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Antec Releases "Skeleton" PC Case
Posted by
ScuttleMonkey
on Mon Oct 13, 2008 04:22 PM
from the case-but-not-a-case dept.
from the case-but-not-a-case dept.
ThinSkin writes "It is appropriate to say that Antec was 'thinking outside the box' when the idea of the 'Skeleton' PC Case sprung to mind. The Antec Skeleton is an open-air PC case with a pair of shelves for the motherboard and other components — held up by arching arms. There are no side panels. This is ideal for the computer user who is constantly fidgeting with his PC parts, or someone who wants to show off his fancy components. Just have a compressed air can nearby. There is also a slideshow of Antec Skeleton images available."
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Good for a lab. (Score:5, Insightful)
But man i would fear every open can of soda, and heaven forbid you have kids or pets.
Re:Good for a lab. (Score:4, Funny)
Parent
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Actually, I believe they try to recreate asexually, but realize their attempts are futile. Then they forget and try again the next day.
Re:Good for a lab. (Score:5, Funny)
Sooner or later you'll notice that your FSB has had an upgrade.
After that you'll just have to find a female connector if you got the male one, or a male one if you got the female one, and the rest is basic IO.
There seem to be some sort of protocol using a closed handshaking routine to initiate the data transfer though and I haven't got that one figured out. There have been quite a few attempts to reverse engineer and document the procedure for the whole handshaking process, part of the progress can be found in TFM by Neil Strauss, but there are no complete documentation yet.
Common practise for finalising the handshake routine includes brute-forcing. But that method requires a wide array of targets since the target host most often will notice the probe and close all ports well before the initializing handshake routine and following data transfer is over. Alternative practise includes paying for a one-time key usable against a single target. This method got its flaws though since the target are usually well protected against intruding code which won't execute whereby not finalizing the final stages of the procedure. You will still get all the benefits of making the connection and following thru the whole data transfer process, but the application will never fork into a new process.
But believe it or not, some people even see benefits of the lack of a child process. For instance you don't have to fight over resources, share memory or try to fight for priority.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
After that you'll just have to find a female connector if you got the male one, or a male one if you got the female one, and the rest is basic IO.
If you've got a female connector, you have no problem finding a male dongle for it. Ever.
Re:Good for a lab. (Score:4, Funny)
Thanks for pointing that out. If he kept on contracting himself, he'd form a singularity.
Parent
But... (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:But... (Score:5, Insightful)
Like the article says, this is for people who probably already have their case open anyways.
Parent
Re:But... (Score:4, Funny)
But! Even my mom wants this case!
Though my friends tell me how her case is always open.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
How many times have you nearly destroyed your computer, only to be saved by the case? Not once in 20 years for me. I have gone through about 10 keyboards though.
Re:But... (Score:5, Interesting)
Already ordered one for our development lap where we're testing under lots of hardware configurations. We've been using old PC server towers, the kind that stand like 4ft tall, so we can easily access all the components when we need to swap out this or that. But they do take up quite bit of space. As the article said, it's a niche product. So i guess next week we'll see.
Parent
Re: (Score:2)
My first thought when I saw this was that it was an idiotic idea, but a couple seconds later realized that this would be ideal for many lab environments where you might need to change the hardware around frequently, and food/drinks aren't a big problem. As an embedded software engineer, I always have bare boards and components at my desk, though mine aren't the type that would fit in any kind of PC case, including this one, so I can see how this would be attractive.
I'd never put one in my house, though. O
Re:But... (Score:4, Funny)
Only the one time. And if they did survive, you could be sure they would learn the lesson.
Had a Irish Setter once. And an electric fence. He wizzed; I winced. But I must say, I never saw him repeat the experience.
Parent
Re:But... (Score:4, Funny)
"Already ordered one for our development lap where we're testing under lots of hardware configurations."
And don't think your lap wouldn't appreciate the weight reduction. :)
Parent
Re:But... (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
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That's what I was thinking. I've certainly had motherboards just sitting on a desk before without issues....
Re:But... (Score:5, Insightful)
I already have dust buildup in my closed case. It has an acrylic side panel, so it does not offer RF shielding. It has a top fan, so it doesn't offer much safety from a beverage set carelessly on top. As a matter of fact, no matter how much I wanted to I couldn't set a beverage on top of this Skeleton, so I would set it elsewhere -- this case is possibly safer as a result.
Perhaps closed cases are overrated in terms of the amount of "actual" protection they provide.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
"Perhaps closed cases are overrated in terms of the amount of "actual" protection they provide."
IME with customer machines, closed cases protect many interesting "dust bunny and (usually) dead insect" ecosystems. As for "pets", I've seen some machines with enough hair/dust/primordial "stuff" to build a small dog.
How appropriate (Score:4, Interesting)
Halloween is just around the corner!
Seriously though, Antec makes some amazing cases. Thing is, it's so easy to get into my P180B, I don't think this skeleton case is going to be any better.
Noise Level? (Score:4, Insightful)
My only concern would be the noise level from all of the components. I suppose it wouldn't matter if I had "quiet" devices. Overall pretty cool looking case.
