With the NZXT Whisper unpacked we get a good look at the monster ... it is indeed very large. The front panel door is made off plastic mainly with long vertical air slots/columns and a sort of stealth wing type design aluminum panel mounted to it. The is also a horizontal blue LED lighted slot on the aluminum panel. To the side of the door is a finger slot for easy opening of the door.
Both the power button and the rest are on a raised section of the inner
panel that protrudes through the front door. However, only the Power
button, power LED and HDD LED are seen/accessible from the outside, the
reset is only accessible from the inside of the door. You can also see the 5.25 to 3.5" adapter bay in this photo, a plus for those who need card readers.
With the front door open you can now see that there ae 7 (not 6) 5.25" external drive bays, one being the 5.25 to 3.5" adapter. The front also has an included 120mm intake fan, which you can see is a blue LED fan.
At the top of the case we find that NZXT has added a concealed accessory header that once unlatched with the easy latch system, allows a USB 2.0, e-Sata and audio ports to pop up for your use.
The sides are pretty much plain and solid, with no venting or windows on either side.
Moving to the rear of the case we can see right off that the psu will mount in the bottom of the case. Above the psu mounting hole there are two 80mm exhaust fans included and pre-installed. Moving up from the exhaust fans we see two pre-cut holes with grommets installed in them for use with possible water cooling setups. A nice sized vag vent on the right side and standard 7 expansion port mother board i/o area. At the top right hand side there is one more 120mm pre-installed fan. The 3 included rear exhaust fans are all non-LED fans. The left side panel is held in place via two rubber encased thumbscrews,
Accessory pack:
Of course included with all great cases is a great accessory pack. The NZXT Whisper is no exception, it's accessory pack had more than enough screws to install a multitude of drives and hardware. it also came with an instruction booklet, system speaker, and a rubber gasket for the psu to reduce vibration and noise.
Another great thing about the NZXT Whisper's accessory pack is that each packet of screw was pre-labeled, so you would know what you were looking at when hunting a certain screw.
Interior Views:
Yep, NZXT went to the trouble to encase the thumbscrews in rubber. this helps you grip them better when taking them out or putting them in, and yes even makes it quieter when you drop one on the floor. lol :)
Once you remove the two thumb screws the side panel can be removed easily, but remember it is heavy don't let it catch you by surprise. We get our first peek inside as well, ... now that is a different layout for sure.
Here we have a shot of the sound dampening material used by NZXT to reduce the noise inside the case to a whisper. It is a 10mm dampening foam material.
Our first good look at the inside without the panel, allows us to see a big distinction between the cases I normally review and the NZXT Whisper right off. The case is virtually a two chamber case. The upper chamber containing the motherboard, video cards and optical drives etc, while the lower chamber will contain the psu and the HDDS. You can also see the sound dampening material on the other panel as well from here.
The lower chamber contains total of 9 HDD drive bays in 3 drive cages. The first drive cage being non-removable and containing 5 HDD trays. The second and third drive cages are removable (via 4 screws each) and contain two HDD trays each. In front of the fixed HDD cage you
In front of the non-removable HDD cage you can see the 120mm front intake fan mount.
Looking closer at the upper chamber we can see the sound dampening material is also present in the top of the case. We see that NZXT also included wire management holes in the separator panel as well as the motherboard tray. We can also see there are 7 optical drive slots here, I have one of the 7 tool-less clips out in the picture.
A closeup of the tool-less locking optical drive clips.
Front:
Here are a couple shots of the upper chamber from the front without the front panel one. You can see the optical drive bays utilize plastic slot/shelves to help reduce noise. You can also see a better picture of the sound dampening material, bottom of the chamber floor and the wiring from the top header.
Moving down a tad in the front we find the 120mm intake fan. It has a tool-less mounting design as well. It also has a filter that can be cleaned, but to do so the front panel must be removed and the fan dis-assembled. Easy enough, press the upper and lower clips and pull the fan assemble forward. Once out turn it around and and do basically the same thing to remove the fan from the plastic mount. Note: I did find this fan mount to be pretty loose, in fact it practically fell out upon removing the front panel. Others I have heard can hardly get it out, so this may have been a blessing. lol
