AMS e-Cube EG65 Review - System Assembly

AMS e-Cube EG65 Barebones System Review

SYSTEM ASSEMBLY:

This is a "bare bones" system which means that there's quite a bit of work to do before we can put this e-cube to work for us. We needed to add our own CPU, memory, hard drive, CDRom, and if we wanted, video card. Here's what we used.

Items We Added to Complete the System:

• Intel 2.4c (200MHz FSB) CPU
• 512MB OCZ Platinum Memory (2x256MB)
• Maxtor 60GB 7200RPM Hard Drive
• Generic CDRom

We also added our own video cards for benchmarking purposes. We added a Ti4200 GeForce4 which is the card we intent to keep in this system, and for comparison purposes we also ran a Radeon 9800 Pro in the box. We'll show you the differences in performance in the benchmarking section.

Installing the CPU:

AMS realized that assembling the system was a bit of a pain in the butt in their popular gBOX so they made several changes to the chassis design of this e-cube to make life easier for the end user. As with the gBOX, the case sides come off with the removal of one thumb screw allowing you easy access to the sides of the case. The upgraded design comes into play when you want to install your components. You've seen the handle on the top of the box, well it's held on with four machine screws. Simply removing the two front screws allows the entire top of the box to flip open via a hinge on the back.

You can see the metal drive rack at the top of the case. There are two small screws, one on each side, that once removed allows that entire rack to slide back and be removed completely.

Once you have the drive rack out of the way you're left with easy wide open access to pretty much everything in the case..

Now, with all of that out of our way, we can easily install our CPU...

The heat sink included with the e-cube is a copper core design with a low profile and relatively quiet fan...

The heat sink slides down nicely into the standard P4 mounting bracket and is locked in place tightly by two retention clips..

These clips are a very tight fit and actually required a bit more effort to install than I would have liked. My days of installing AMD CPU's still have me leery of applying a lot of pressure to a CPU. Fortunately, with the heat spreader on a P4 this isn't a big concern. Their tight fit in the end is a good thing, as with this e-cube being of a mobile design you want your heat sink mounted as soundly as possible.

With the CPU securely mounted below our heat sink fan you are left with this..

If you're like me you're wondering how in such a small space you'll be able to get the hot air out of the case to leave the computer running as cool as possible. AMS has already prepared for that with their "xross blade cooling technology" In the rear of the case there is obviously not enough room for a full size 80mm cooling fan, so they've used their own design in what appears at least to me, to basically be a turbine.

Above on the left you see the cooling system mounted below the included 220w power supply, and to the right you can see the rear of the case and where it exhausts the hot air with it's turbine like blades. This is a very ingenious design that actually does a decent job keeping the case cool. Just as in the gBOX, disconnecting this unit results in a rapid rise of the internal case temperature. Very nice design considering the limited space available and the efficiency with which it works. It's not exactly quiet, but considering the job it does the sound level is more than acceptable.

Alright, on to page 4 so we can finish up installation and get to benchmarking this thing...

Next: System Assembly (continued) >>
 

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