Date: May 7th, 2009
Article by: Joe Anderson (Hardware Reviewer)
Edited By: Nathan Glentworth (Owner / Head Editor)
Product was submitted by: NZXT
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PRODUCT INSTALLATION AND TESTING
After connecting the side fan to the motherboard and the side panel replaced, a touch of the power button reveals the lighting scheme of the Guardian 921. Three illuminated blue lines, reminiscent of a popular game logo, serve as the “power LED” and the LED side fan bathes the interior in a pleasant blue glow.
The display is quite legible without being overly bright and shows temperature readings from the areas in which the thermisters were placed in the case. According to my digital thermometer, the readings are believable, but may be a bit high. Just below the display, an HDD activity LED signals drive activity, and there is a speaker back there somewhere as well.
With the door open, you can see the glow from the intake fan near the bottom of the case, but it's all but invisible with the door shut. I'll have to admit that I like the look of the Guardian 921 much more than its older sibling. I'm still ambivalent about the side window design, but that is purely subjective and I won't hold it against the 921.
Another detail that I won't hold against the Guardian, or any gaming case, is that it's a bit loud. The front fan seems to be the worst offender and the roaring noise is likely a result of its airflow being disturbed by the HDD cage. On to the testing phase of this review.
While the Guardian 921 does a more than adequate job of keeping this high-watt hardware happy, I frankly expected more out of a case with three 120mm fans. Here is a table illustrating the temperature change relative to the open test bed, in degrees C. Ambient temps were kept at a constant 21C in the lab and the system was shut down for one hour between test runs.
As you can see, this case does a good job of keeping temperatures in check. There is clearly air moving in through the front over the hard drive and CPU numbers are well within the range that I'd consider good. There is clearly a dead spot in the graphics area due, I suspect, to the airflow impedance of the HDD cage. After playing around with the NZXT Guardian 921 for a couple of days, I think that removing the drive cage would almost surely improve cooling performance, particularly in the graphics card area. This can be done relatively easily and there is room for two HDDs in the upper bays, provided you don't use a floppy.
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