This case is just a straight-up knock-off of the Corsair 4000D, and yet manages to fumble the actual "air"flow portion of its name. We're reviewing the Montech Air 1000 Lite case.
Sponsor: EVGA Z20 Keyboard on Amazon geni.us/kvPqEC
The Montech Air 1000 Lite is our second review of a Montech product on this channel. The first time Montech sent us a case, it was the X3 Mesh. That one did relatively well in our testing, and we'd say it was a good start for the brand. Unfortunately, the second case that they sent was this one -- the "Air" 1000 Lite -- and it fails to live-up to the name while being otherwise mundane in build quality and features.
Our new fan testing equipment is expensive, but you can help support us by back-ordering the GN Teardown Toolkit! Back-order now to make sure you get one in the next shipment: store.gamersnexus.net/product...
If you want to see our review of the Air 1000’s twin, we reviewed the Corsair 4000D here: • Corsair 4000D Airflow ...
We also reviewed another Montech case, the X3 Mesh, here: • Cheapest High Airflow ...
You can also check out our playlist full of case reviews: • PC Case Reviews
RELATED PRODUCTS
You can shop Montech cases on Amazon here: geni.us/Ym7Qr
Montech X3 Mesh on Amazon: geni.us/CmmZkO
Corsair 4000D Airflow on Amazon: geni.us/aMBA1r
Phanteks P400A Digital on Amazon: geni.us/e3bBj
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TIMESTAMPS
00:00 - Montech Air 1000 Lite
01:20 - Borrowing Ideas
03:00 - Math on Holes
04:19 - Build Quality of the Montech Air
08:00 - Radiator Fit & IO
10:10 - Thermal Testing
10:48 - Thermal Benchmarks - CPU
12:17 - Thermal Benchmarks - GPU
13:17 - Gaming Thermals
13:43 - Blender Thermals
14:18 - Standardized Fan Testing
15:26 - Noise & Noise Normalized
16:31 - Conclusion
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Host, Test Lead: Steve Burke
Testing: Patrick Lathan
Video: Keegan Gallick
If you want to see our review of the Air 1000’s twin, we reviewed the Corsair 4000D here: kzhead.info/sun/fL2sf9GCcIptgq8/bejne.html We also reviewed another Montech case, the X3 Mesh, here: kzhead.info/sun/mJVmlMOmbnV5aoU/bejne.html Our new fan testing equipment is expensive, but you can help support us by back-ordering the GN Teardown Toolkit! Back-order now to make sure you get one in the next shipment: store.gamersnexus.net/products/gamersnexus-tear-down-toolkit
Steve moved back to the old studio! Yay!
Hey Steve, do you own a Delorean? :D
Heyo! Captions have misspelled your "shanzhai" reference as "shanghai". I tried searching the (former) term in your channel and came up empty. I'd love to see your prior discussion on that cultural term/meme! Great Vid! Scritches for Snowflake!
I believe in an open market. These are just fancy sheet metal / plastic boxes anyways. . . Isn't exactly a new idea.
Steve you forgot to check for air in the 4th dimension. That's the new standard on the case manufacturing.
Nah, Thermaltake's timecube has been patented and copy righted. No one else can replicate it LOL
Steve: "So we ordered the new 4th dimensional airflow tester, it cost us a few vials of strange matter and about 100 gross of self-sealing stembolts, you can help us out covering those costs by buying our modmats or yamok sauce"
LMAO
Waiting for glass/rgb 'quantum airflow design' case design
As Doc would say, you’re not thinking fourth dimensionally!
The old studio, in some way, makes me feel like I'm "home". I have officially watched too damned many of your videos. I had this awkward moment in the past, at least once before.
That's how Linus' kitchen set was for me as well.
The new place is great looking much more professional but the old studio makes me feel like they are always testing something while they are filming or they are extra busy more than usual.
I really miss the cat case in the new studio!
It's strange to think I've now been following the channel for two studio moves, ahaha
MOAR tchotchkes!
Steve's mastered the art of time travel, just so he can continue filming videos in the old studio! 😮
Legit I had to double take at first, "hang on, did I miss this one? Wait, why is it uploaded 30 minutes ago? What's going on?"
He does look a bit like a timelord
That should help ïn measuring the airflow from the 4th dimensiön.
I'm sure he is filming from the tesseract
@@rogehmarbi fam I didn't even notice. This place is GN to me.
That quick eject dust filter is absolutely genius imo. For every PC I've built and sold, I show the customer how to remove dust filters and advise them to remove and clean at least once or twice per year.. or more often in dusty and floor mounted environments. But so far I've noticed
Clones are only good if they are significantly cheaper without compromising on quality. Easier said than done.
