Top Motherboards

SilverStone Alta F2 – Evaluate 2023


At practically two ft excessive and greater than two ft deep, the titanic SilverStone Alta F2 isn’t a chassis you possibly can lose in any lineup of PC circumstances—it’s very a lot its personal colossus. This space-devouring $999 mega-case is massive in each dimension, and it flaunts nearly each conference. You may set up your video card upright at a canted angle. And your motherboard mounts, in traditional SilverStone model, rotated 90 levels, with the ports dealing with upward.

We’re not fairly positive who the right purchaser for SilverStone’s top-end full-tower is perhaps—we’re fairly sure they’re wealthy, although. This case will eat for lunch probably the most amped-up PC configuration you possibly can think about or afford, and munch the remainder of your finances for a snack. It is a excellent performer and a heck of a looker, but in addition overkill personified: For most folk, the worth makes the Alta a supercar-style lust object versus a practical PC case choose.


The Design: Outsize Opulence

Take into account simply the Alta F2’s 46.5-pound weight empty to grasp that this case goes to be a little excessive: A lot of our full take a look at builds, with all parts in place, weigh much less! In parallel with the gargantuan measurement, SilverStone spared little expense on glitz, with its mixture of brushed and matte anodized aluminum face inserts, extra-dark tempered glass, and textured end.

You will discover the case’s front-panel connections on the precise entrance panel: 4 USB 3.2 Sort-A (Gen 1) ports, one USB 3.2 Sort-C (Gen 2×2), and a headset/microphone combo jack. Energy and reset buttons above these ports characteristic power-on and laborious drive exercise LEDs.

Because the Alta helps motherboards even bigger than Prolonged ATX (EATX), your first shock is perhaps that the again panel has solely 4 enlargement slots (dressed up by way of a detachable plastic plug) at a jaunty angle. These slots accommodate your video card, mounted vertically; the quirky angling is, in response to SilverStone, a bit above 10 levels and the best-case situation for cooling airflow, per the corporate’s checks. Additionally again listed here are two push-button side-panel latches and a seize deal with. The dearth of a motherboard I/O part is your first indication that the Alta F2 makes use of the rotated-motherboard design first launched by SilverStone a dozen years in the past.

Zooming in on the seize deal with reveals nothing lower than a power-supply mount behind it, or we should always say, forward of it, for the reason that gap is on the rear panel. The house above the facility provide mount is capped with a thick, vented aluminum plate.

The highest plate is a correct exhaust vent, missing any mud filters. (Filtering air because it exits the case has by no means made a lot sense, however many chassis makers put a filter up right here regardless, within the occasion you utilize this as an consumption.) It’s hooked up by small everlasting magnets which can be glued into countersunk holes round its periphery.

The Alta retains with the rotated theme when opening the glass aspect panel: Right here, we see an influence provide tunnel that runs vertically alongside the rear edge, behind the motherboard tray. A small bracket atop the facility provide tunnel is designed to safe PCI Specific extension cables for the rear-panel different graphics card mount, and a 2.5-inch drive tray resides within the tiny house beneath the decrease finish of the facility provide tunnel.

Viewing the identical house from the opposite course, we see two dual-3.5-inch drive cages mounted (additionally at an angle) to the again aspect of the entrance panel, plus three 180mm consumption followers that draw air upward from a completely filtered backside chamber.

Countersunk, glued-in magnets maintain every of the decrease chamber’s mud filters in place, whereas a daily filter sheet is utilized to the within of the aspect panel vent (for the facility provide) by way of magnetic strips.

With these particulars out of the way in which, it’s time to disclose the motherboard chamber in its full glory. The inside is designed to situate the motherboard’s I/O panel (that’s, the standard “again” panel) on high and its “entrance” edge on the backside. SilverStone describes the vastness of this house by referencing the outdated XL-ATX customary (which provides as much as 1.8 inches to the underside of the board), along with the EATX customary. (It provides as much as three-quarters of an inch of house to the ahead fringe of the motherboard.) You will not discover any cheap motherboard that does not match right here. Most unreasonable ones ought to, too.

