Silverstone Grandia Series GD06 HTPC Case Review

In recent years there has been a steady increase in the number of case forms that are available on the market andthis is driven by the end user trends. Throughout the years, HTPC and SFF (Small Form Factor) chassis have had a strong appearance on the market and Silverstone have always been a strong leader in the HTPC sector and a number of successful models have continued this success. As time has gone on and we come forward to where we are today, the market has become more diluted with the different shapes, sizes and styles of cases - ranging from the m-ATX options which pack as much as they can into as little space as possible right upto the E-ATX cases that have enough room to fit hypothetically more than one system into. In the more recent years and with the digital age now more mainstream than ever, personal computers are used more and more for home entertainment centres. This has in itself opened up a whole new new sector to the HTPC market, in the past a HTPC was typically a low power machine that played video content with out any real demand placed on the system. The modern HTPC however demands more with the streamlining of high definition content. No longer will a budget all in one board with onboard graphics cut the mustard. Discrete graphics are being called for and this poses a problem with a majority of HTPC designs that can only occupy low profile expansion cards. Today we get the chance to look at Silverstone's new Alpha male in their Grandia HTPC line up, the GD06. As with the majority of the Grandia range the design has been fine tuned and refined to give the best performance and design, improving what the consumer needs & likes and taking out what they don't - such as the small LCD panel on the front. The side of the box gives us a clear image of the chassis design along with a quick run down of its main features and specs. The end of the box gives us a run down of the cases specs and also an introduction into the Grandia series of HTPC chassis. Included with the GD06 are the obligatory bag of screws and user manual, a set of reusable cable ties, a molex to 3x fan adaptor, a set of keys for the front panel, four rubber feet for mounting to the bottom of your PSU to reduce vibration and interestingly a USB3.0 to USB2.0 header adaptor. The main bulk of the chassis is made up of steel and a plastic front panel with a thick brushed aluminium door in the middle keeping everything hidden away, this is a bit unconventional in comparison to other HTPC case designs but following the crowd is not a design point that will set a case apart from the crowd. The top of the case possesses no real looks about it, after all you'll most likely be looking at the front more than anything or stacking the chassis inline with other home entertainment devices, there is a small grill towards the rear for dispersing some heat out of the chassis. The right hand end has grills for two pre-installed 120mm fans. The left hand side has another grill for a fan towards the front of the case whilst a small long grill is at the rear above where the power supply will sit. The rear of the case is compact yet still functional with a large grill to the left above the I/O panel where two more 80mm fans can be mounted and four full height expansion bays slot neatly into the middle. A further expansion bay is mounted horizontally above the PSU area for mounting expansion brackets or fan controllers for example. On the underside of the chassis we can see the two large round feet towards the front and two rubber feet towards the rear. Beneath the PSU bay is a grill allowing ventilation from below. Something that sets the GD06 apart from its siblings is the locking front cover that stops access to the front I/O panel and drive bays. With the front door unlocked, the aluminium panel drops down giving access to the front of the chassis and the I/O behind. On the right hand side we can see the single optical drive bay with its brushed metal effect cover and below this, the front I/O comprising of two USB3.0 ports - one each either side of the audio jacks. Next to this is the reset button. To the left is a unique feature on the GD06, a pair of quick access hard drive bays. Both of these are simply opened by a quick release toggle on the front and the sprung doors swing open releasing the drives inside. At the back of the drive bays are the SATA power and data connections. These push into the drive when closed and on opening, the drives are pulled out of the caddy for removal. Underneath the front panel is the power button with the power LED around it. Part of me does wonder why this was left out from the cover whereas everything else is able to be locked away. None the less its subtle and blends in with the design. Inside, the GD06 only has space for a m-ATX motherboard, but with the number that are available on the market today, there are loads of options to go for. Tucked in between the hard drive bays and the side of the case is the single 120mm fan of which can be changed down to a 80mm fan if you so wished. The motherboard side of the chassis has the two pre-installed 120mm fan with grills on the inside to prevent the blades catching on any cables that may be in the vicinity (or if you're like me, it saves you having a chunk taken out of your finger whilst tinkering). Above the PSU is space to mount