Panels, yes plural, as this is a two-piece panel. You can clearly see the split in the panel in the above photo. The front portion is held in place by six allen screws and is intended to be removed to secure the right side of your optical drives. I think this is a pretty neat idea, but would be much better implemented without the use of six Allen screws. Perhaps just a few thumb screws or a quick-release hinge door like on the left side panel would be much easier to work with.
So what about the other main panel? Unfortunately it follows suit to that of the rear panel and is not intended to be removed. Doing so will, again, void your warranty. Upon closer inspection, this panel actually doubles as the motherboard "tray". Again, perhaps a quick-release hinge design would be useful here to help with motherboard installation. It comes without saying that the Fatal1ty does not have a removable motherboard tray.
Here we have the interior of the Fatal1ty (and yes, that scratch on the motherboard panel was there out of the box). Included within the case was a ziploc bag with all of the necessary screws (and allen wrench), cable ties, etc, that is needed to install your hardware in the case. One thing missing, however, was an instruction manual. Most people have enough experience to not need a manual. I did some checking around online and other review sites had a manual with their Fatal1ty, so perhaps this is just an isolated event.
The hard drive cage is unlike anything I have seen before. This cage houses three drives, which are slid into place with the aid of rubber rollers on all sides and are held in place with straps. I was a bit skeptical about this at first but after using it, I absolutely love it. The drives fit in snugly, so no worries about one sliding out. Also, the rubber rollers drastically aid in reducing disk vibration, which in a normal cage, is amplified throughout the case and you end up with a very loud drive. Anyone with a 10,000 RPM Raptor drive is familiar with this.
The Fatal1ty supports up to four 5 1/4" external drives. Everything looks good here, but as you will see in a bit... looks can be deceiving.
More ahead as we check out the rest of the interior...