Disagree. There's something to be said for super cheap clones that cut corners. However, they must be extremely low priced. It's the Harbor Freight model. Buy it and if you like it enough to replace it when you look at it wrong, then get the real thing. I don't know about cases, and it's a no go for critical gear, like power supplies. Alternately, they save money on finishing, which may be perfectly okay for someone who wants a project or plans to mod it anyways. It doesn't really work here though. The margins are just too thin, and for $10 more the Corsair fans can't be passed up.
@@arthurmoore9488 100% agree. Bought a $40 case with 4 “rgb” fans and decent mesh. Sure it was made out of tin foil, horrendous cable management options. Molex fans, mesh wont do much against dust, and “rgb” is just fans with 3 different colored led’s. But it held all the components. Prevented thermal throttling, and looked decent. Cannot complain
@@andresacosta5318 haha same, my buddy built a pc but unfortunately got a cheap case, looks good though i must say
Disagree. Clones are only good if the originals are unreasonably over priced. Under any normal circumstances, any clones should be despised.
Good points yall. Glad to have inspired some discussion
I'm sure there's air in it, it just doesn't move, so the name is technically correct.
it might as well be a vacuum chamber with how little heat gets dissipated
It's white, they could have added "frost" , "ice", and "arctic" to the marketing lingo...
@@volvo09 Missed opportunity right there!
@@Am_Yeff A vaccume would actually cool things more effectively than this case.
I would prefer a unique take on cases rather than a saturated market of the same 5 designs with minor alterations
Balls in your court bud, let's see what designs you got. I get the same feeling but then sit on my butt haha
Exactly. Designed my own case in cad, had the parts laser cut/cnced, and assembled it. I have several empty cases from over the years. The one I desgined myself is my favorite of course.
@@whasian1487 Anything you make will always be your baby lol. That's awesome though
@@Debauchery_Tea kinda. I threw out two versions of it before I got something I really really liked. You can also get stuck in a fabrication loop where you make alterations and figure out you don't like it, for example. The journey is fun too, if building something from scratch is something you like in general.
Me too, but if somebody comes out with something new, and it's pricey, and somebody makes a knock off it a year later that is actually decent and cheaper... well...
Yes, keep testing these cheap cases. I like them for two reasons: (1) They will bring down the price of name brand similars either by discount or in the original pricing, and (2) some of them are just really good value. Maybe temper your expectations a little for these similars that come out of the gate cheaper than the name-brand mates.
This. Some of the shortcomings are acceptable if the copycat case are like much cheaper.
I might be wrong but the cool thing about copy-cat designs is it just shows why 'premium' cases cost as much as they do, apart from materials used it also covers the research and testing that goes into cases.
How do you know my dad ?
@@internetfamous5491 cause I'm your dad boi
Well, that factors into the difference, but there's more to the story of cost recovery. The price that the copycat product goes for might be lower than the original's price, but the difference isn't just for the recouping of R&D that the original manufacturer was doing. If the copycat company could just subtract the cost of R&D, they could only lower the price by a fraction of that R&D recouping cost in order to keep the rest as extra profit. However, these copycat companies often don't have as high a sales volume, meaning they will likely have to pay more per case they get manufactured which will increase costs on their end. Their break-even price may be higher as a result, so it's a balancing act between the cost-savings for less R&D vs the higher cost to bring a product to market if they aren't in as good a position as the original company (in this case Corsair). That's just one of the many things that can shift their costs and thus their price around, even if the products they sell look similar. Other parts of the supply chain might be more efficient for the original manufacturer, too, an advantage that the copycat company may not have.
This still looks dangerously close o a case where Montech could actually take Steve's advice and actually start making awesome cases, then making more margins off more market share
My issue with copycats is that their existence means that companies that do design and R&D work have to compete with companies who don't do as much design and R&D work, preferring to leech off those around them. It sounds to me like they could cause a dangerous race to the bottom in both price and quality.
Evident in this video, just copying isn’t good enough. Copy but improved is much better.
You must've not watched the video, as it's not a race to the bottom for garbage. Rosewill makes 20 dollars cases, and they don't sell because they're shit
I respectfully disagree, these copycats do have their place in the market, it creates competition, puts more products on the market, which I like, think it's great. One hand we have cheaper cases, lower quality, but cheaper, on the other we have original projects coming out to compete even in price, but usually in quality. Oh, and more GN content, of course.
This isn't engineering a CPU or a quantum computer. There is only so much "innovation" and variations that can happen to a metal box with holes in it. There's no race to the bottom when you're already at the bottom.
@@AaronShenghao People like this channel's audience who care about quality would look for the quality option, however everyone else would just buy the cheaper thing that looks similar. Do you think a kid who saw a cool expensive case that some streamer got would care about how well that performs, or how convenient it is to build in? I highly doubt that...
Knock $20 off the price and then maybe people would consider. Right now it’s trying to be a budget knockoff while basically being the same price as the original…
or maybe even more expensive as the 4000D is a bit older and goes on sale sometimes.
