Test System

Assembly

Installing a fully sized ATX board is done by traditional means, with the use of spacers and screws. Due to the lack of front drive bays, there is loads of room to work with. The elements on the bottom edge are pretty close to the shroud cover, but can still be routed nicely.

One important element to mention is the fact that iBUYPOWER strongly recommends the use of white parts within the Snowblind to give your LCD screen the best backdrop and thus visibility. Unfortunately, our test hardware needs to stay constant across all our case reviews, so this is what we will work with.


Installing an SSD is done outside the confines of the chassis because of the tray. You may simply place it back into the chassis once it has been filled using the included screws. The whole tray is secured with the thumbscrew.


Installing a 3.5" hard drive requires tools as well. You have to take off the front and its dust filter to get to the screws mounts which are to hold the drive in place. On the upside, as screws are used, the drive will stay in place no matter what.


Installing a power supply requires the use of the frame so that it and the PSU may be slid into the chassis through the back. This is due to the metal divider—it isn't high enough to install the unit through the side. iBUYPOWER also included thumbscrews that do not come off the metal frame, which is a nice little touch.


With everything installed, the iBUYPOWER Snowblind makes a great and clean impression. Thanks to the trench, as I call it, all the cables disappear nicely. Most of the cable mess is inside the closed off compartment because there are not too many mounting possibilities on the motherboard tray, which is fine as you won't see any of the cables once the panels have been put back in place.

Finished Looks

With the system turned on, there are several elements that light up white. This naturally includes the three fans, but also the power button and the front iBUYPOWER logo.


Once you turn the system on for the first time, your LCD screen will be detected by Windows as a fully functional second display. It is, however, rotated 90°, so you have to set it right inside Windows for it to be upright. That means you will see everything, including the Windows Start bar, for example.


iBUYPOWER suggests you go for high contrast or even black and white assets for maximum impact. The chassis uses Rainmeter as a basis, which allows you to load your own and iBUYPOWER branded widgets to display on the screen directly. This is very cool—you could have a visual reference or even go as far as having additional info displayed here for a high-level overview of what is happening with your system or within your gaming session. Naturally, you can display anything on here, and iBUYPOWER also suggests that you download Wallpaper Engine from Steam to put up some cool backgrounds that react to your mouse or keyboard input, for example.


To show you some of the possibilities, I left the window open to take advantage of the white backdrop. Please ignore the subtle black mark as that is the photo studio backdrop. What you can do with the screen is pretty cool, and it is fun to use, especially considering the price of the chassis. That having been said, it does get pretty warm on its own, which will affect system temperatures, as you will see on the next page.