Hands-On Review--PowerLogix Clear PowerCube Case

PowerLogix has released two PowerCube cases for the Power Mac G4 Cube, one made of aluminum and the other made of clear acrylic. The former, which we reviewed, has been discontinued and the latter has just been released.

The Clear PowerCube case at 8.5x8.5x10" is in between the sizes of the original Cube case (8x8x10") and the aluminum Power Cube case (9x9x10"). It's increased size, coupled with the larger top grill, increases the Cube's cooling capacity, a major consideration when upgrading the Cube's components. Our "Super Cube" has been upgraded with a PowerLogix 1.4-GHz G4 CPU, an Nvidia GeForce3 graphics card and a Seagate 7200-RPM 80-GB Barracuda IV hard drive. These upgrade components increase the Cube's power demand and the heat generated inside it. The PowerCube case allows more air to circulate through the case. Especially important, it allows one to easily relocate the DC power board, the weakest component in th Cube, to improve cooling it.

The PowerLogix Clear PowerCube kit includes four torx bolts to hold the Cube's chassis in the PowerCube case, a torx Allen wrench, a cable for the DC power board, bracket for the DC board, two sets of bolts, spacers and nuts to attach the DC board to the bracket and two CDs. One CD has a PDF, Word file and QuickTime movie of PowerLogix's installation intructions. The other CD contains the installation instructions in a format that should play on a standard DVD player.

PowerLogix's detailed installation instructions are excellent, making an easy job even easier. The only significant difficulty that one may experience is pressing the motherboard end of the cable into the slot on the motherboard. The connector on the cable has a ridge but there is no corrresponding slot in the connector on the motherboard, making for a very tight fit. In addition, the Cube's bolt that doubles to hold the lower end of the bracket is a little too short so we substituted another one.

Once installed, the G4 Cube looks great in this enclosure. The PowerCube case's acrylic is highly polished. We added a white Apple logo to the chassis' front plate (see photo above) for ready identification as an Apple computer. Being able to see the superb engineering that went into fitting all the Cube's components into the tiny cube is impressive.

The Clear PowerCube case also desensitizes the static switch on top of the Cube. Ours has gotten so sensitive that it occasionally shuts off and on spontaneously. We temporarily fixed that by disconnecting the switch but the Clear PowerCube case seems to be a permanent fix. So far there's been no spontaneous activity.

With only acrylic plastic between our AirPort Extreme Base Station's signal and the Cube's antennas, the AirPort reception is excellent, better than with the original case by one additional bar.

At an introductory MSRP price of $129 plus $8 S&H, the PowerLogix Clear PowerCube case is reasonably priced.