The case costs 45$ in my area for some reason. Maybe the case is just expensive in the west?
@@svetta3003 possible ! Pricing is sometimes nuts.
I would prefer more unique. In this case, I would purchase the Corsair 4000D. 10 more dollars is insignificant when spending near $3000 on a PC build.
In other countries, this case is much cheaper and is quite nice for a low budget ~$800-1,000 build.
There is a lot of room for cases that take a design and then tweak it in interesting ways and push forward new ideas. The ejection filters are actually a really neat idea that I haven't seen before. Also there is something to be said for helping push down prices. However, sometimes a race to the bottom leaves a lot of quality getting thrown away so more expensive cases built to last are also important. Also if I was a manufacturer/designer I might be a little salty about it (unless I worked for a big company where I didn't make a percentage).
I used the phanteks (metallic gear) neo qube for my last build. It's basically a straight rip of thr lian li 011 but considerably cheaper in my country so I'm quite happy for the similar competition. Helps avoid paying just for the name
Imagine shitting on a case that is half the price of the other one with only a few minor drawbacks.
I work in the engineering field and consider protection of IP of high import. I don’t buy cloned items if the OEM product is still in production/available, with the caveat that the item is not being priced gouged. I will always email the original manufacturer though and point out to them why I felt the need to pursue a more reasonable option.
In a lot of cases, "clones" are actually licensed by the original designer to be sold under a different brand. If you walk into an auto parts store and buy a TRW suspension component for a Ford Mustang, you're buying a "clone" part. TRW is the actual manufacturer, but Ford allows them to sell the same parts under their own branding.
@@aaronthomas6155 Absolutely true. I understood the context of the vid to be that the Air 1000 in question borrowed heavily from the Corsair Airflow X000D series of cases, unbeknownst to the OM. I’m not very bright, so I may have missed something. Also, I inadvertently white-knighted myself in my OP. I try to live up to my own standards, but deviation thereof are by no means rare.
Thanks to your advice and videos. My new 12700 KF, I went from a 100C spike when not even overclocked. I used the Phanteks P500A and an Artic Liquid Freezer II 360. I am now overclocked to 5.1MHZ, and never even see 70C. Thanks a TON !! I used your links as well. Hope you got the credit from Amazon.
The 4000D is ~ 3x the price in my market. Also, the 1000 lite's front panel has been updated, since this video. It was an obvious choice for me. Oh and I just replaced the rubbish included fans with (ironically, perhaps) Corsair units. Works a peach.
Steve, I wonder if you could create an airflow test where air is piped to a section of a case, and the air pressure in the pipe is logged to get a sense of how well that part of the case performs. The idea being that the worse a mesh/drilled hole solution is, the more air pressure builds up in the pipe. (I suppose we could the same thing by ducting a 120 mm fan's output, then mounting the fan to the case and measuring the output of the fan.) I'm just spitballing here.
To answer the question you posed at the beginning, myself personally I'm very price sensitive to products but only in so much that the price is a significant factor in how I determine the *value* of a product, and that is what matters the most to me, irrespective of copying. Let's say company A is a well established entrenched case manufacturer and company B is a new upstart which has just blatantly ripped off a very popular case design from company A. For sake of argument if we assume the ease of use, features, and quality are the same between them both, but company B's is slightly cheaper, then this has more value to me, and I will go with it. If it is trully of a similar standard but costs less this is pushing competition forward in the market and pushing the other companies to compete better. In the real world this is almost never the case (haha). Typically the price will be less but the quality will fall to follow it and there will be more inconveniences and less 'nice to haves' which particularly for PC cases are things that don't cost a whole lot to do, but require elegant design and thought to make work, but which add a lot of value to the product to me, making me willing to pay more. Typically manufacturers 'borrow' a design from a more established brand to try to make their product look or feel like the competitor's in order to potentially steal some of their market share by association or confusion, and also perhaps because it looks more 'propper', but they skimp on the quality and you get a worse product as a result. This is not innovation and probably does detract from the market because it can harm the image of those sorts of cases due to the potential for association, and frankly it just creates more waste. If you're going to copy a competitor, or 'borrow some of their concepts to create a superior product' as one might say, then doing it right and competing in your own right properly without trying to leach off the image of a superior product is important in my view, as the value of poor quality copycats is really low in my mind as they end up being tacky and frustrating and so I avoid them. To me it looks like Montech is at least trying to compete in earnest with that type of case and is ripping off the concept/basic design to save some design cost/hassle and get themselves a little boost by association while at least making an effort compete, and I think this is fine. If they continue to actually try to push their cases forward performance wise then they will be a genuine competitor in my eyes.
Love your channel man! Recently picked up some products at your store recently to support your channel as well. If I could critique anything, it would be awesome if conversation could be more based on performance vs. price. Other then that, your channel is one of the very best tech channels. Keep up the great work!
