In Win Allure – A Unique Computer Case

Introduction:

The selection of computer cases presently has grown to cover almost every conceivable design, concept and specification any one engineer can put a pencil to paper and draw up. In early March of 2009 I had some family in town while on their vacation (living in Orlando, FL, I get that a lot). During this visit my brother was interested in having me build up a PC for my niece. Looking through the computer cases TechwareLabs had in stock, none of them seem to fit the profile of a young girl of 5 years. Most of the cases were very large and looked like Aliens or had some other outrages design that just didn’t fit who I was building it for. Of course my brother said anything would do as long as the final cost of the build wasn’t too much. I just happened to come across a case that IN WIN had sent TechwareLabs and at first glance it fit the bill. The IN WIN ALLURE is a case that should appeal to most girls out there with its white exterior decorated with a few purple flowers and sparkling crystal like jewels. Let’s take a closer look.

Features:

Specifications:

When the case arrived at TWL, the box the case came in was done up to look just like the case, white and decorated with purple flowers. This of course led to being teased by the guys at the Lab. Upon opening the box I discovered a small white box which opened like a book, it revealed a poem and a small plastic bookmark and the Manual for the case. The case was sandwiched between two Styrofoam holders and cloth-like bag which held the case inside.

One very eye catching design	Standard packaging for most computer cases.
The case is inside a cloth-like bag, between two pieces of styrofoam	At the top of the box, just under the lid is this small box.
Inside is the poem and the owners manual.	Though touching to someone, the poem was lost on this reviewer.

The poem and bookmark were something I have never seen come with a computer case before. The packaging of the case was very affective as the case arrived without any damage.

Closer look at the Allure:

The front is very simple in functional design, but the paint scheme will get anyones attention.	The patent pending front door flips open at the press of a finger. Though an inventive idea, it did get in the way when we installed a ROM drive in the top drive bay.
The left side of the case is blank, not even a window to look inside..	The right side of the case is done up with purple flower design. Since the right side is all done up and not the left, the end user may need to rearrange their desk where the case will sit to be sure to show off this side of the case.
The top of the case has a corragated look which doesn’t appear to provide any additional function other than a place to put items. NOTE: The front half will need to remain clear as the front door of the case does flip up and cover some of the top.	The back of the case has a cover unlike any other case this reviewer has ever seen before. The cover does have the ability to remove different plates to allow for access to the back of the case. Though the cover does allow a little space for cables to be plugged in and ran to the bottom of the panel, providing for a very clean look.

The Allure is a case for those who are looking for a theme for a room in an office or home where everything seems to match an on-going theme…. perhaps? Anyway, this case will work out just fine for whom I’m building the PC for.

–~~~~~~~~~~~~–

Closer Look Continued:

The inside of the Allure is very nicely engineered with the tool-free design.	The 3.5″ drive bay swings out for a quick access to two hard drive slots.
The front panel also comes off with a press of a button.	The cowling for channeling air from the side panel to the processor is on a hindge and swings out of the way.
With the back panel removed, you can see the back of the case and what panels one may choose to remove if they need to.	Here we decided to remove the cover which hides the power supply. The case came with a 90 degree power cable which we installed and routed out the bottom of the panel.

After the PC was built and shipped to my niece. My brother purchased a mouse keyboard and a monitor which he tried to hook up all the cables to the PC and reinstall the back cover. Though several attempts were tried, in the end he simply left the rear cover off due to a monitor cable which refused to bend 90 degrees off the plug. This isn’t a huge deal, but a design flaw that we would have liked to see fixed in the design phase.

Since this computer was going to be for my very young niece who will be using it for school and playing very simple learning games, I didn’t need to obtain anything high-end, so I decided on one of my favorite processors to date, the very energy minded AMD 4850e. Since the Allure is designed for micro ATX motherboards, I decided to use the Asus M3A78-T motherboard. With the processor and motherboard combo, the price was well under $150. I also added two gigs of RAM bring my total to $177. At the time of this review the IN WIN Allure is listed at $109. The last components I still needed were a full size power supply (minimal wattage needed), SATA hard drive, and an CD/DVD-R Rom drive. These last items I did have laying around from other systems, so for $270 or so I was able to assemble a very nice PC. There is still a little room inside to add an additional video card if my brother wanted to use the PC for a entry to mid-level gaming PC. The 4850e Processor did handle such games as Crysis pretty well. Of course we did add a high-end video card to play those video demanding games.

Installing the motherboard wasn’t too bad. With items like the cowling and hard drive bay which swings out of your way (sort of), the install was pretty easy.	The installation of the 4850e with heatsink was also an uneventful effort.
With the periferal installed and cabled we come to notice there was no real cable management to help hide the cables, though in this small of a case it would be difficult to have anything extra packed in such a small space.	Swinging the cowling into place, it just squeeked into place under the DVD ROM. Which if the cowling was swung closed with pressure in the wrong place the Cowling would hang on the back of the DVD ROM.
The next surpise with the cowling was the fact the hole for the heatsink didn’t line up with the heatsink.	Closer look at the alingment of the cowling to the heatsink. Though this is just one motherboard and not having another model available to test if the alignment would be better.

Since I was using the AMD 4850e processor which is a very cool running processor, I wasn’t too concerned that the alignment of the cowling and the heat sink weren’t spot-on. The rest of the installation of the peripherals were pretty easy and uneventful. Once the PC was powered on and I went to put the operating system CD in the DVD-ROM drive I noticed the front door made it a little difficult with the ROM drive installed in the top most 5.25″ drive bay. I then lowered the ROM drive to the second drive bay. This allowed me to put the OS CD in the drive effortlessly. Now since the DVD-ROM drive was in the lower of the two 5.25″ bays the cowling did rub. This tight fit between the ROM drive and the cowling was of little concern though as it didn’t disfigure the cowling.

Conclusion:

The engineers at IN WIN have put together a case like no other. The Allure is a case with a look which no other case on the market today can hold a candle to. The clean look and eye catching floral design is a case that can be placed in the home as well as the office. I would not be surprised if this case was placed on the shelves of a popular electronics store that keeping the Allure in-stock would be a real concern. Though the Allure doesn’t fit this reviewers life-style, I have suggested it to many family and female friends with great response. I have shipped this PC to my Niece, Amber, who has been using it for several weeks now with no issues. I would like to thank IN WIN for sending TechwareLabs the Allure as it is one of a kind. I reward the IN WIN Allure the Awesome Hardware award due to the Allure’s unique look, great design, and superior functionality. The allure gives light to PC case market showing that all computer cases don’t need to be black or beige.

  Previous Page         Page 1Page 2Page 3Page 4Page 5Page 67. View All         Next Page