Antec Sonata 550 Plus
Introduction
The Antec Sonata Plus 550 is the latest edition from the Sonata series. Antec have added some power to the Sonata Plus in favor of a 550W NeoPower Modular Power Supply - hence the name the Sonata Plus 550. So here we have it, a perfect combination, but how perfect?
Features:
- Side panels layered with sound-deadening high-density polycarbonate to dampen noise and vibration
- Enhanced Cooling System for improved air intake and quieter cooling
- 1 x 120mm TriCool™ rear exhaust fan (installed)
- 2 x 92mm front fan mounts to cool the HDD - Antec TriCool™ fan with 3-speed control allow you to optimize the cooling configuration and control the noise level
- Built-in washable air filter keeps harmful dust out of your computer
- Ultra-quiet, high-efficiency 550 Watt NeoPower™ power supply
- Advanced cable management reduces system clutter and improves airflow
- Universal input and Active PFC
- Up to 85% efficient reduces power consumption and saves you money - Integrated cable organizers help keep your system neat
- Dual hard drive mounting system – two ways to mount your hard drives for best possible quiet operation
- Tray Mount – Four trays with extra soft silicone grommets to reduce hard drive noise
- Suspension Mount – Three sets of elastic suspenders to suspend hard drives in the cage to maximize noise reduction - Eight drive bays (or seven with suspension mount of HDD) for maximum expandability
- External 3 x 5.25″; 1 x 3.5″
- Internal 4 x 3.5″ for HDD or 3 x 3.5” with HDD suspension - Side rails and individual drive trays allow easy installation of all drives
- Silicone grommets on internal 3.5″ trays reduce vibration and noise
- Front-mounted ports for easy multimedia connections
- 2 x USB 2.0
- 1 x IEEE 1394 (FireWire®, i.Link®)
- Audio In and Out (High Definition and AC’97 compatible) - Removable side panel with easy-access thumb screws
- Removable front bezel for easy access to drive bays
- Blue LEDs on front for Power On and HD indicators
- Motherboard: Fits micro and standard ATX
- Unit dimensions:
- 16.7″(H) x 8.1″(W) x 18.2″(D)
- 42.4cm (H) x 20.5cm (W) x 46.2cm (D) - Package dimensions:
- 19.2″ (H) x 10.3″ (W) x 21.1″ (D)
- 48.8cm (H) x 26.2cm (W) x 53.6cm (D) - Net Weight:
- 20.6 lb / 12.05 kg - Gross Weight:
- 30.1 lb / 13.63 kg
Packaging
The Sonata Plus 550 arrives in a normal Case Sized box, although a little wider than most and of higher quality. Antec have clearly labelled the box with their name and have certainly worked hard on the graphics for the box alone.
The case is supported in the box by two huge bits of foam, one supporting the top and one supporting the bottom.
The next part is a bit special, instead of the case being wrapped in the normal plastic packaging, its wrapped in a white cloth. The reason for this is to protect the glossy piano black finish from any marks it may receive during shipping and handling when removing the case.
External Impressions
The front panel of the case certainly is a work of art. It’s brushed aluminium mixed with the glossy black and shiny orange finish sets this case on fire. This case marks a work of class rather than the ‘gamers’ look.
The front has space for four 5.25” drive bays, although one of the four bays has a 3.5” Drive converter installed- which can be easily removed. There are two USB 2.0 slots, one Firewire and the normal headphone and mic jacks. Along with all this is a blue hard drive activity LED, a power switch with a blue LED ring surrounding it and a reset switch. Surrounding the drive bays is a copper/orange colour trimming which looks amazing contrasted with the glossy black and brushed aluminium finish.
The sides and top of the case are of very high quality, the paint job that has been done on them is extremely glossy much like a professional car finish. The sides don’t seem to show fingerprints as easily as other black cases- like the P190- which is good if you are worried about fingerprints.
The rear of the case is pretty normal. The Sonata 550 Plus uses the classic position for mounting hardware so nothing on the back panel is really that different. Black thumbscrews have been used on the side panel that is removed primarily and there are normal silver screws used on the ‘slave’ side panel. The two black thumbscrews on the back are a bit different though, they are actually fixed into a cap on the chassis so you loosen the screw from its cap and then the side panel can be removed, this method is used on a lot of Lian-Li Cases and saves you from loosing the thumbscrews.
On the bottom of the case are four anti-vibration feet. These feet are pretty normal for cases nowadays and are made of very soft rubber. With the aid of these feet, your nice new case won’t rattle against your floor - making things a lot quieter.
