How To: Build A High-Class Media PC With Antec's Fusion Media Center Case

Fusion Media Center PC case VFD

Mixed in with my anticipation of the arrival of the Fusion was no small amount of anxiety. I had already built a small form factor (SFF) system, enclosed in Apevia's X-Qpack case. While the end result had been successful, getting from start to finish involved much knuckle scraping, mouthing of words unsuitable for use in refined company, and even the occasional adult beverage to steady the nerves.

So is the Antec Fusion Media Center PC case everything it promised to be? Stay tuned -- what follows is a blow-by-blow account of how I built myself a new media PC.

Originally, the Fusion was tentatively scheduled for an April release; it finally showed up on my doorstep in August. Oh man, it's beautiful. Forget the X-Qpack. This is artwork. No, it's better than artwork: It won't just sit there and stare back at me. Let's get through the specifications:

• Aluminum plate front bezel with VFD and volume control to work with Media Center applications; includes space for user-mounted infrared receiver
• Triple-chamber structure to separate the heat and noise of the power supply, hard drives, and motherboard
• 430-watt ATX 12V v2.0 power supply with universal input and active PFC
• Removable hard drive brackets with soft silicone grommets to reduce vibrational noise
• Cooling system with two side-mounted 120mm TriCool three-speed fans
• Low-profile desktop
• Three drive bays: one front accessible 5.25-inch and two 3.5-inch internal
• Four expansion slots
• Micro ATX form-factor (9.6 x 9.6-inch) motherboard
• Front-mounted ports: two USB 2.0, one IEEE 1394 (FireWire i.Link), audio in and out
• 0.8mm cold rolled steel construction

Those are twin 120mm fans. And the compartment on the left side actually holds two 5.25-inch drives -- although the one on the top is truly a bit of a stretch of the imagination. With the VFD out front, there's nothing you'd want to put there of any consequence because you can't access it through the VFD panel.

The lower bay is custom-tailored for a CD/DVD drive. The button pushes through the panel and the drive drawer slides out through a drop-down panel section. By the way, the two-bay bank on the left not only tilts up, it also slides right out of the case. It's one of the easiest drive-installs you're likely to do.

There are two additional 3.5-inch vertical bays on the right side. Perforations in the bottom of the case, toward the front, allow for the intake of air, which passes over those two 3.5-inch bays, and then gets sucked out of the case by the fans. Even so, until I could get temperature indications from inside, I elected not fill those bays, even though theory says that the cooling system -- part convection, part forced air -- should work well. And the fan in the power supply cares for some of the cooling needs in its compartmentalized section of the case. Filling The Beast
I selected an ASUS P5LD2-VM DH micro-ATX motherboard (the DH, by the way, is ASUS' designation for Digital Home, in case you were wondering) with integrated graphics via Intel's Graphics Media Accelerator 950, a gigabyte of Crucial Ballistix DDR2 memory, a Pentium D 805 (that I later cranked up to 2.933GHz), a Hauppauge WinTV-PVR-150 MCE tuner card, and Windows XP Media Center Edition (MCE).

The hard drive became a problem. I didn't have a spare Serial ATA (SATA) drive handy so I was forced to use a Parallel ATA (PATA) drive instead. That may not sound like a big deal, but there's no way to mount a master 3.5-inch PATA drive over on the right side of the case and have the slave DVD drive on the left. I've never seen a cable arranged to allow that much distance between the drives.

So I wrapped the 3.5-inch 320GB PATA hard drive in a 5.25-inch bay adapter bracket and stuffed it, slightly recessed, into the top bunk on the left -- it wouldn't need any external access and it wouldn't contact the back of the VFD. The lower bay received a Pioneer DVR-111D DVD burner -- although you'd never know it, because the burner's hidden behind the drop-down flap on the front panel and accessed via the panel's button, not its own. Still, it all worked out fine.

Finding The Trouble Spots
Getting the motherboard in was the only real problem, if you could call it that. The space is tight -- so tight that you practically need to drop the motherboard straight down and then slide it over the half inch or so that it needs to fit in place through the back panel. I found it more tedious than problematic.

