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Raidmax Cobra 822


Date
: 12/5/04 – 08:45:20 PM

Author
:

Category
: Cases

Page 1 : Introduction

Manufacturer:
Raidmax

Price:
NA

It isn't often that you see a case of this type turning up on our desks. Indeed, I have never personally owned one and could not see the lure to the bright lights, odd styled windows, and themed bezels. I'm talking about heavily pre-modded cases; Thermaltake, Raidmax, Cooler Master, Antec, and so many more all do it in some form. These are the cases that were built to grab attention.

What we are looking at today is one such example from Raidmax, the
Raidmax Cobra 822
. Built from steel, this case offers the buyer an included power supply and three cooling fans to start. While the design is made to catch the eye, we will be more interested in the sum of its features and how well it performs. Let's begin…

Page 2 : Package

The box the Cobra arrived in looks like it's been through a lot in getting to us, but fortunately it did the job and the contents inside were all fine.

That is except for one small area of chipped paint I noticed. The good thing about this is that the chipped paint is barely visible when the panel is on the case. A quick fix would be to just run a sharpie (black permanent marker) over the steel to draw less attention to it.

Included with the case inside were various screws, a power cable, and a few expansion slot covers. The cover with a piece cutout allows the audio and MIC front IO ports to connect to the back of a sound card.

Page 3 : Specifications

Gathered from the Raidmax website are these specifications:

The standouts are the side window, included power supply, and three cooling fans that are included. The case should allow plenty of expansion room for storage and optical drives with a total of ten bays.

Page 4 : Exterior

Looking at the front of the case we can see the stylized cobra bezel. Towards the bottom, there's an attractive yellow grill that's visible and serves just for looks.

Opening the door reveals four external 5.25" drive bays and two external 3.5" drive bays. To the left of the 3.5" bays are the power and reset switches. At the very bottom of the case are the front USB, headphone, and MIC ports. The way the door opens will make opening it very difficult if the final system is resting on carpet. In that case I removed the door for easier access.

The left side panel features a window and fan complete with laser etched grill. The fan, a multi-colored LED fan, will act as an intake once the system is running.

The right side panel offers little to talk about, with only some venting; I would like to say that the paint finish is very nice. As you can see in the picture, it is polished to a shine.

>From the back of the case the included rear 80mm exhaust fans and power supply are visible. The included IO shield, once removed is trash, as are the expansion slot covers that come built into the case.

Page 5 : Interior

Turning our attention to the inside of the case, the construction is nothing special with no tool-less qualities to mention and little that differs from the average budget case. All the drive bays are fixed into place and we have a bundle of wires for conenction to front IO, LEDs, speaker, and switches.

The front of the case does offer room to install up to four 80mm intake fans. For the purposes of this case I installed one in front of the hard drive that would be used. Those looking to increase the cooling potential may consider drilling larger holes into what's already there.

At the rear of the case interior there are the disposable slot covers and IO shield that I really dislike, but are typically of cheaper cases. Also shown are the two rear 80mm exhaust fans.

Here we have have a view of the side panel from the inside:

And finally, the included 420W power supply:

Page 6 : Installation

Installation into this case went very smooth and without a problem. There were no rough edges to cut myself on, and despite not having tool-less bays and a removeable motherboard tray, most should find that the case is very easy to work in with a typical amount of components and ATX motherboard. Below you can see my wired mess:

>From the back you can see how that slot cover with the cutout was put to use:

Last, we have the profile shot of the case. The neat thing about this system is that the power and hard drive activity LEDs are the eyes (at least that's what they are to me) of the case and glow orange with flashes of red from hard drive activity. I built this system to give to my older sister and figured my nephews would get a kick out of this, because I know I did.

System Specs:
AMD Athlon XP-M 2500+ @ 2.00 GHz, 1.4V
Retail AMD HSF
512 MB OCZ PC3200 CAS 2.5 DDR RAM
Western Digital 60 GB 7200 RPM 2 MB Hard Drive
FIC AU11 Motherboard
ATi Radeon LE 32MB Video Card

Raidmax 420W Power Supply

Lite-on 16x DVD Drive

Raidmax Cobra 822 Case

The case performed well with system temperatures at 35°C load and 34°C idle in a 23.8°C environment – somewhat warmer than my residence. While not filled to the brim, these results represented an average system not used for gaming. Looking at the included power supplies performance, I tested with the same system specifications. The results:

The 12V rail showed a small drop under load, and shows that this power supply isn't the strongest as the 12V rail is not under a very heavy load with this being a Socket A with a small number of components installed. For a bundled power supply it will do the trick for typical users, but putting in enough high draw components will open up the door for instability. The true test will of course be longevity of the supply, and so far the PSU has stayed just as strong in more than a months use.

The noise levels of this system were not loud, but audible. With a retail AMD HSF installed most of the noise came from it and a small contribution by the four 80mm fans that were installed into the case alongside the power supplies two fans.

Checking Newegg it appears that Raidmax has made improvements to this case without increasing the cost to the consumer. Now they offer a similar case, but the rear fans are temperature controlled and the steel is zinc plated giving it an aluminum look.

Page 7 : Conclusion

The
Raidmax Cobra 822
was a fun case to work with. It doesn't offer all the features that the more expensive cases have, but it functions very well with a descent power supply to get things going and cooling that can handle such heat well. This case is very much about looks and so it does this in great fashion. Raidmax's claim of a show car paint job are very warranted with the high quality finish on the body of the case. Those looking for an inexpensive case that has more appeal than a plain beige box will probably be happy with this cases cooling abilities, expansion, and looks.

Advantages

Inexpensive
Descent power supply
Good quality finish
Design is very eye catching
Plenty of cooling fans included

Disadvantages

Front audio/MIC not internal connection
Not tool-less
No removable motherboard tray
Expansion slot covers not reusable