In Win Mana 136 Mid-Tower Chassis Review
Chris Hadley / 12 years ago
Once built, there is no real opportunity to show off the insides via a window, but we can see a certain aspect of the build through the grill where optional fans can be fitted.
With everything installed, overall we can see that the cable management is pretty good the the only real mess being at the bottom of the motherboard tray where the large cut-out is found.
When fitting our cooling to the chassis we found that there was just about enough space for mounting the cooler. Had the case been any more narrow or the rear fan any more to the middle of the case, then fitting would have been an issue. We do note that any users who have X79 boards and potentially memory with tall heat spreaders may have clearance issues, but our Kingston HyperX RAM for example could be used in that situation with no problems.
As we’ve found with numerous tool-less designs, installation take only a matter of seconds and makes removal just as easy.
With the 3.5″ drives, installation is a little more involved requiring the fitting of the supplied screws to the drive first, but these can be done thumb tight and the drive slides in with ease. A little bit of force is needed to lock it in place, but at least you know its not doing to fall out of place when the system is moved.
Whilst the SSD does mean getting the screwdriver out, its orientations keeps all the cables to one side and out of the way.
The bottom of the case will allow for larger power supplies to what we have used here, we even found that even though a larger supply would cover over the top of where a secondary 2.5″ drive would be fitted, the raised platform on which the PSU sits gives enough clearance for the mounting area to still be used.
As we mentioned earlier, we are thrilled to see that a manufacturer has finally used an opening other than those that would be used for water cooling hoses to pass through the USB3.0 cable to the outside of the case.
When powered up we can see the two front panel LEDs that come fitted to the case. We do note that the power LED is considerably brighter than the drive activity LED, whether this be due to the colour used or the LED itself is something we are not sure of.
Lastly, whilst talking about LED’s, we can see the front fan lit up in all its glory. Even though it is powered via a molex connection an thus runs at full speed all the time, there was virtually no noise heard from the front of the case.