Thanks for another great vid! As like everything, I always do my research on the product I'm interested in.
On the topic of copycat cases, you guys should review the SAMA IM01 on newegg. Its very similar to the CM NR200 but supports mATX boards and ATX PSUs, and arguably looks like it has better cooling too.
as long as the case works, i have zero issues with "copycats". it takes smaller companies showing how cheap we COULD get equal value products in order to reign in the bigger competitors in the market. If Corsair decides one day to make a great mid-tower sized case that has a unique, effective design, then charges $300 for that design, I'm going to wait for a seperate company to implement the same idea in a more economical philosophy for the consumer. I don't care for "brand symmetry" or "designer brand" equipment when i could get an equal or better product for less money.
Love my 4000D airflow which I got because of your review. I removed the extra front mesh thing.
I looked at this one and ended up going with the Montech Air X instead. Similar to this one, but with 2x200mm front fans. Seems to flow well based on my temps.
Very glad to hear you say that the Premium version would do better. Prices over here are really funny as the 4000D is currently double the price of the Air 1000 Premium. In fact, cases with frontal filters are really hard to find here, making the 1000 Premium one of our best choices (if, like me, you really need a frontal filter that's easy to clean). The Aerocool does have a frontal filter (that doesn't cover the frontal fans), but basically cost the same as the 1000 premium, even having much less included fans and lower build quality in general
1000 Lite tá 309 reais agora na Terabyte. Aí vendo o Steve nesse vídeo dizer que a difereneça pro 4000D era somente 10 dólares, resolvi pesquisar... tá 900 conto kkkkkk. Loucura demais pagar 900 reais num midtower genérico
@Matheus fica bom se tiver fans com alta pressão estática, com os fans stock nem tanto
They both have their place. It's not bad to have choices, and having a lower priced case with sufficient (but not amazing) airflow is plenty good for lots of value builds. It's also perfectly okay to not want to buy a Corsair case given recent events.
I was looking at this case but your review makes sense 4000d it is. Thank you Good video .
Love the front panel and pop out filter.
If there was anything truly unique about the case being copied, like Lian Li's cases, then I don't think it's good that they can be copied but since the only functional differences between the majority of cases is size and mounts, with some minor convenience like wire ties or potentially a fan hub. I do wish that they'd "copy" some of the older classic cases tho. A modern HAF X/932 would be absolutely amazing right about now, since most cases dislike side panel fans. Basically if it's defunct or uninspired in itself, you can't complain if someone copies it is my take. Same as games and software that's no longer sold should be considered freeware if it's been off the shelf for more than a year.
Big companies should expect copycats like this and most of them probably do. I think as long as the copied product brings any functional differences, advantages or features over the original (ie. cheaper cost, higher quality, different form factor...) and has a non-idedntical design, it may be a little unethical but still fair competition in a free market. It's up to the consumer to decide if they want to go for good support, quality... and higher cost or less support, quality... but cheaper cost, and that's how products get better.
Thank you guys for the hard work. God bless
I have a little suggestion for the temperature and noise diagrams. I think it would be helpful if you'd show the difference in performance of the cases you're highlighting. If the case that is being reviewed is the baseline, for the case it is compared to there could be a little number to the right saying +3,4 K or -1,4 K in either red or green for example. That would help me a great deal in dicerning the differences between the cases. Maybe I'm the problem if I can't calculate 59-54 in my head at a reasonable pace, it's just that I find it very difficult while looking for the numbers in the charts and also listening.
What I would like is companies venturing into how to make cases more efficient in design and making the components cooler not just making the case look cooler
"Boss, we have an issue with the new case" "Yes?" "It has no airflow. No airflow on the front, no airflow at the bottom, not even at the top." "Have you tried the name" "What"
I feel like there's probably companies where this sort of conversation happens between the engineers and higher-ups+PR all the time.
"We'll add some airflow in the marketing, don't worry!"
was browsing for cheap alternative, Montech in particular; and this pop up. dayum what a day!
Some people say the filter removal direction is a minor thing, but I really appreciate it on my Inwin 101. Although I would appreciate my side exhaust having a bit more hole to go with the steel as well, can't lie.
I've considered these lesser known Amazon brands a few times now, thanks for reviewing them!!! Totally fair competition imo.
Personally, I’ve never understood vibration dampening. Hard drives produce vibration obviously, and the kinetic energy needs to go somewhere. If you were to attach rope to each screw hole of a 3.5 drive, that energy isn’t being transferred to the rope effectively and the drive now has to deal with all the vibration. Wouldn’t it be much better to use actual metal screws to mount a drive/fan to the case so that the case can absorb that energy? I’m led to believe that rubber doesn’t transfer mechanical energy well, it simply isolates it. I’d love to see a test on this, because I don’t know if I’ve been led astray with bad info each time I question why you call anti-vibration a good thing, because to me that instead translates to “anti-energy medium”. Love you stuff Steve! Back to you Steve.
