Verdict: Lots of gimmicks isn't the same as good design.
Overcomplicated design is bad. This isn't to say that everything in life should be simple, but when it comes to attaching gimmicks, racks, fan ports and cooling ducts to cases, sometimes the smart thing to do is decide enough is enough before it becomes just plain silly. Unfortunately, this isn't what appears to have happened with the Xilence X2.
The Xilence X2 appears to be a fairly basic steel case from the outside, but it's here where we start to see the effects of over-enthusiastic design. A small door on top covers the front USB, FireWire ports and headset jacks, and another much larger door covers the front drive bays. Two doors is two doors too many if they aren't well executed, and in the case of the X2, both doors are poorly designed. The door covering the ports is entirely superfluous and serves no useful purpose, while the drive bay door slides down clumsily and doesn't feel very well made. Other than the doors, the outside of the case looks plain ugly - not that this is always a bad thing, as one of the best budget cases ever made is the Jeantech Phong 2 and that looks like the arse-end of a robotic dog.
There are three 5.25in external bays and a single 3.5in external bay at the front, all of which are covered by one of the doors. Located on the bottom of the case near the middle is a hard disk cage for up to five drives. A 120mm front intake fan mount at the front of the case (jut visible below) is a long way from the disks it's meant to cool. Only the 120mm exhaust fan is supplied.
The PSU cage is located somewhat unconventionally on the bottom of the case, which places it rather close to the hard drives which not only risks having extra heat near your precious drives, but also means you have to deal with serious cable congestion in this area.
Expansion cards are held in place by a screwless retention bracket, which is fine and dandy until you want to install a dual-slot card. Due to a rather odd design quirk, the screwless bracket section has ridges, so to install a dual-slot card, you have to remove the bracket and replace it after fitting the card, which is an added and completely unnecessary annoyance.
The crowning glory of the cramped and congested innards of the case is the big red plastic air duct that's clearly intended to make it easier to suck out hot air from critical system components. This is a reasonably good idea, and side panel vents and other such designs are no bad thing but, given the sheer size and unwieldiness of this particular duct, the benefits are offset by the bulk of the duct in such a confined space. In addition, the duct will only really work if your CPU HSF has a fan mounted on top, as with the reference Intel and AMD designs; most high-end CPU HSFs have side-mounted fans. As the Xilence X2 is fairly small case anyway, this means that accommodating components and neat wiring will be difficult at the best of times - the last thing it needs is a great honking air duct inside the case.
Conclusion
The saddest aspect of the Xilence X1 is that the designers have clearly put a lot of effort into it. We have numerous innovations like the mounting of the PSU on the bottom of the case, away from where all the hot components are located. This has some merit but leads to messiness. The problem is that none of the design features, such as the massive air duct crammed into the tiny interior, gel together. In a budget case, the emphasis should be on simplicity, particularly in a case of this small stature. As such, despite the Xilence X1's diminutive £45 price tag, we can't recommend it.
