterior design is not
something I would personally pick out when buying a case, but
it has grown on me which I think speaks a lot for it. Those who
do look for the flashy, pre-modded look in a case will love it,
just as I have come to.
Pros:
Extremely Stylish Design, Good cooling with minimal noise levels,
Front Temperature probe readout, Ample internal space in a Mid-Tower
design, Powerful silent and quality built PSU included
Cons:
Independent connectors on the FireWire, Internal 3.5” mounts
rear facing, A few miscues in a case that costs more then most,
Side Air-Duct assumes manufacturer position of CPU which is not
always correct
Bottom
Line: The XG
Dragon is in fact, all of that. Looks that kill, design that
inspires and tool less to the point of only needed on initial
install give this case a thumbs up. It's your choice now; either
carry this baby to your next LAN or watch someone else do it.
If
you have any comments, be sure to hit us up in our forums.