You know... I feel like this test would be at least 10 years too late.
@@Slay1337pl pretty much this, modern hard drives don't vibrate that much. plus, more and more builds are ditching all spinning drives in favor of SSDs so it wouldn't be worth the research.
Right, rubber helps isolate the vibrations instead of transferring it into the metal of the case itself. But the point is that not all vibrations are equal in terms of perceived noise. If the hard drives are fully mechanically isolated there is just direct acoustic noise from the drives. If not, vibrations from the drives produce vibrations in the case, which can lead to annoying low-frequency hums, some high-frequency noise, and sometimes even resonances. The degree to which this happens is probably dependent on drives, case, airflow pattern, and drive mounting, but I've definitively had cases where decoupling (even by rubber grommets) lead to a much more bearable sound. The hum is easiest to reduce. Presumably decoupling makes the drives run slightly warmer though, but I've never worried about that.
Not a good idea, because you don't want the case vibrating. That can very easily cause far more noise than the hdd on its own since cases tend to have a bunch of components that have just enough wiggle room to rub against each other. For this to work, you would have to prevent every single panel, filter and whatnot from moving at all. Any rattle when shaking the case will turn into a hum when vibrating the case. Also, the vibrations will be further transferred into whatever the case is standing on, so a table or even the floor (unless you live in a room where the floor is 100% solid) then makes even more noise. You see, the rubber mounts do absorb energy. The energy is being transferred to the rubber the same way it would be transferred to a screw. It's just that the rubber itself absorbs the energy so unlike the screw it won't transfer it to the case (as directly). That's why the case is not vibrating when you use them. You can imagine this like holding your phone in your hands when it vibrates. It's not bolted to your bones, but your soft flesh still absorb the vibrations. The energy is still being transferred away from the phone, but absorbed by your fingers instead of shaking your entire arm.
@@340Hz My idea is more so about keeping the drive lifespan as high as possible. If there’s vibrations in your case you’ve got other issues IMO. Nothing should be “lose” at all, and components should be physically contacting what they’re meant to as much as possible. I’m a perfect world, each mounted component would be atomically fused to each other when assembly is done, which isn’t possible if you’re anything short of a God. But under these circumstances, nothing would be moving/bouncing around on a microscopic scale, which is what vibration is. We can’t achieve perfection, but we can achieve what is would be for all intents and purposes by making sure everything is connected to each other under some form of pressure. Movement decreases the life of drives and fans, their bearings will get hit with the shafts or the ball bearings will get sudden uneven pressure, resulting in a friction increase on them and slowing down whatever was turning. Applies to hard drives too, except this time throw the actuator and head into the mix, and suddenly you have the drive perform just that little bit of extra error correction to make up for change in position. If there’s vibrations in your computer case due to hard mounted screwing, check what is securing that device, and find a way to transfer its kinetic energy better.
THANKS SO MUCH. I was about to buy this case in 1 week, you just saved me $50
Case reviews a favourite, thanks for the hard work!
Glad to see airflow being all the rage nowadays. Would still love to see if you can get your hands on the Lian Li Lancool 205 Mesh. The advantage is it comes with 2x140mm and 1x120mm rgb fans installed, and it's got a great all-white aesthetic.
I also would prefer to see a review on this Lian Li Lancool 205 Mesh.
Well the Montech case is called Air not Air(flow) ;)
@@DeeDee.Ranged so, I don’t understand spending time testing bad cases! Is this Montech any popular? I can’t even find it on sell in Europe.
@@ricmalta The Montech X3 did amazing in test and it's dirt cheap. But they didn't know that before they tested it, so the statement "I don't understand spending time testing bad cases" is a bit funny.... how are they supposed to know before they test it? Take the manufacturers word for it? Only test cases others have already tested?
For what it's worth, I'm an engineer by training, and, after going through the many hours required for thorough product development, I can't really support a company copying the end product without putting in the effort. If they look at a design and think they could do it better, thus bringing something new to the table, then there's an argument to be had, but I don't know if this brings enough new stuff to make me comfortable buying it. Ymmv.
That design for removing the front dust filter is great, super easy to remove it for cleaning. Just a shame the front panel isn't more hole than solid. I would consider it if I spotted it discounted.
I cant wait to see that new best cases viedo whever you come out with it . I have some family who are wanting to buy new computers for Christmas.
No, I would rather the genuine article, and in this particular case (no pun intended) the Corsair Warranty is worth more than the $10 you would save by not buying the Corsair case.
My friend and I just re-built his PC in the Montech Air 100 (their mATX version of this) and temps were solid for his mid-range build. His i5-9400F on a cheap tower cooler barely broke 50 under full load, and his RX 5700 graphics card I think stayed around or under 70, which is perfectly reasonable. Plus the case came with 4 fans. All for like $70 which is pretty solid. Build quality was really good and there were great quality-of-life features like the magnetic door-style side panel. When it comes to a mid-range build, a case like this is totally fine. Just because it isn't the best thing to ever exist doesn't mean it's not fine when aesthetics and noise and important, and temps are already reasonable.
