[section_title title=Conclusion]
Conclusion
Having used the Colossus for a couple of week, with general use and gaming, lets see what what my overall thought on this chassis was and if there were any areas that I thought could be improved.
To start with, BitFenix have started off by using the already brilliant Prodigy chassis and added a different shell, much the same as they did with the Phenom that we looked at previously. The Colossus is certainly more of an eye catcher than the Prodigy was, mainly down to the LiteTrak which I feel is a brilliant addition to the chassis. Whilst walking around a handful of LANs here in the UK, most notably Insomnia, I saw a lot of Colossus towers. Naturally, I enquired why they had decided to stay with the tower now it is a little aged and most people said it was because of the exterior lighting. The simple aesthetic of the Colossus, teamed with the LiteTrak really does add to BitFenix’s ITX range.
I feel that BitFenix have done an admirable job fitting as many features as they have into such a small package. The fan support for both air and water cooling solutions at stock is excellent and still leaves a few options open for any aspiring modder. The removable hard drive cages further lend themselves to the water cooling scene. Allowing people the chance to use longer graphics cards, but also to fit in larger radiators and water cooling equipment. The tool-less implementation on the top hard drive cage is nice, as it allows you to add and remove it in a matter of seconds. The two spectre fans that BitFenix have supplied with the chassis are of a high quality and do shift a lot of air for their near silent operation. The SoftTouch finish is brilliant, and it is something that I have been a fan of since I worked on a Shinobi a few years ago. It just adds that little bit more polish to the case and finishes it off nicely.
When I reviewed the Prodigy, even though I was being very picky, I picked up on the lack of dust filtering on the front intake fan and optical bay cover. I’m pleased to say that BitFenix have addressed this with some fine foam behind the front panel for both of these. However, the little SSD mounts that were on the back panel of the Prodigy are gone on the Colossus. This was a feature that I really liked as I gave mounting options for smaller drives if you removed the cages altogether for water cooling. Upon closer inspection it appears that this has been done because of the space taken up by the LiteTrak on side panel.
In Conclusion, this case really does deliver the goods in the ITX department with good performance in both cooling and acoustics, gorgeous aesthetics with the LiteTrak which can be tailored to suit the colours of your build. The only thing that I was a little skeptical about is the price, £75 seems a little too high and I would have felt that £65 would have been the sweet spot for this chassis. I would wholeheartedly recommend this case to anyone wanting a small build and I feel that it is totally deserving of our Performance and Design awards. I would like to thank BitFenix and OverclockersUK for supplying us with this sample and look forward to seeing more from them in the future.
The Colossus ITX and other items from the BitFenix range are available to purchase from Overclockers UK –Â http://www.overclockers.co.uk/mfrList.php?mfrid=556
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Performance
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Design
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Value
Summary
The BitFenix Colossus M is another brilliant ITX chassis from BitFenix, Combining the brilliant steel frame that we first saw from the Prodigy and coupling it with a gorgeous exterior with the striking LiteTrak, BitFenix have built an extremely capable chassis which will appeal to gamers and modders alike.
