Final Thoughts

I have looked and played with a lot of enclosures over the past several years, but I have never seen one as feature-rich as the Antec P190. This product is geared specifically toward the enthusiast crowd and includes a lot of refined enhancements to make your goals of overclocking more easily attainable. With a weigh-in of nearly 50 lbs or just over 26 kg, it is not meant for that monthly LAN party, but for sitting in your room keeping everything nice and cool plus quiet as well.

The base setup comes with five fans; a pair of 140mm fans on top (exhaust), a 120mm rear fan (exhaust), a 120mm fan in the power supply compartment (intake/intermediate airflow through power supplies), and the 200mm "Big Boy" mounted on the side panel (intake). All intake areas are filtered and overall airflow is huge throughout the system. There is a mounting bracket included for an additional fan for the hard drives, but this is unfortunately empty.

As noted early on, this enclosure is large. A lot of the extra dimension numbers are for the depth of the case, which allows for motherboard up to the 12" extended ATX models. It also gives plenty of room for the newer graphics cards (such as GeForce 8800 Ultra and HD 2900 XT) hitting the market that are longer than what we have come to expect. Even better, the P190 comes with a plastic bracket that can be used to secure these long boards firmly in place, so there is no need to fear damage to the component or of it slipping out of socket during operation.

The power that is default to the case is also massive, just like the case. With 1200-watts to make use of and enough connectors to jump start three rigs besides your own, you should not ever have to fear about not having enough juice to get the job done. In the event that this just isn't enough power for you, the dual mounts for the power supplies will also allow you to install an industry standard PSU of your liking. Just make sure of length measurements before your purchase.

Another feature that we have covered is the soundproofing material used in this case. This material is used on both side panels and is meant to help keep the noise from escaping to the outside world. While this isn't a totally silent enclosure, the amount of noise is certainly minimal when considering the amount of airflow being moved around. With fans on the LOW setting, I can barely hear them running. Even with all fans set to HIGH, the noise is far less than the noise made from the high-end graphics cards being sold today.

Price is going to be the major fear factor with the P190. This behemoth has a MSRP of $499 USD but can be found online for roughly $450 USD in the United States and around $550 AUD in Australia. While this is a huge amount of cash for a case, consider what you get. The average cost for 1200-watts of power is currently $350 - 400 alone. This is the power you will receive with this product, which brings the comparative cost of the case down to a more respectable $50 - 100. Considering the features included in this thing, this really isn't a bad deal after all.

Bottom line... If you have been looking for the be-all end-all in enclosures and want more features than you will ever need, the Antec P190 is definitely for you. It is huge, has excellent cooling, and more power than even a hardcore gamer could ask for. It also has a price tag to match, but still doesn't come in as a bad bargain.

- Pros

Large enough for Extended ATX boards and long graphics cards

1200-watts of power and a huge number of connectors

Exceptional cooling with fans up to 200mm

Includes soundproofing in both side panels

All air intakes filtered

- Cons

Has an empty fan socket

Expensive

Rating - 9.5 out of 10 and TweakTown's "MUST HAVE" Editors Choice Award!