Great content as always! Will you release new videos about the new office? Been months now I think, I suppose there's been a lot of changes.
I value Aesthetics 1st for a case then once i have a couple choices then I look at air flow performance, cable routing, fit and finish, then cost But it is valuable information to have place to go for case, fan performance when deciding on my next build
This makes no sense... If the 4000D is just a little more expensive, why would anyone want this knock-off...?
Because they don't know how much better that is?
I think when a budget is involved. If you’re $10 short and need to drop the quality (and, thus, the price) of something, you’re gonna start churning through the parts list to see where you can shave off that $10 to stay just within the budget (and some people may prioritize case quality over all else). Then again, it’s just speculation on something with no clear answer.
I mean not everything is available everywhere
Depends where you are tbh, for me this case is 1/3 of the 4000D price
@@Operational117 If 10 bucks break your budget maybe waiting a little longer to get something way better is a good idea.
Long story short: Some amazing design choices can't save case with fatal air flaw.
I Just built in the Montech air 100 ARGB Micro-ATX version for a friend. I think it was a fine choice he picked with out any pc building background. I just told him to avoid glass front panels. It was around $60ish. It's a fine case for what he does with a 1050ti for now. Our only major stag was the break off PCI slot covers. We just got everything all settled and cabled managed and it was finally time to put the GPU in BUT when breaking the PCI slot overs out they would have scraped the motherboard. We tried breaking them out the other way but would bend the slots and scrape again. We had to take the whole motherboard out, then break them out then put everything back in!
Montech Air X ARGB is another montech case, and when I was looking, I found nothing like it elsewhere. Although I could have missed something. The case has 3 fans, one 120mm fan, and two 200mm fans
I got the Montech X3 mesh knowing its limitations full well (I watched your review before buying it, after all), but one thing that made all the difference is the fact that Fractal doesn't even really sell in my country, so I could only get a Meshify case at absolutely insane prices thanks to import tarrifs. The X3 was the best airflow case I could get for a reasonable price, with the Lancool II Mesh being triple the price, Corsair cases being laughably expensive, and pretty much all other offerings in the same price category having either one fan or none at all. In the end, being able to get a similar product for a cheaper price can make sense if the tradeoffs are worth it, like how the X3 came with molex-only fans with non-addresable RGB, but still came with six of them. The Air 1000 Lite, it seems, just falls short of being a worthwhile product if you can find the 4000D for a price that isn't much more expensive.
Exactly. Alot of these knock off cases are probably more accesible to other countries. And the well known branded cases in my country cost 3 to 5 times as much as whats provided by local brands or companies such as montech. Maybe in America its like a 20 dollar difference. But somewhere around the world that 20 usd is as big as 300 usd for us.
For the $$$ I’d much rather buy the Corsair 4000D especially only $10. Not that $10 usd isn’t much but looking at the years the system will last because it runs cooler well worth it.
I'm confused are you saying $10 is a lot or isn't anything?
@@emeraldwolf7920 they are acknowledging that 10 dollars isn't nothing, it does have value
@@emeraldwolf7920 Sometimes it makes all the difference, getting down to the change jar at points and even that’s looking slim!
Can you get your hands on an old Antec Lanboy Air and put it through your standard test suite? It would be interesting to see just how far (or not far?) the industry has come in the last decade. From what I remember, the Lanboy Air was the king for airflow.
Great! Just grabbed lunch. Have a good day team and Steve!!
Decent air flow and build quality for 70$ compared to the corsair's 95$(on Amazon atleast) seems a great deal to me Also 50 vs 52 isn't a huge difference lol
I too want to excuse my awful purchase... But I agree with you in some instance. If I'd bought the 4000D, it would mean my case is nearly the cost of my CPU.
I don't mind something less expensive inspired by a successful, more expensive product. But ultimately, it still has to be a good product above all else. If it breaks in a week, then it's 100% wasted.
I got spooked. I have the Corsair 4000D and thought I'd been bamboozled for a hot minute.
Id wait for the review on both
Looks like LTT is now trying to compete with GN in the in-depth, science based tech review space. 🤣
Its a logical upgrade.
For me, direct copies are not my favorite.. although, as long as they are of the same quality and not making shortcuts, I don't see too many problems. As a Corsair 5000D airflow owner... I somehow feel like it would be extremely difficult to match their quality control and 'feel'. Thats just my 10 cents though.
I used to think that Steve's complaints about single digit temperature difference between cases where a bit exaggerated, but after swapping my DIYPC tier case with a Spec-03, the 7ºC difference means I don't have to remove the side panel to play without throttling anymore. I should have listened sooner.