There were two other potential trouble spots. The PATA cable supplied with the motherboard wasn't long enough to reach from the left-side drive bays to the connector on the board. That sent me scrambling out to CompUSA about 10 minutes before the store closed to find a replacement cable. (Although the original ribbon cable was only about two inches short, it took a round cable that was six inches longer to get from point A to point B. Some of the extra inches were used up between the primary and secondary drive connectors.)

Also, the VFD displays information from MCE and, to have that happen, it needs to be connected to a USB port (and have its drivers loaded). Antec supplies the VFD cable with a USB connector and a plug-on adapter that reconfigures the connector so it will plug into the motherboard's internal USB ports. It will reach any internal port with ease, but if you strip off the adapter and try to run it outside the case -- to one of the back USB ports, for example -- it's really a tight fit, at least using the ASUS motherboard. The plug will make it to a port but it will give you a few moments of sweaty palms as you gently twist and tug to get it where you want it to go.

It took a couple of hours of tussling but everything worked quite well in the end. Even the VFD, once the device driver was loaded, spewed out information like there was no tomorrow. In fact, I had to use its configuration tool to tell it not to bother with local news, or checking my e-mail, or displaying city information, like the weather. The system features were more than enough for me and even there I culled the depth info just a bit. (Do I really need to know my network address?) But it is nonetheless, to borrow a phrase I once heard, way cool! A Little Improvisation
A note for folks who, like me, have several systems to store: While the Fusion will (just barely) fit into a standard A/V rack or easily into most component bays in the average IKEA TV table, those side-mounted fans need to vent. That means two to three inches of open area on the right. (Or a quick field alteration to your rack with a hole saw.)

And if you're like me, the fact that the Fusion doesn't have a bay for a floppy drive may cause you some consternation. Sure, you're an adult and you don't believe in floppy drives any more. That's fine, even though there can be times -- like when upgrading or restoring a system BIOS -- when only a floppy drive (and not a USB drive) will fill the bill. And how about a media card reader? That would also work well in a floppy bay. Without one, you're using the external USB variety -- one more thing sitting on top of the case.

So if you do want a floppy, you'll have to settle for an external USB version. Because I wanted both a source and destination hard drive, I added an external hard disk (USB again). Luckily, the ASUS P5LD2-VM DH motherboard has four USB ports out back. (Remember, I used one for the VFD.) There are also two front-mounted USB ports that connect to the motherboard, along with mic and headphone jacks.

Unfortunately, I couldn't find a place to connect the Fusion's front-mounted FireWire port on the P5LD2-VM DH. Looks like the second PCI slot will soon hold a FireWire card.

Lasting Impressions
Surprisingly enough, the integrated video solution works great with the Hauppauge TV tuner. TV play, capture, or playback is unaffected by what I consider to be one of the lowest forms of PC graphics available. I wouldn't try game play with it, but that's not what this particular system is all about.

The only downside to this case is that it's loud, but that's not its fault. At first I thought it was the two 120mm fans, which are Antec's tri-power models with low, medium, and high speed settings. I backed them down incrementally, figuring that the noise would diminish as I did. Didn't work.

Then I had an epiphany: It wasn't the Antec fans. It was the stock Intel CPU fan causing the ruckus -- and the reason I could hear it with all of the Fusion's panels buttoned up was because of the fan grilles used for the case's two 120mm fans. They let the sound waft through. There are aftermarket CPU fan alternatives that will quiet things down significantly.

Perhaps under the category "small things for small minds," the biggest hoot so far has been the volume control. Having to grab the mouse, click the audio icon on the taskbar, adjust the volume, and then click somewhere else on the screen to get rid of the volume control is now passé. All I need to do is reach over for the knob and twist.

The graphic equalizer display in the VFD is also mesmerizing. (Small mind, remember?) To see it, you need to use Media Center, and not Windows Media Player, to play your tunes.

The Bottom Line
Antec's Fusion is probably one of the most affordable Media Center PC cases on the market right now. Originally, I was put off by the price (which runs through the streets starting at around $153 on PriceGrabber) but it works as advertised and does actually fit into a living room environment without provoking a second glance -- something none of my mid-sized towers can do.