Rosewill Gram Mid-Tower Chassis Review (Page 1)

Introduction, Specifications, and Pricing

We already know that Rosewill is into rebranding already existing designs, putting the Rosewill name on them, and selling them more affordable than the original design. While we immediately thought of Xigmatek due to the Norse mythology behind the name of one of their latest cases to be released, it is not one of their designs. We are sure someone out there is aware of the first version of this chassis and what it is called, but there are simply too many cases out there we have never seen, to track it down to a particular unit. Even though we realize that this is not the first the world has seen this orientation and layout in a chassis, to us, it is almost as if Rosewill has come up with this design, as we have never laid eyes on this amalgam of parts making up a chassis.

We had to do a bit of fact-checking, as Norse mythology is not something we spent much time on, outside of the Thor movie series. For those well aware of the full history of the Norse, the many characters, and the many tools which they used, it is easy to assess that the name of this mid-tower has nothing to do with its weight. If not for the "Broken Sword" sub-name to this chassis, we would never have Googled it up to see that this case was named after a sword once used by Sigmund, given to him at the wedding feast of Signy, by Odin, once it was pulled from the trunk of a tree. Once we ascertained this information, our gut said Xigmatek as the OEM, as we all know Norse mythology has lead to a full lineup of products whose names originated here.

If you still are clueless as to the angle Rosewill is taking with this tale, let us introduce you to the Gram mid-tower chassis. In all honesty, we are not sure yet what to make of this chassis as it is a mix of older elements that give this product a dated feel to it, yet it offers many things featured in some of the best and brightest designs we have seen in cases. Hopefully, by the time we make it to a conclusion, we will make up our mind if the affordability found with the Rosewill Gram offsets a few of the irregularities enough to make us want to use it in the future, or better yet recommend it to our readers. Until we reach that verdict, how about we show you what the Gram Mid-tower is all about and see if this Rosewill offering is just somewhat cool to look at, or if it is worthy of our full support and recommendation.

We took this chart from the Rosewill Gram product page, and find that the information is listed willy-nilly, and not grouped as well as we would like to see. Of course, the list starts with the Gram chassis name and also shows the 11-147-257 SKU for it. It is then that we see its 14.6-pound weight, jump past the Rosewill Gaming series, and find the 17.91" length, the 8.27" width, and the 18.31" height. Moving down the chart a bit, we then see that is it made of steel and plastic and is categorized as an ATX mid-tower chassis. For some reason, Rosewill also lists the measurements again at the bottom too.

Cooling inside of this chassis is handled by two fans out of the box. If you want to use 120mm fans, the front has room for a pair, one spot with a fan pre-installed. The top can also use a pair of 120mm fans, and the back can house one, which is filled with a clear fan with blue LEDs. If you wanted to try using 140mm fans, you could use them in the front, and at the top, in pairs. As for water cooling, you can use the front fan locations and the one in the back for support, but the top does not sit far enough from the motherboard for compatibility.

While there is still plenty more going on with this design, that is all Rosewill has supplied us, the customers, to gauge this chassis with. There is a bright side to this still, though, and that is that the Gram from Rosewill will not break the bank. We fully expected the Gram to be listed at Newegg, as Rosewill was created by them, and it is there where we find the Gram listed at $79.99. What strikes us as a bit odd is that you can also shop at Amazon and find the Gram, but the pricing, not on sale, is set to $62.67, still well under the MSRP. While this is an affordable solution, seeing how high the NZXT S340 Elite raised the bar for mid-tower designs, Rosewill has stiff competition to the worth of this Gram chassis.

Chad's Chassis Test System Specifications

• Motherboard: GIGABYTE GA-Z68X-UD4-B3
• CPU: Intel Core i7 2600K (buy from Amazon)
• Cooler: Corsair H80i GT (buy from Amazon)
• Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws F3-12800CL6D-4GBXH
• Video Card: ZOTAC GeForce GTX 970 AMP. Extreme Edition (buy from Amazon)
• Storage: SuperSpeed 128GB SSD
• Power Supply: SilverStone SST-ST85F-G (buy from Amazon)
• OS: Microsoft Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit (buy from Amazon)