I think your next priority should probably be a better cooler
I've always been in the crowd of wanting something unique for my personal rig. I'm also in the group of spending a LOT on my personal rig, so that makes sense for me. However, when building for others and working off a budget, I go with either the best airflow, or what the person the computer is for is preferring. Example, my sister wanted something plain, simple, and decent airflow, something she could decorate herself, whereas my friend wanted a case to dampen the sound from the computer with good enough airflow, and a bit of lighting to show up in the dark.
"copy cats" are fine, if we didn't have companies doing copies, we wouldn't have affordable cars, phones, etc There will always be a market for budget products, if the big names aren't selling cheaper editions of their products then it's their loss.
A unique case would have a 5.25" drive bay and USB-C without costing $150+.
For the question of: Cheap copies or unique cases? I kinda fall into the Function over Form camp. There are often so few cases that have the list of features I want that I only end up having 2-4 options. At that point I look at Cooling capabilities and practicality. As an example of a feature set I had when hunting for a case for my next PC build: 1) 2+ external 5.25 inch bays, 2) No glass, 3) Capability for 4+ unimpeded 100+mm case fans, 4) 3+ internal 3.5 bays, 5) 2+ internal dedicated 2.5 bays, 6) 10 rear expansion slots with 2 being vertically mounted slots that will not interfere with any motherboard slots, 6 months ago when I was looking there was only 2 cases I could find that met that specification and 1 was only available on Alibaba through some brand I had never heard of before. The other which I went with was the Rosewill Rise Glow. Its larger and clumsier than what I wanted but it has room for everything I need and everything I might need in the future.
I always find it interesting to see how many weird mistakes the case manufacturers seems to make with just about every case released. An it's especially weird that a lot of these I could have spotted just looking at pictures of the case. I guess they think we should be grateful there is any air flow at all instead of just having TG panels over every visible surface. But things like the very restrictive front panel and top filter on this case is what really confuses me. Why even try if you can't be bothered to calculate the open area of the panel? And that top filter? First of all it sucks as a filter. The holes are to big for a filter and the area between them to big for airflow. Besides when was the last time you used the top as an intake? Because as an outlet you don't need a filter on it. I do remember one case that had louvers that opened when power was applied and closed when the machine was turned off, and that was a pretty well thought out idea as it had minimal restrictions on the outgoing airflow and didn't let in dust when not in use. However I can't say anything about how reliable it was or even what case manufacturer. But it was a way of keeping dust out while retaining the airflow. But even the large and well known manufacturers tend to stumble when it comes to airflow and I find it weird. To put a new case design into production isn't cheap, so why don't they put at least some effort into optimizing the design for airflow before pressing the "Go" button? If even I with no relevant education can spot so many problems then a case designer certainly should be able to.
_These two products are similar in design and price. Which should I buy?_ *MADE IN CHINA* _The other one it is_
As if the other one isn't MADE IN CHINA also
Both.. are… stick with Cardboard box from local mill ;)
My PC case isn't really a point of pride for me, so as it's safe to use, and a good value, yes I would buy a copycat case. I would not feel bad about it.
please bring back case and fan reviews :)
Kewl to see you're back to the good set.
I actually like it, that push filter thingy is genius imo
I'm using a copycat called NOX Hummer Zero, and it's either a straight copycat or rebranded Darkflash DLM22. I LOVE the case. Very well built, easy to build and was cheap, around 40 euros.
Vetroo K2 M-ATX Mid-Tower Pc Gaming Case.... You guys will love it !!!
Service plays a roll in my decision making when it comes to deciding between two products that are feature for feature, price for price.
How much service do you actually need with a case? I've got a Fractal Design Define R4 since 2013 and never required any service or parts in those years and before that i've also used some really cheap cases around 2005 and never needed any service.
I see a case I like and I buy it. Still using a Corsair Air 540 since 2015 despite it at that time already being a couple of years' old design. The cost is always a secondary consideration but I can see myself going for a Montech or similar if it were aesthetically pleasing to me on the day.
I think you might be interested in reviewing Chieftec's CI-01B-OP case. It's a 50$ case that seems to be fairly well designed in terms of usability, would be interested to see how you would rate it.
I have the Montech Air X ARGB case with double 200mm fans in front and I like it a lot. I would imagine that its airflow would be much better than this case because of the bigger front fans.
They're definitely getting better and I actually like this. I'd buy it
Still have my meshify C and want a new case but it's hard to justify a new one with the really good air flow
Montech Air 100 LITE. i5-10400f & ventus 3060. Stress tested in Cinebench 23, highest cpu temp at 4ghz was 49c. Not bad
2:20 I'd say it's fair if there's some meaningful difference in features since it gives people some choices, features like more fans or the hinged side panel which I really like. But I'd just go with the original if there's no meaningful difference in features. As for something unique, as long as the price is reasonable otherwise I'd rather just do some case modding and do the unique design that I want. Thermal performance might not be so good after the mods, but it's unique.
