Lian Li PC-B71
Case Details
Published: 18th January 2010 | Source: Lian Li | Price: £250.28 |
Case Details
At the front of the top panel on the B71 is where you will find the power and reset switches. There is also a small flap which conceals the 4x USB, e-SATA, Firewire and headphone/microphone connections.
The B71 is an upgrade from the A70 & A71, because of this there are many similarities and also quite a few changes. On paper it's these changes I was most worried about as I've had the pleasure of working with many A70's and felt the changes Lian Li had made would be losing the cases simplistic purity but I don't mind admitting I was very wrong. I tried my hardest to find fault with the new additions but I'm afraid they completely won me over. The first and foremost is the PCI fixing latches because I thought they would feel cheap and loose, and to me unnecessary complication. They are however very good, they have a positive locking mechanism that supports even the heaviest cards in place.
Another feature that I was somewhat reserved about is the adoption of the door locking mechanism from the v2000 and V2010 series. This was a very successful system on those cases, but the B71 is made of a much thinner aluminium and I was concerned of flex or even that it wouldn't feel quite so secure. Again I was proven wrong as the doors secure and latch perfectly, and if I'm honest the doors being slightly lighter actually helps make the fitting of the doors easier. The side rails make it very easy to align the door, once in place you simple slide the top rail to latch and secure the door, then just screw in the thumb screw and that's it, the door is on and locked in place! The backs of the doors are also covered with noise absorbing foam to add to the quality feel and quiet operation of the case.
The hot swap bays are a primary feature of the B71, I had my reservations here as well. One with the way the drives would be fixed in the case, and two with the airflow over the drives seeing as the front fans also feed air into the case. Something I have found disappointing was the fact the power for the hot swap PCB's is provided by soldered in molex connectors on 50mm of cable. I think it would have looked much better of the molex was just off the pcb and not dangling off loose as you can not really do anything with them. I appreciate 3 molex is better than 7 SATA power cables but a small change could have made a big difference here.
Here you can see the simple HD rails, they just screw into the sides of the hard drive. The case come with 7 hard drive rails, all the screws and fixings needed and a spare PSU plate should you wish to run dual power supplies.
Lets move on to see what the case looks like with our testing hardware fitted.
Most Recent Comments
im abit conserned about the hot swap bays tho, as the green color of the back plate might get in the way when you're modding?
well love the review and the youtube videos! great idé with the new "Lian Li B71 - What Mods Are Possible?" want to see more of those in the future.
Cheers //// Apans
There's a couple of images missing the larger versions on page 4 and I want to look at em
On my next big rebuild (i.e. socket change, totally new system, happens every 4-5 years or so), I'll seriously consider this. Can't quite justify dropping £250 on a case right now when the P182SE does me fine.
I liked how you try to get across what good case cooling is. I never would have expected it to perform so well if I'm being honest. Perhaps I underestimated Lian Li, though I've been after one of their cases for a while, but ended up with two Antec cases instead, mainly due to price.
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