A Closer Look - Inside

You can clearly see another bracket for hard drives along the interior's side once the main side panel has been removed. Four screws that need to removed for assembly to take place attach the bracket to the frame. Once gone, you have a clear path to the motherboard tray. A large opening in that tray allows for easy access to the CPU cooler's underside, but there is unfortunately no room to hide cables behind the tray.


The hard drive panel may hold three 2.5" and two 3.5" drives. The interior's inverted nature makes the main panel the one with the I/O and hard-drive cages, so you have to connect the separate leads as you close up the case. As the Prodigy M uses the same side panel as the Prodigy, you will also find two spots for 2.5" HDDs here.


There is a large air vent with several fan-mounting possibilities in the front, though the PSU, once installed, will block it off. The very top has the single 5.25" drive bay, which you can also get to from outside. The Phenom M, for example, offers the same bay, but without the ability to get to it from outside.


There is nothing out of the ordinary in the rear, aside from the arrangement. The exhaust fan in the back is of the retail BitFenix Spectre variety and utilizes a 3-pin connector. Above that are the five expansion slots, and that is pretty much it here.


You will find a 120 mm fan on the floor. While it will certainly help with airflow, it will also suck in dust, and you will have to remove the solid plastic cover to really use it properly; there is even a spot for a 3.5" hard drive. You may install either two fans or go for a liquid-cooling setup of up to 240 mm in the top. However, doing so will block off your optical drive bay.


Before diving into the assembly process, let us take a quick look at the main cables within the Phenom Micro-ATX. There are the USB 3.0 and audio ones, both sleeved black to go with the color of the chassis, and the usual case cables for the Power and Reset buttons and LEDs. You will also find a special, angled PSU plug with which to route the PSU connector to the back of the case.