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
My only concern would be the noise level from all of the components. I suppose it wouldn't matter if I had "quiet" devices. Overall pretty cool looking case.
RTFA "Above, the huge 250mm fan is controlled by a three-speed switch, and is extremely quiet at the lowest setting.". Sounds OK to me as long as you don't need a hell of a lot of cooling doing. And yer i agree, amazing looking case.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
RTFP: I said components, not the CPU fan. As someone else stated HD's, power supplies, overclocked GPU's....THOSE are the real noisemakers unless you use major passive or water cooling. The BFF over the CPU is only part of the solution.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Not a problem. For the CPU fan, get a Thermaltake Tsunami, which has a giant 120mm fan and is very quiet (this might not fit in this new Antec case, though). For the power supply, get a Seasonic power supply with 80+% efficiency and a 120mm temperature-controlled fan, also very quiet. For the GPU, get a GPU with only passive cooling. I have some Nvidia card (6600?) with heatsinks on both sides with a heatpipe connecting the two.
On my system, the only problem with noise is the 4 hard drives, and the vari
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
And if the computer is running Windows Vista, the whining from the user itself.
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Yes, but for those of us who have their PCs on 24/7 with the cases open and a hard drive or two just sitting on the desk, sans enclosure, connected to the PC wouldn't mind something like this at all. In fact I'd love to have something like this.
When I get tired of the noise coming from the computer, I just shut the office door. When I'm using the computer, I just tune the noise out or turn the speakers up and don't even notice the PC.
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I like it too but already have my 'show-off' cases for 5 years and expect another 5 out of them. This takes up more real estate than the more standard shape and i really would not have room for this :(
A tad pricey for what you get. That is more than my clear ones were back when there were only 2 places on entire internet to get them!
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What TFA fails to report is... (Score:4, Funny)
Tesla Coil! (Score:5, Funny)
Just put a Tesla coil on top.
No, I haven't thought mu cunning plan through.
Parent
Re:What TFA fails to report is... (Score:4, Funny)
Parent
Unpractical, really (Score:5, Insightful)
Even if we assume that there are no problems with air circulation and proper cooling (it's Antec, after all), this things takes up much more desk space than a normal tower case, cannot be used like a destop type case (however awkward they are) because of its shape and cannot really be placed under the desk (it negates the whole puprpose of such a design and most computer desks have no place suitable for something like that anyway, except maybe the printer shelf). So it's half a desk for a weird novelty. Not worth the hassle, IMO. Even for someone who likes fiddling with the parts a big tower without the left side panel and placed on the right hand side of the desk would be probably a lot more practical.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Hang it on the wall.
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But often when swapping parts you need to turn the case on its side. If you have a really tall and long case, like most of the cases I use, this takes an awful lot of desk space. My desk never has that much space, so I'm inevitably stuck unplugging everything and transferring the computer to the floor.
If you compare this to a case that's lying flat, it actually uses a lot less space.
EMI (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:EMI (Score:5, Funny)
Screw EMI. After all, they're part of the RIAA.
Parent
Re: (Score:2)
Exactly. The box is there for a reason. EMI is one of them.
The other reason for the box, is to keep the monkeys I work with from getting out of control.
Re:EMI (Score:4, Insightful)
My previous computer was mostly plastic (yeah, bad choice... the case broke at a LAN party but I kept using it for 4 more years) with only a plate of steel behind the motherboard. This should *increase* the EMI (read: ground plane [wikipedia.org]) but I certainly never had a problem. A CRT monitor or even your cable box produces far more EMI (and in those cases, more "tonal" EMI) than your computer.
...just checked. The FCC compatibility requirement is basically a "free air" certification.
Parent
Nothing new, just slightly prettier (Score:3, Interesting)
that's hardly 'open' (Score:2)
It ought to look more like a Tri-D chess board from Star Trek. (Pic [memory-alpha.org])
Awesome. (Score:5, Funny)
looks perfect... (Score:2)
For when my 7 month old son decides it's time to learn walking... :-P
This is not the STUPIDIST idea ever (Score:2)
You can by a lot of dry wall screws and angle iron for that price, *and* customize it with a tin foil hat hanger!
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
If it was comparable with a standard simple case $40-100 I could see getting one just for the fun of it. Unless the entire thing is a solid block of Aluminum and functions as a giant passive heat sink there's nothing there worth almost $200.
Why so cramped? (Score:2)
If I'm gonna get a 'Skeleton Case' I don't want it to be tiny and cluttered, I want it to be open and easy to fiddle with. That case looks cramped as fuck. My 20.6" x 8.1" x 17.8" case is cramped with cables already.
Re: (Score:2)
Who cares? Anyone who buys a case like this isn't going to buy a pre-made computer, they're going to build it themselves. There's no laws (at least here in the USA) against selling parts like this, regardless of the fact that the resulting system won't be EMI-compliant.
Besides, the typical place for one of these to be used is in a corporate lab, where EMI, reliability, and acoustics aren't a concern, and listening to the radio definitely won't be a concern.
Re: (Score:2)
Reminds me of this gadget [highspeedpc.com].
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Nevermind that, the question is does it blend?