Ultra Grid ATX case
 

Introduction

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I would like to thank Jon at Ultra Products for making this review possible.

Here is what Ultra has to say about the Grid case:

Specifications

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<tr>
<th scope="row">Color</th>
<td scope="row"> Black </td>
</tr>
<tr>
<th scope="row">11 Drive Bays </th>
<td scope="row">4 - External 5.25&quot;<br>
2 - External 3.5&quot;<br>
5 - Internal 3.5&quot; </td>
</tr>
<tr>
<th scope="row">Material</th>
<td scope="row">SECC Steel </td>
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<tr>
<th valign="top" scope="row">Form Factor </th>
<td valign="top" scope="row">AT, Baby AT, ATX, Micro ATX</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<th valign="top" scope="row">Expansion Slots </th>
<td valign="top" scope="row">7 standard slots </td>
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<tr>
<th valign="top" scope="row">Case Fans </th>
<td valign="top" scope="row">2 (included) </td>
</tr>
<tr>
<th valign="top" scope="row">Dimensions</th>
<td valign="top" scope="row">16.75&quot; x 7.5&quot; x 19.5&quot; (WxHxD) </td>
</tr>
<tr>
<th valign="top" scope="row">LEDs</th>
<td valign="top" scope="row">Blue - Power<br>
Red - Harddrive Access </td>
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<tr>
<th valign="top" scope="row">Switches</th>
<td valign="top" scope="row">Power, Reset</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<th valign="top" scope="row">Front Access </th>
<td valign="top" scope="row">USB, Audio </td>
</tr>
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Well, lets take a look at the Ultra Grid!

Packaging & Contents

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The packaging of the Ultra Grid is colorful and displays the case and the included power supply on the front. The back of the case shows the features of the case and gives the user an in depth look of the inside.

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The case is packaged quite well. The case comes wrapped in a heavy duty plastic bag. The top and bottom are covered in a foam which is much better than Styrofoam. The foam is not destroyed if the package is dropped, this is not the case with Styrofoam.

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Inside the case is a small white box which includes the power cable, a diagram for the front USB connector, a manual for the power supply and a few screws. There are enough screws for the basic installation, but you will need to supply your own if you rather screw your drives on instead of using the snap ins.

A closer look

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The front of the case is made of sturdy steel. It is perforated which adds a nice look to it. There is one drive bay exposed, so you can use your most commonly needed drive or a VFD without opening the door. The door does not open more than about 100 degrees, which is plenty for every day use. It would have been nice if the user could mount the door the other way as well. You may notice that there are no latches for the door. It has three magnets attached to the inside, which hold the door in place. A very nice touch. The power and HDD activity LEDs are covered by the door so you will not see if the system is on without opening the door.

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The side of the case has the hole of the fan duct, which is covered by a perforated metal plate as well as an Ultra fan grill. The combination of black and chrome looks really nice here. Below that you will find a vent for the graphics card to draw fresh air from. The paint job of this case is just phenomenal. It comes close to car paint quality.

The back is nothing out of the ordinary. One thing to note would be the thumb screws to secure the side panels.

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The front already houses a 12 cm fan, which is - once again - hidden behind a perforated metal plate. This makes the use of a fan grill obsolete. Even with the door closed the fan will get enough air, as the front door has a round hole in the back plastic. Users can add a LED fan if they like, which will surely look great in the front of the case.

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The hinge of the case is quite sturdy, so you do not need to worry about the door breaking off. The front I/O is located on the right side of the case. It would be prudent to place the case to the left of your chair or monitor, as the door opens to the left and the USB and audio ports are on the right side. There is a possibility to have a firewire connector as well, but Ultra left that out, most likely to reduce cost.

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The side panels are secured by afore mentioned thumb screws and have handles, making the opening of the case a breeze. Quite simple and very effective. The case itself is made of SECC steel.

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The side houses the duct, which is placed right above the CPU. This will definitely help with temperatures, as the CPU gets more fresh, outside air. All the drives can be secured using plastic locks. These locks can be taken off and the drives can also be held in place with normal screws if you wish.

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The back also houses a 12cm fan. Both of the fans have 12V pass-through molex connectors. 3 pin mainboard connectors would have been much better here, even if they do not include an RPM signal. It saves the user a lot of trouble when connecting all the power cables. The case comes with the usual front connectors. The audio connector is an AC '97 one. Some manufacturers have started to include a HD-Audio header as well. The header from the Grid case worked fine on the nForce 4 audio connector nonetheless.

Power Supply

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The Ultra Grid includes a V-Series 500W power supply. It is quite sturdy and sports a 12cm fan. The casing is powder coated black, which looks nice.

<table class="resulttable" border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="5"><tr><th rowspan="2">Connectors</th><th align="center">Main Power</th><th align="center">5.25&quot;</th><th align="center">Floppy</th><th align="center">4 Pin CPU</th><th align="center">SerialATA</th><th align="center">PCI-E Aux Power</th></tr><tr><td align="center">ATX 20+4 Pin</td>
<td align="center">8</td>
<td align="center">2</td>
<td align="center">1</td>
<td align="center">2</td>
<td align="center">1</td>
</tr></table>
Ultra has a very unique connector configuration. The 500W power supply only sports 1 PCIe connector, one 4 pin CPU connector. This may be problematic if using SLI or dual core based mainboards with 8 pin CPU connectors. Also 2 SerialATA connectors will most likely not be enough for power users, requiring the use of an adapter. Ultra included a total of 8 12V molex connectors. Most users will not ever use that many connectors. While there are plenty of connectors, there is not really a good balance in the mix of connectors on this power supply.