another 3.5" hard drive upside down on a set of grommets to reduce resonant noise. There are also mounting holes for an SSD or 2.5" drive as well although there are no grommets for the latter. Being a SFF case, there is limited room for a power supply and Silverstone detail that there is a limit of 150mm, so a number of recent high rated supplies would be ruled out from installation. Silverstone do make a number of supplies including a 400W, 500W, 600W & 700W that all fit in with a bit of room to spare. Unfortunately this is not an inclusive option with the case, but it can be purchased separately. Most lower wattage supplies should fit into the space but its best to check any third party supply dimensions before purchase to be on the safe side. On the motherboard side of the case is a tray for fitting an optical drive to. This is fully removable along with the hard drive caddy and the stability bar that runs from the front to the back of the case. Removing the hard drive caddy is simply done with 2 screws at the front and 2 towards the rear of the case, the whole unit then lifts out as one. With both drive bay areas and the stability bar removed, there is more than enough room to work in during installation of your system. In our test setup we used a mini-ITX motherboard and this left us with two clear options for cable management, in this case we bundled all the cables together between the motherboard and power supply, however there is plenty of room to tuck all of these under the hard drive bays when installing a m-ATX board instead. When using the mounting plate for the hard drive above the power supply, the cables are left to pass through a rubber cover. This cover has one very simple job to do and that is to prevent any heat from graphics cards which would otherwise surround a hard drive and potentially lead to thermal problems with the drive. We can also see that the 400W power supply that Silverstone sent with the chassis fits in with a little bit of room to spare. If you had a PSU that was only a few mm over the stated 150mm limit then you may be able to get away with it. When installed, the only contact the power supply has direct with the case is on the rear panel, the included feet stick to the base to reduce any resonating noise through the chassis. Our black optical drive as shown here neatly sits in a recess in the front panel. When powered up, both the hard drive bays light up with an LED to the right of each cover. The power light is not over intrusive on the look of the chassis. The bottom portion also acts as the HDD activity light. Overall I am very pleased with the GD06 HTPC chassis, its clean simplistic looks make a stark contrast on its surrounding environment its steel body, whilst very sturdy is a little bit heavy though especially as its got a fairly weighty front door on it. Talk of the front door, on of my first thoughts when i took this out of its box was that it would work fantastic as a home server chassis, purely because of its easy access to the hard drive bays and that the front can be locked up so that no-one can access it. Space wise inside, granted there is no room inside to fit a full ATX motherboard and supply like you can with some other HTPC cases, but if there was, then this would no longer come under the category of a SFF design. With a m-ATX board, things may be a tight squeeze if you have to have everything neat and tidy inside, but it is possible and a some time and patience overcomes this. Even though there is minimal space for a motherboard, there is ample room to fit an 11" graphics card with a bit of room to spare. The three included fans that come with the GD06 do a remarkable job in keeping system temperatures down, things quickly started getting warm inside when we tested with the fans off, and considering that they're pretty quiet, even at full speed, it makes sense to have them running. Considering its main role is to act as a HTPC chassis then any audio you would be listening to will cancel out the faint hum in the background. All three fans inside create a positve air pressure inside and with the whole host of grills and vents on the sides and rear keep everything cool even under full load. The inclusion of the USB3.0 to USB2.0 adaptor is something that I'm surprised I've never seen on any other cases to date, its simple and does exactly as it says on the tin. The only major design flaw that i can see in the GD06's design relates to the removable hard drive bays. Installing a hard drive is a breeze , but when it comes to removing the drive, I felt like i was going to snap the plastic cage inside the bay if I pulled on the door too hard, perhaps a metal bracket here would have been a more sensible option. Also it would have been a nice idea to have the blue LEDs on each bay cover set to come on only when a drive is installed rather than permanently on as a form of indication that a drive is installed in that bay. The GD06 is available on the market for a mere £94.78 which in comparison to some of its rivals is a fantastic price, especially considering its the top model of its line and some of the unique features that it has such as the USB adaptor, quick access hard drive bays and a completely hidden lockable front panel. As mentioned it doesn't just have to act as a HTPC case, it would also double up as a suitable home server chassis or even use in desktop apllications.