We all know about Lian-Li cases right? About how they're built very well from aluminium, and that (in most people's eyes) they look cool. Well, in this review i'll be showing you one of their latest creations, incorporating a few new features that have not been present in earlier cases.

First of all lets take a look at the specifications of this baby.
Dimensions (WxHxD): 210x450x490mm
Drive Bays: 4x 5.25", 3x 3.5"(Ext), 5x 3.5"(Int)
Front USB Ports: 2 (USB 2.0 Compliant)
Motherboard type: ATX & pentium 4 (MAX SIZE: 12"x9.6")
Features: Two red LED light strips, Acrylic door, Windowed side panel

Along with the case you get a couple of bags of screws for mounting various things (drives for example) into the case, as well as a few cable ties for tidying your cables and you get a stick on black aluminium bezel for your floppy drive.

The case also features many useful additions to make your life easier and to make the case look better. Such things as a removable motherboard tray, thumbscrews for everything, blue and red leds, 4 ready fitted fans, top blowhole, fan speed selector, detachable cables from front panel to motherboard, it also has a tray for sliding in and out of the psu.

Now for some pictures of all the various features.

The acrylic door. The grey frosted bit is designed to hide your drives.

The removable motherboard tray, and the back exhaust fan, the first of the four included fans.

Look at all those thumbscrews.

The blue LED and red light strips. Very hard to get a good picture of!!

This is the cable that connects your front panel (LEDs, buttons etc) to the motherboard.

The top blowhole, very neatly done, and with the second of the four included fans fitted.

Showing the removable PSU tray, held in with thumbscrews.

Lian-Li !

The buttons, LEDs and fan speed switch to control the speed of the two front intake fans. 3 speeds.

A drive, with the unlit LED light strips.

The windowed side panel, showing the decorative lines pattern. When the case arrives, this is backed with a sheet of silver brushed aluminium, useful for mods!

The usual edging to prevent user injury.

The internal 3.5" bays, fitted.

The internal bays, removed.

The last two of the fitted fans and various wiring for the front panel, also showing the back of the fan speed controller.

The motherboard connections for the front USB 2.0 ports. Notice they are in single pin connections, this makes it very tedious to attach them to the motherboard, but on the other hand, it does accommodate for any motherboard that you may have.

The front intake filter on the bottom of the case, this can be removed (with more thumbscrews) for cleaning. If you have the case on carpet, it is useful that the filter is there, or your case would get very dusty very quickly (depending on the cleanliness of your carpet ;).

The PCB for the fan speed controller, behind the front bezel.

One of the red LEDs for the lightstrips, easily changed if required.

There, that's all of the features of the case covered, now for the schpiel eh?. The first thing you notice with this case, and any other Lian-Li for that matter, is how light it is compared to your usual steel cases, it makes a nice change. As I said earlier, the case is of very high build quality, it seems that Lian-Li have thought long and hard about the design of the case, to make sure everything works ok. The acrylic door on the case is a nice touch, but i'm not sure as I like the frosted part of the door, as it prevents viewing of any digital devices you might have in your 5.25" bays, so I think i'll have a go at making a replacement door for it at some point in the future. The LED light strips on the front are a nice addition and look very cool, they brighten up the front of the case well. One issue I found was that the case shows fingerprints very well, too well in fact, so unless you wear gloves when working with it, you are going to have a hard time keeping it looking its best. OK, more pictures? Yup! (dodgy ones mind...)

There you go, some images of the case in action. The blurriness is due to the camera being very sensitive in the mode i was using to show the lights properly. I think the pattern on the window looks very cool with some lighting behind it, so i'd recommend buying a CCFL lamp or two with the case.

Overall, I think Lian-Li have done a good job on this case, although it may not appeal to the modders out there, as it has some modifications already, but it would certainly be ok for those of you who want a nice looking case without having to get their hands dirty. The case incorporates a load of useful features as I went over earlier, the cooling is superb, a lot better than my last steel case, looks good and is well built, what more could you want in a case?

I'd like to take this opportunity to thank Lian-Li for providing this sample for review and congratulate them on another well built case. As per usual, any questions or comments can be submitted in the forums.