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The ATX power, 4 pin CPU and PCI-E cables are all around 50 cm long, while the 12V molex end up being more than twice the length. You will have a hard time cleaning out the cabling in your case with such a configuration. Especially if you are forced to use both 110cm 12V molex strings.

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<table class="resulttable" border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="5"><tr>
<th colspan="9"><div align="center">Ultra V-Series 500W </div></th>
</tr><tr><th>AC Input</th><td colspan="8"><div align="center">115V/230V 10A/6A 60/50Hz</div></td></tr><tr><th>DC Voltage</th><td align="center">+3.3V</td><td align="center">+5V</td><td align="center">+12V1</td>
<td align="center">-5V</td>
<td align="center">-12V</td>
<td align="center">+5VSB</td></tr><tr><th rowspan="4">Max. Output</th>
<td align="center">32A</td>
<td align="center">20A</td>
<td align="center">28A</td>
<td align="center">0.6A</td>
<td align="center">0.6A</td>
<td align="center">2.0A</td>
</tr><tr>
<td colspan="2" align="center">180 W</td>
<td align="center">336 W </td>
<td align="center">3 W </td>
<td align="center">7.2 W </td>
<td align="center">10 W </td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td colspan="3" align="center">480 W</td>
<td colspan="3" align="center">20 W </td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td colspan="6" align="center"><strong>500 W</strong></td>
</tr>
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The 500W power supply is rated quite nicely and will surely power any single VGA system. Still, it does not compare to today's dual rail 450W to 550W power supplies, which supply between 32A to almost 40A. The power supply has a rated efficiency of 70% which is mediocre at best.

The power supply has a voltage switch toward the inside of the case where the user can choose between 110V and 220V. Here it is switched to 220V and ready for use.

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The power supply has a few stickers on it to show what quality tests it has passed. The cable tree comes out of a fairly large hole in the power supply chassis. This increases the risk of damage if the cables are pulled to hard. The cables are not sleeved, which will drastically increase cable clutter inside the case.

Installation & Noise Level

Installation

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Installing the mainboard went without a hitch, but as soon as the four hard drives were installed the first problem surfaced. The Grid has space for five hard drives, but the top space cannot be used if the system is powered by a big graphic card like a 7800/7900GTX or X1800/1900 series card. The PCIe connector will not fit if a hard drive is installed at the same height. So I moved the hard drive down to the bottom to be able to connect PCIe power.

The screw-less drive installation does not hold the drives in place well at all. The drives moved around if a power or IDE/S-ATA cable was connected. If you go to LAN parties, make sure to remove the screw-less locks and screw in the drives the old fashioned way. Maybe the use of rails would have been the better option in this case.

Once the power supply was connected to all the components, the huge mess became apparent. As mentioned before the combination of over 1m long molex connectors, the lack of more S-ATA connectors, the use of 12V pass-through molex connectors on the fans and the lack of cable sleeving really made a huge mess. You will have a hard time cleaning all the cables up. Notice that none of the S-ATA or IDE cables were installed at this point.

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Once everything was installed, the PC was turned on. The power LED is bright blue, which does look quite nice. Also the use of the Thermalright Blue Orb 2, which uses a blue LED fan, looked very nice. The blue glow could be seen through the Ultra fan grill and air duct.

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The VFD simply looks great in the open drive bay, no matter which way you look at it. All in all the case does look beautiful.

Noise Level

The two 12 cm fans are surprisingly quiet. Even quieter than the Lian-Li fans in the PC-G50 we reviewed here. The power supply fan can be considered quiet as well. The overall noise level can be considered very good.

Value and Conclusion

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• The Ultra Grid ATX Case has a MSRP of $149.99 which is OK for such a 500W & case combination. But considering other stand alone 450W power supplies with higher ampere dual 12V rails and sleeved, modular cables start at around $50-60, the MSRP may be a bit steep. Luckily the actual retail price is just around $100 dollars for this combination, which is definitely worth it.

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• Great look
• Incredible paint job
• Silent fans
• 500W power supply included
• Screw-less installation
• Sturdy steel construction
• Sturdy, high quality door
• Open drive bay great for VFDs
• Lots of space for drives
• Door closes with magnets
• Nice Ultra side duct
• Well packaged

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• Screw-less locks do not hold well at all
• Power supply will not handle SLI
• Large graphic cards block hard drive bay
• No 3-pin headers for fans
• No sleeving on the power supply cables creates huge mess
• Power supply cable and connector mix not very good
• Power and HDD led cannot be seen with closed door

</td></tr>
<tr><th>8.2</th>
<td>
The Ultra Grid starts out looking good, with its great build quality and perfect paint job. The door is sturdy and uses magnets to close while the side has a sweet looking Ultra fan grill and duct. The 500W V-Series power supply may be enough for normal users, who do not care what the insides of their case looks like, but will not satisfy power hungry enthusiasts.<br />
You definitely do not want to show all that cable mess off at the next LAN Party. While the the screw-less drive installation works, it is more of a problem than a relieve if you ever plan to move your PC around. The cooling setup of this case is great, but nothing very innovative.<br />
If you are looking for a great case, with no window, do not plan to open your side panel at a LAN party and can live with using old fashion screws to secure your drives, this is definitely a great case. But make sure to add a VFD in the open drive bay, as it just looks to sweet to pass up. This case can definitely be recommended, if you can live with the cable clutter and are willing to sacrifice the screw-less drive installation for more security and transportability.</td></tr>
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