he AMAZING $30 "Computer Case"! #Helpful Post

so there are a lot of great reasons to

use a test bench instead of a

conventional case let's say for example

you like the look or maybe you swap your

hardware out really frequently or I mean

those are really the main reasons that

you might want to do it anyway we use

tons of them here at Linus Media Group

because we're constantly benchmarking

graphics card CPUs coolers all sorts of

things basically all of our writers have

one or even two or three test benches in

the case of Anthony but as you guys

might know money's been a little tight

around here ever since I broke that Xeon

Platinum CPU so we needed some new test

benches but we didn't have the funds for

these open bench tables that we like so

much enter Aliexpress where we got this

test bench for how much was actually a

little bit under $30 how bad could it be

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so the open bench table here is pretty

much what we consider to be the gold

standard in test benches it does have

some drawbacks for example their

radiator mounting could be vastly

improved but it's completely toolless

it's really easy to access it folds

completely flat and it fits pretty much

all the hardware that you could want for

95% of the testing that you'd want to do

without any restricted ability to get at

things or any restrictions in terms of

cooling the problem is that I'm going to

do these ones cost $200 $200 it's a lot

of shekels so we've got a static safe

packing foam in here not that I'm too

concerned about any of these things

being sensitive to static we've got some

instructions that are Chinese only but

early pictograph of cold so I think we

should be able to figure it out we've

got front USB that's a and front audio

that's a nice feature to have for a test

bench at the open bench people don't

have it no they don't

Wow remote power button and reset switch

all the included tools and standoffs and

screws and everything not tool that was

amiss I misspoke okay we've got some

extruded aluminum something's there's

five of them

oh and wow that's it this is pretty

flimsy okay so that's not the world's

finest looking piece of acrylic

it's very flex I can't fight this

feeling anymore started fool see they

can't copyright strike me if I'm Way off

key this is really the the

quintessential aliexpress experience

here isn't it

that's kind of like Aliexpress meets

IKEA so first up I've got the hard drive

mounts over here so evidently the hard

drives go in between two of these

kind of something like I'm not sure what

the orientation is yeah it looks like

they go like that how you doing

I opened this upside down and now really

do have meat Anthony oh my god the

screws are labeled and you get they were

numbered all this was gonna be so easy

you screwed us so this is a spectacular

example of waste not want not

so we've got our our bench here and you

can see they actually cut out the

harddrive holders from the rest of the

bench in a spot where the motherboard is

gonna sit on top of it anyway acrylic is

actually a much more expensive than

you'd probably think does it make any

sense to have the numbers on the top or

the bottom so like I look at this and

I'm like oh okay I'll open it up but no

it's like this with this blank piece of

whatever it is we'll let the audience be

the judge actually we shouldn't do that

they always side against me I don't know

what it is no matter how junior or

completely unlikable someone is they

always side with them against me when we

leave it up to the audience okay I'm

gonna put another hard drive on here for

lulz I want to load this thing up like

will will deck it out it will put as

much stuff on it as we can or two hard

drives and an optical drive whoa did you

see that I opened it up correctly

it wasn't even hard oh wow I just huh

there's not really as many pieces on

this whole thing as I had sort of

expected from looking at the like the

diagram are we missing some this is the

light version this is a universal set of

instructions so there's a version that

actually comes with up to a 240

millimeter radiator mount as well as the

PCI Express plane there but we got the

most basic versions oh I think we did

this is where the reputation comes from

China it's not that you're not capable

of designing a tool path for this it's

just that you can't be arsed to just go

double-check this measurement I'll just

put a slot you'll be fine

how do you miss a line your own thing

why is that a slit instead of a hole

acrylic isn't one of those things that

dramatically expands or shrinks when

your laser cutting it so that's pretty

cool check that out so we just run these

cables over to our motherboard and boom

we've got front i/o on our test bench I

mean the thing about a test bench is

that accessing the rear i/o is usually

as simple as turning it around but still

I wouldn't say no to being able to reach

it from both sides

oh wait that's weird no it does say from

the buttons and that was five which you

had these super long ones in for and it

doesn't say for the USB one that's not

labeled whatever reason this one uses a

hole instead of a slot yeah like they

were they were confident on that one so

this is actually a cool design for the

button though so it's anchored along the

outside here and then there's just these

flexible pieces of acrylic that actuate

the button and that's actually got a

pretty decent little clique to it cool

yeah that's really neat

all right the holes are bigger want to

come see the big hole well I put it in

hey this really is not anything special

I've gotten some pretty amazing stuff on

like dealextreme for 30 bucks even

though we paid 30 bucks on Aliexpress

this thing can be had for 16 bucks on

cowbell why did we pay $30 for it on

Aliexpress because it didn't know was on

time Oh wasn't until I followed the tab

out link on that

that their instruction sheet ha so we

actually bought rebranded Chinese crap

from a rebranded Chinese crap

marketplace where several levels deep

right now this is like Soulja test bench

if it goes like any more levels deep

that is not pretty so interestingly

they've actually removed the most

material for our drive mounts from the

area that has the least support from the

feet this this obviously isn't a thing

but then wait yeah yeah everything goes

on the other side really okay well back

to the drawing board

like we're not we're not missing

something here are we I mean we might be

but I don't think so

this too is a protective layer hey so

that's good it makes a little more sense

now so we can go ahead and put some PCI

Express due to Adam a jigs on here so

these are actually very similar in their

design to our open bench table one just

cheaper and crappier now where does this

go there's like these big gaps between

the standoffs and the top here why okay

and then do you know what screws that

uses brilliant doesn't say here's

another bizarre one so there's that

weird gap and then these holes are

hexagonal instead of round why are they

to distinguish them visually okay hey

something makes sense learning a thing

so the hexagon ones are for the the

drive cage things and they can either be

three and a half inch or five and a

quarter inch so here's the other two hex

ones this one is barely even in you can

see there's a gap here and then there's

another set one two three here three and

a half five and a quarter brilliant okay

now I'm just gonna fix that I put the

drives in Rome in fairness to it that's

more solid yeah alright um hold on I got

okay I'll get these so put the standoffs

where they go and I'll screw them in

from the bottom by the time we go

through all this hassle though we could

have done it Luke's way why would they

put the legs right where the holes are

okay at least they got this aligned

correctly now see if I was learning I

would have kicked it hey that's a

legitimate strategy to help prevent

damage I'm not kicking it I'm catching

with my feet look here I'll give you a

demonstration okay so if I were to

accidentally drop this cooler if I'm

like Oh see look how much of its

momentum was arrested before it hit the

ground here it's fine I'll demonstrate

for you again like Oh No Oh

so once your motherboards on like this

then you get your power supply and

honestly this is so stupid

so it just goes on like that oh you guys

are gonna have a full appreciation for

this one side sent it back over

we have to take the board off in order

to mount the cooler because the hard

drives go right under where the CPU

socket is and it doesn't even have a

cutout anyway mm-hmm

yeah and it's not like it has these

stock cooler

it's a beefy stock cooler for like wow

it's like that sucker you like that I

like these more yeah those are awesome

and this doesn't have them well it's

about what you'd expect from just a

piece of acrylic it does get some more

structural rigidity from having the

motherboard like mounted to it but not

as much as it as we want it to have I

mean is this it do we just fire it up at

this point I mean we can if you want to

let's do it we need to plug in the front

panel there we go let's see if the reset

reset switch works it does technically

have a power LED in there so there you

have it this is the geek studio 16

dollar test bench as long as you can get

it off Taobao 30 bucks off Aliexpress it

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