Viewing this house from the opposite aspect, we see two 2.5-inch drive trays hooked up to the again of the motherboard tray up high, and two dual-drive trays stuffed contained in the consumption space beneath the motherboard chamber. Every of the decrease trays has two units of 4 vibration-damping grommets on 3.5-inch drive mount spacing, plus a set of two.5-inch mounting holes inside the three.5-inch spacing.

The two.75 inches of house between the motherboard’s I/O panel and the Alta F2’s high panel supplies room to bend cables over. Within the completed construct, you’ll route cables by way of the rear panel’s handhold gap to achieve these ports.

A take a look at the uncovered high panel would possibly make clear issues somewhat (beneath), as you’ll see the beforehand considered power-supply mount in the back of it and the open motherboard I/O panel rectangle close to its entrance. 9 enlargement slots in a row assist to clarify why SilverStone referred to eight-slot XL-ATX sizes, and we even see a four-slot different slot bracket subsequent to the facility provide mount. In order that makes 3 ways to mount your video card…or does it?

Massive Cooling is among the massive the explanation why builders with massive expectations would possibly purchase a giant case like this, however with this chassis’ comparatively small dual-fan mount up entrance and all of the slots on high, it might not instantly be obvious that the Alta F2 is even designed to carry a big radiator. However behold: It has a lot of the mounts for a four-by-120mm (480mm-format) high panel radiator. Placing one right here requires ditching the four-space detachable slot panel subsequent to the facility provide, however that’s one of many causes that the panel is, certainly, detachable. The one downside remaining is that high panel radiators block all 9 usually positioned (in relation to the motherboard) enlargement slots.

In the meantime, the underside panel, SilverStone claims, can take as much as a 540mm or 560mm radiator, however these sizes are utterly past our expertise. Alternately, a radiator could also be positioned above the underside’s three consumption followers, however we’ll have to cowl a little bit of the set up equipment to clarify how.


Equipment and Cabling: Fairly the Extra

Consistent with its measurement and set up flexibility, the Alta F2 consists of one heck of an adjunct equipment. First is a radiator-adapter bracket that matches a three-by-140mm (420mm-format) or four-by-120mm (480mm-format) radiator over its triple 180mm consumption followers. You additionally get a bracket to adapt the two-by-140mm entrance panel mount to carry two-by-120mm radiators, plus a pair of brackets to help lengthy graphics playing cards when mounted sideways to the rear panel. Additionally within the field: an influence provide adapter for the highest panel’s detachable four-slot bracket, a triple-fan splitter for a single motherboard fan header, a bundle of cable ties, and a rubber damper and two thumb screws for the cardboard help bracket.

Then there’s the remainder of the screws and associated fastener objects: a Phillips #2 drive adapter socket for hexagonal motherboard standoffs, a pack of 12 motherboard standoffs, a bag of #6-32 screws to carry the motherboard to its standoffs and three.5-inch drives within the front-mount drive cages, a bag of M3 screws for two.5-inch drives, a bag of shoulder screws for mounting 3.5-inch drives to the grommet-damped holes of the decrease drive trays, and a bag of coarse-threaded screws for securing plastic followers.

The PC trade has began to make use of the time period “Sort E” because the official title of the Gen 2×2-supporting cable that results in the Alta F2’s front-panel USB 3.2 Sort-C port. Most mainstream and higher-end trendy motherboards now have this Sort E connector. Shifting over to the 19-pin cables that feed the 4 Sort-A ports, that’s a special state of affairs: Many of the boards which have two of those are extra upscale than those we use for case analysis. In fact, you had higher be placing an upscale board in a luxury-model case like this…we hope!

The front-panel headset combo jack connects by way of the HD Audio cable, and the entrance panel button/LED group is bundled as three pairs and two singles regardless of an industrywide effort to undertake Intel’s decades-old nine-pin format.


