External Appearance - Continued
Round the back we find some of the reasons for the X11’s bulk. The full-size PSU space is mounted vertically on the left, along-side which are a couple of pre-fitted 80mm fans.
Click for larger image
Underneath the fans resides the usual space for the I/O ports of the mainboard, and further along we have enough blanking plates to satisfy the full-sized ATX board that the X11 can hold.
Click for larger image
Taking an closer look at the plates reveals that they don’t match up to the rest of the X11 in terms of quality.
Very simply, the plates are directly riveted to the chassis – itself not really an issue, but the metal used is the sort of grade you’d find on a £15 case, not on a chassis in the £200+ end of the market.
Taking a even closer look reveals a bigger problem; the blanking plates are of the twist-and-permanently-remove variety. If you decide to remove them make sure you honestly need to. This is disappointing stuff considering the X11’s price point.
Overall then, the X11 looks good externally, except for the I/O blanking plates, which puzzles us given the efforts Origen has gone to elsewhere.