Internal Impressions
After carefully popping off the side panel, we can see that the Sonata will be able to hold a micro ATX motherboard or a standard size ATX motherboard. There is a 120mm Tri-Cool Case fan at the rear of the case with a 3 speed switch included. Below the fan are the spaces for the expansion cards, expansion cards in this case are installed simply with a screw- no fancy pants tool-less stuff here. Also, we noticed when removing the sound panel that there is anti vibration material installed on the panels which should help to create a silent running machine.
A maximum of eight drives can be installed in the Sonata 550 Plus, four spaces are for internal hard drives, and the other four spaces are external 5.25” bays for your drives; however a 3.5 inch converter is installed in one of those spaces. All drives are installed on sliders, but we’ll show you that later on.
At the bottom inside the chassis you will notice some clips fixed to a small mounting plate, these are the sliders for your 5.25” drives. The mounting piece for these clips can be removed if they really do bother you.
The front of the case can be popped open by pressing 3 clips, it will then swing open revealing two fan filters and space to install two 92mm Fans.
There are two possible methods to install the hard drives into this case. The first is to screw the drives onto trays with noise dampening grommets separating the tray from the hard drive. The trays then slide into position.
The second method is to suspend the hard drives from elastic straps. To do this you simply squeeze the hard drives through the straps. By doing so, the hard drives will be not touching anything which will lessen the vibrations by far. However, when I did so, the hard drive didn’t seem very secure and looked as through it could easily slide out of place.
At the other side of the case are some cable tidy clips which you can wrap all your excess cable round to tidy things up a bit. I found that if you make proper use of these you can create a very tidy case very quickly.
The power supply that is included with the Sonata 550 Plus is a 550W Antec NeoPower Power Supply. It comes with all the normal connectors a power supply would have plus 4x Sata, 6x Molex and 2x PCIExpress, this should be more than enough connectors for most people and of course its all modular which should tidy things up a bit. The fan inside the PSU is controlled by the temperature of the case, so as long as your pc is cool, the PSU should be working silently.
The power from this power supply is spread over 3 12V rails, one for motherboard, one for graphics card, and one for the drives and peripherals. By using these 3 rails it should help to produce a very stable computer and combined with active PFC and universal control input this should make a rock solid PSU for the average computer system.
Installation
Installing the motherboard, CPU and ram in this case was extremely simple. For this machine we installed a ASUS P5K Premium, an Intel Core 2 Duo E6750 and 2GB Corsair XMS2 6400 RAM.
The first procedure was to install the extra motherboard standoffs that our motherboard needed. This was extremely easy and the holes ended up lining up perfectly with the motherboard we installed. However, we noticed one thing, if you install the motherboard without the PSU being in, you will not be able to get the PSU in again- you’ll have to remove the motherboard again.
The next step for us was to install all of the drives. This is pretty easy, screw the sliders onto each side of the drives and then slide the drive into place from the front. They will click into position and are extremely stable when installed
. 
Installing a hard drive into this case was also a breeze. As we opted out of the ‘suspending hard drive’ idea, all we did was screwed the hard drive to the bottom of the tray using the screws supplied and then slid the tray into position.
All that was left after that was to connect up all the cables and install the expansion cards which were also a breeze.
Here’s a shot of our Intel Test system installed.
Conclusion
The Antec Sonata 550 Plus is certainly something for Antec to be proud of. Its incredible looks, simple design and finish set this case apart from the rest. The case itself is also very structurally sound, the steel that has been used is of very good strength and certainly won’t bend, while the paint job is of very high quality and is hard wearing.
Antec have certainly thought about cooling and quietness with this case. Including it with a 120mm fan and mounts for two 92mm fans, they’ve really thought about the people that are going to be buying this case. All the sound deadening material and methods that have been used certainly work, although I’m not too sure on the ‘flying hard drive method’. When I booted this machine up and started playing BF2, I could hear only one thing inside the case, the graphics card. With only one 120mm fan at low speed and no other chassis fans this cooling was adequate for my system and the temperatures produced were of very low degrees.
The Test system that I installed in this case was quite rushed, however it worked straight away and also seemed to be rather tidy. This is all due to the modular PSU, the cable tidy clips but also the back side panel which has a small gap between that and the motherboard back plate. This means you can hide many of your cables behind the motherboard plate.
There are only a few problems that I can see from the Sonata 550 Plus. Firstly the fans, although there is space to install two additional 92mm fans, most people will probably want a 120mm fan instead of two 92mm’s. Also, the Hard Drive Elastic Mounting idea is good, although it isn’t safe at the moment and could use more work, however I can see this being a very good idea if the idea was looked at more carefully- maybe including more and tighter elastic will solve the problem of the hard drives flying out.
The only other problem is that you can’t install a PSU after you’ve installed a motherboard in this case, which could put some people off this case, however its not really much of a problem for most people.
This case could be perfect if some of the problems mentioned above were sorted. But as it stands, I’m going to award this case 4/5.
Thanks go to Antec for providing us with this case.
