House plus power pairs from the Chieftec workshop

External

This house is already a much more serious, non-entry level product, plus it is made in landscape design (or is designed for landscape use) and is not secretly aimed at HTPC builders. In terms of size, it can be called a mini-tower, which is why it is not surprisingly suitable for microATX standard motherboards. Within the manufacturer's products, Maestro strengthens the line. The front panel is articulated by curved lines and, although made of plastic, its pattern gives the impression of brushed aluminum (this increases the feeling of quality, but does not significantly increase the purchase price).

Simplicity is also characteristic of it, the contiguous surfaces are free of chunks, the two buttons and the two LEDs are located in the middle, which are surrounded by a swing door from below and above. Behind the top you can hide the optical drive, and at the bottom you will find the terminals (two USB 2.0, one FireWire, one headphone output and one microphone input). On the right side of the housing, you can also notice an additional tilting panel with an adjusted position, behind which you can attach a 3,5 ″ device, which can be, for example, an information panel, a card reader, etc. (of course, even an FDD drive, but there would hardly be a realistic need for this in an HTPC). An 8 cm fan can be mounted on the cover.

The side panels are identical, with two facing triangular ventilation grilles facing each other. At the rear, in addition to the special-sized power supply (the CS-01B-300 also has a built-in Chieftec power supply, which, as the name implies, has a total power of 300 W), two 6 cm fans can be installed (underneath the motherboard ports), a maximum of four expansion cards can be placed on the left edge.

Internal

In the interior layout, at first glance, we find nothing strange when we put the house on top of it, we get practically the inside of a standard mini-tower. However, due to the small space, there are some special modifications, such as the frame at the front of the housing, which fills about 75% of the length - which, among other things, receives the optical unit - can be completely removed with a screw.

In this state, it is much easier to mount the drives, which can be a 5,25 ″ unit in the middle, a 3,5 ″ unit below, and a 2,5 ″ unit next to it. As long as the frame is outside, thanks to the open path, a 01 cm fan can be placed in front of the CS-9,2B. The smaller rack system left at the edge of the housing can accommodate two more 3,5 ″ devices, one of which can also be accessed through the front panel.

Because the inside of an HTPC is not frequently touched, all drives are secured using the traditional disk screw method, and this finding is also true for fixing expansion cards. As already mentioned, this housing (in this package) also includes a power supply, which is a special, small-sized model. The manufacturer is Delta Electronics (Chieftek prefers to use this company's interiors in its power supplies), model number DBS-300AB-9 C (rev 02 F). Two 12 V branches can be loaded with a maximum of 22,5 A, with a maximum combined total power of 285 W.

Key features summarized:

• Model: CS-01B-B-300
• Power supply power: 300 W
• Number of 2,5 ″ drives per piece
• The number of 3,5 külső external drives is one
• The number of 3.5 belső internal drives is two
• Number of 5,25 ″ drives per piece
• Installable motherboard standard: micro-ATX
• Front terminals: 2 × USB 2.0, 1 × IEEE1394, 1 × headphone output, 1 × microphone input
• Fans that can be installed: one 8 cm at the top, two 6 cm at the back, a 9,2 cm at the front
• Dimensions: 350 mm (W) × 136 mm (W) × 440 mm (W)
• Weight: 7,2 kg