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Enermax’s PhoenixNeo isn’t the prettiest case, but it has some neat features. We liked the four USB ports, microphone and headphone sockets on the top, as they make it easy to connect peripherals when the case is under your desk. The side of the case bears a stylised phoenix, which covers a 220mm fan and some vanity lights. The fan’s rotation is reversible, so you can use it to draw air into or out of the case, and a dial allows you to adjust its speed for noise. At full intensity, the giant fan sounds like a plane readying for take-off, so you’ll want to turn it down or replace it. Although the side-mounted fan is useful and can act as an exhaust fan, the case comes with a single 120mm intake fan mounted at the front, but you can fit another one at the rear if you need more cooling. The plastic and metal fascia was easy to remove, exposing five 5¼in bays. Three of these came with clips to hold drives securely in place.
The PhoenixNeo is fairly inexpensive and provides plenty of room, but we didn’t appreciate whatever aesthetic Enermax was trying to achieve. The large fan could be useful in a high-powered system, assuming you add additional system fans for airflow, and rubber grommets make it easy to add a water-cooling system. Unfortunately, the case feels light and flimsy, and we acquired a few scratches on sharp internal corners while we were building our system.