Constructing With the Alta F2

Now, we lastly get to disclose the enormity of the Alta, by the use of comparability: The complete-ATX motherboard proven is 12 inches from left to proper on this picture, as its backside edge is on the left and its high edge is on the fitting. It seems to be like a Mini-ITX board on this case!

Previous XL-ATX boards would fill among the empty house between our board’s backside edge and the facility provide tunnel on the rear, whereas EATX boards would fill a lot of the house between the three consumption followers and our ATX motherboard. Our GeForce RTX 2070 card is much too small to even want the included help bracket, although in the present day’s high playing cards are typically 3 to 4 inches longer. Noticing how ungainly the extension cable seems, we assume that that is a part of the rationale SilverStone picked so darkish a tint for the aspect panel glass.

We wouldn’t even have put the graphics card on the angled rear mount if not for the radiator of our AIO cooler stopping us from putting in the cardboard straight into the motherboard’s slot. Whereas it definitely seems to be good in that location, placing it there merely wouldn’t have been a obligatory a part of this take a look at had the radiator and graphics card been in a position to coexist on the high of the case.

You see, we couldn’t put our radiator on the underside panel as a result of its air bubble would have ran upward, into the pump. And we didn’t need to place it on the entrance panel as a result of that space doesn’t seem like as nicely ventilated. Moreover, most of our earlier PC case critiques have used the radiator’s followers to tug warmth off the motherboard’s CPU voltage regulator, and we didn’t wish to put the Alta F2 at an obstacle in that regard.


Testing the Alta F2: Vastly Cool

Under is a rundown of the take a look at {hardware} we put in within the Alta F2. We stacked it up towards the numbers we noticed from among the largest, baddest circumstances we have examined in the previous couple of years, amongst them the Asus ROG Hyperion GR701, the Cooler Grasp HAF 700, and the In Win Airforce.

It’s most likely as a result of its consumption followers push a lot air, however the Alta F2 produced the bottom CPU temperatures we’ve seen from this platform. It barely edges out the previous champion from HP, the Omen 45L ATX case, but it surely’s nonetheless a win.

Ought to we’ve been involved in regards to the influence of transferring our AIO cooler’s followers away from the voltage regulator? Going by the Alta F2’s successful voltage-regulator temperature, apparently not.

Placing our graphics card in its extra seen, barely tilted location didn’t assist it dominate on thermal readings, but it surely did end in a three-way-tie among the many NZXT and Asus samples for third place. Thoughts you, it appeared nice doing it.

One good factor about massive, thick followers is that they’ll transfer a lot air at little noise. The Alta F2 additionally makes use of its glass face and aspect panel to mirror a lot of the noise from our graphics card again into the case: The metal right-side panel doesn’t comprise noise as nicely, however the Alta F2 continues to be quieter when measured from this nook than its rivals.


Verdict: A Mighty Fortress for Your Components

Between its superior cooling and average noise ranges, the Alta F2 might not even have to justify its value for among the PC constructing market’s spendier patrons. And that’s an excellent factor for its maker, as a result of we actually can’t give you a great way to justify, in a sensible sense, spending a kilobuck on any PC case, as good as this one is.

We would say “extra radiator help,” however we’ve by no means truly seen a 480mm radiator, and we’ve already reviewed far cheaper circumstances that help 420mm ones. We would say “extra efficiency,” however just a few levels shaved off a thermal chart are laborious to justify towards a multiplication think about value. And we’d say “more room,” however most customers will run out of money earlier than they run out of elements so as to add right here.

Nonetheless, generally “extra bragging rights” is the reply. Quite than take into account the Alta F2 an exorbitantly priced assortment of high-priced options, consider it an answer for a selected builder who has a selected objective in thoughts, and doesn’t let little particulars like value get in the way in which. Additionally consider this investment-grade field because the final PC case you will ever want to purchase in your lifetime.



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