ClearPC, C3 and BeanTech: The Clear Chassis Comparison

Installation

It came to our attention over the last few case reviews that we were not paying enough attention to the actual installation procedures of our cases.  Let us take a few moments to highlight some of the ‘gotchas’ we came across in each of these cases.

ClearPC: In the construction section we mentioned that there was no removable motherboard tray.  The case comes with approximately a dozen acrylic tubes that have to be used to support the board on top of the backplate.  This proved to be a very time consuming process, even for us.  Installation requires a little bit of wrench work, so take your time and work slow. 

C3:  The motherboard tray took the prize for installation of the C3.  Clearly labeled, and requiring no anchoring, we flew through component assembly of this case.  Unfortunately, the 5.25” to 3.25” bay converting pins were made of inferior material.  If they got even a slight bit warm, they expanded and broke off inside the hard drive housing.  Even screwing the adaptor a little too fast results warmth and expansion.  Do not unscrew the adaptors while your hard drive is still warm. The C3 should have been our installation winner; it’s too bad a silly little 5 cent piece of metal hurt the overall installation procedure.

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BeanTech BT82:  Overall, installation of this case proved middle of the ground between the ClearPC and the C3. It came with instructions, but they were not as thorough as those found on the ClearPC website.  A removable motherboard tray would have gone a long way for this case.  As we mentioned earlier, all of the motherboard stands need to be reverse mounted and then the motherboard can be screwed in from the front.  This case has an advantage of providing its own 3.25” bays without the need for adaptors. 

BT82 Included Instructions

Below is a small cross section of the assembly time of each unit we constructed.  Keep in mind, we have done this a fair amount of times, and our installation times may reflect a slightly faster score than most people can obtain.  We measure our assembly time from package opening to first errorless boot.  The components we will be installing include three fans (the BT82 and ClearPC already had fans installed), hard drive, motherboard components, video card, DVD-RW, hard drive and 3.25” floppy drive. 

	Time (min)
BeanTech BT82	37
ClearPC.ca ClearPC	45
C3 Crystal Clear	34
Kingwin 436-B-WM Aluminum	21

Our small benchmark shows the C3 ahead with a small advantage on installation time.  The majority of their lead comes from the motherboard installation.