Chieftec Scorpio TX-10BLD Entry Level Server Chassis
Reviewed by Akimoto, 04.25.02
Provided by: Chieftec
Street Price: $49 USD w/o power supply

Directron carries a wide variety of Chieftec cases, including an all new Chieftec Matrix Case. Check it out here. Be sure to use the special  $10 of $100 Directron offer by entering "firsthardware10pub" when checking out. Hardware Pub appreciated your patronage. 

The Case - Inside
    The inside of the case is pretty roomy; 1.8 cubed feet, to be exact. It has more than enough space to accommodate any ATX mainboard, and has a nice overhead with room for modification, if that's your bag.

    The first thing that will strike you upon opening the case are the drive rails that sit along the bottom of the case. These attach to the sides of your 5.25 drives and rather than screw them into the drive bays, as with conventional cases, the drives then slide right in. If you look to your right, you will notice that there aren't any screw holes in the 5.25" drive bays. This is an incredibly expedient and convenient feature, essentially allowing the user to screw their drives in outside their case, which can be a pain. Moreover, if merely moving parts around, the ability to slide drives in and out streamlines the reconfiguration process. The case comes with eight of the drive rails, which provides you with enough for all four 5.25" bays (which should be enough for most every home user).

    Another great feature is the two 3.5" hard drive bay cages. They slide in and out of their appropriate space and are secured by a lever. Being able to screw in hard drives outside the case is a nice benefit that can reduce a lot of the hassle associated with dropping small screws inside your case and cursing and just having a troublesome time in general. Moreover, one of the cages has a fan mounting bracket, so that one of the two front intake 80 mm fans can blow over two of your hard drives. This essentially kills two birds with one stone and obviates the need for a hard drive cooler, saving one of those precious 5.25" bays.  To increase airflow around the hard drives Chieftec should have gone with more of a cage-mesh, like the exhaust and intake vents, to house the hard drives. This can be modded pretty easily if you care enough to do so.
    Unfortunately, this case does not have a removable motherboard tray. These save drastic amounts of fiddling time, and really should be standard with every case directed toward enthusiasts these days.
    One final note on the inside: like the outside, the edges are rounded on everything. No nasty sharp edges with which to snag a finger, which makes installation a lot less painful.

Thoughts on Modding
The Scorpio case offers several modding/customization opportunities. Both the intake and the exhaust fan holes have enough space around them to allow you to widen them and install 92 mm fans for quieter or higher output cooling solution. You can strip down the hard drive bay cages to allow for more air to flow around your hard drives, and to take special use of a larger front intake fan, as previously mentioned. The case has two parallel crossbeams that traverse the length of the case to hold the power supply; these are great for attaching such modding paraphernalia as cold-cathode lights, or other items with which to customize your case. But how would cold cathode lights help you if you can't see them? Well, this case does appears to be quite window-friendly, so you can bust out those tools and have some DIY fun!

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