I prefer to see the big players full niche markets. I picked up a small cooler master td500 case that has fantastic airflow. At 60$ it's a fantastic matx case that is just big enough to fit everything and have good airflow and room for a radiator. When I was searching for a case in the 50-70$ range, there really weren't any cases like this, that offer plenty of expansion while also being small and compact and having great airflow, magnetic filters, and a glass panel.
I don't mind the lack of front USB-C since many motherboards don't have a connector for it especially on value boards. Also I can't find much I can plug into my desktop that uses USB-C. There is a lack of USB hubs that use USB-C that are not made for laptops and have an attached 6-12" cable. There is some M.2 external enclosures, but other than that there really isn't much USB-C hardware on the market.
Did this new video from the old studio come from the same dimension the Montech case pulls its air?
Even before Steve says anything (other than the thumbnail and title, I guess), I can see that the front panel is more panel than hole. 3:51 - There it is!
I remember all of my old cases not their names or anything but their air flow and performance and one day I found your channel and saw thermals and decided I need to fix this now. My first case had a side panel fan but it didn't help. My second case had no airflow but I drilled some extra exhaust holes into the top to mount two more fans with zip ties which helped a lot. However my current and probably last case is the Thermaltake X71. I have every slot with a fan except maybe one setup with static pressure and I've never seen temps go above 70 on the CPU and 50 on the GPU. I've got plans to do custom liquid cooling in it which is why I got it even though the parts I have do not require it it would only be for aesthetics. I enjoy the case even though it is heavy as all the sins I've committed and almost taller than my wife. I feel like with the new Intel CPU's coming out with Intel's history it may need some beefy cooling and having some larger cases to know to either avoid or work in might help some people.
They showed how good fans make a difference in case temperature. Could you suggest any good fans to change the ones that came in the case I bought? Or is that not worth changing? The case is Corsair Carbide 275R, it has 3 fans. I don't want to spend a lot of money, so it can't be high-end, a mid-end is fine for me. And Noctua doesn't exist here in Brazil.
I definitely want to see new and unique products. Hey Steve, have you actually used the EVGA keyboards? I was considering their optical mechanical to replace my aging Corsair. Thanks
I tried it, couldn't get the software to work on multiple pcs. Can't save lighting profiles to it, so software must be running. I did like the optical switches, so I ended spending the money on corsairs k100 optical. Much better board. I paid full price for it but you can find it with some really nice sales.
I want a vertical tower, maybe even a semi circle you could push against a wall. Not anything like traditional computer cases. You could even mount fans at the bottom for intake and top for exhaust and support the heat's tendency to rise anyways. Outside of the case could look like just a light bar so it's not immediately understood when looking at it that it's a computer, like how scifi gadget's purpose need to be explained when its shown on screen. I'm honestly about to just build the case myself.
I've seen the marketing for this case, thought it looked nice, so when I saw your video title I was like "what did he mean by this?" and as soon as I saw how not-see-through the front panel was I was like "oh..."
i have the montech air 100 black .very good case +good argb fans
Just built a rig cannibalised from a couple of others (One upgraded to Alder lake) in a Corsair 4000X. It was a pleasure to build in, and it's a really smart looking little system. Having built my last 4 rigs with Corsair cases, and stuck to their AIOs and custom water loop blocks and pumps I'm now heavily into their eco-system. It's brilliant. Components are fully interchangeable between rigs, and one RGB control system makes that aspect much easier. It clearly limits the cases I can choose from to continue this strategy, but well worth it in my opinion. My daughter's PC, in the 4000X is now 9900k and 3080Ti (one of Linus's VAG MSRP prizes) with 32gb of DDR4 3600, and I'm running a 12900k, 32gb DDR5 5200 and 3090 (also MSRP) in a Corsair 680X Crystal. My other daughter's rig in a much older Corsair case has a 3600 and 2080 Super, but she has the RGB moved from other cases and AIOs, and at 8 that's the most important aspect. A fourth case houses a small mining rig now, with lots of matching non RGB Corsair fans all around it to keep it cool. If I was starting again I might choose Lian Li now (I built a system for my dad recently in one of theirs and this was also a good experience), but sticking to a single eco-system has so many benefits.
All cases should have handle swing open doors. Its the one pet peeve I have on the MB311L I have (which I like overall)
This case is nearly identical to the Antec Dark League DF600, I’m wondering if Montech may be affiliated with Antec? I picked up the Dark League DF502 and I noticed close similarities to this case you’re reviewing…dimensions, shroud style, hard drive cage type, placement, and mounting, fan filters, even the exact same case feet. And now I notice that Montech’s logo is remarkably similar to Antec’s. Are the two companies affiliated, or maybe they have the same chassis supplier?