AZZA Silentium Case Review: Knowing the Limits

Conclusion: Know What You're Using it For

AZZA's Silentium offers some of the best acoustic padding I've ever seen on a case. With our stock testbed, the Silentium proves to be one of the quietest cases I've ever tested while offering middling thermal performance. If you're going to run your hardware at stock and you just want to muffle the noise, the AZZA Silentium is definitely worth considering.

I like a lot of what AZZA has done with the exterior of the Silentium, specifically the flip-down door for the optical drive bay that allows you to leave the front door of the case closed. Venting is also well hidden by the extruded fan intake at the bottom of the face. The case also winds up being much more spacious than it looks due to the extruded side panels and soft acoustic foam.

Where the Silentium runs into trouble is both a messy interior design (due to the wasted motherboard headers and the lack of a routing hole for the exhaust fan header and AUX 12V line) and, more seriously, with competing case designs on the market. At the same price, I like the BitFenix Ghost better. It has a similarly attractive design (if a bit chintzy looking in places, just like the AZZA), but is more feature rich and has better expandability. Closed loop coolers are often a good choice for users who want quiet, efficient CPU cooling, and the Silentium only allows for a 120mm radiator while the Ghost, Fractal Design Define R4, and Nanoxia Deep Silence 1 offer much more in the way of options.

Unfortunately the last two make things even more complicated. If the DS1 never makes a successful landing on US shores, the Silentium and Ghost both still have to contend with the Fractal Design Define R4. At $10 more, the R4 is a better built and better looking case, and it offers an integrated fan controller which is useful for tuning fan performance to exactly where you need it. Of course, if the DS1 does make it to the States at $119, it will land like an atom bomb and wipe out the majority of competing cases within $40 of it in either direction.

There's a place in the world for the AZZA Silentium, but it pretty desperately needs a price cut. This case feels like it belongs at $79 (which is incidentally where it resides with rebate at the time of this writing), where its shortcomings are easier to forgive and it's out of striking distance of the competition. At $79, the Silentium is one the least expensive quiet cases you can buy, and has a strong value offering that makes it a stronger competitor to cases like the Ghost and R4. If you see it for that price and it suits your needs, it's certainly worth the recommendation, but at $99 I'd shell out the extra bread for an R4 or DS1.