Final Words & Conclusion

Final Words & Conclusion

At a price of 70 EURO the X2 Spitzer leaves a lot to be desired. While the build quality is not bad, it isn't good either. The side panels feel thin and easily bend, there's ample room for liquid cooling, the inner cabling isn't black and then the storage options can be considered to be mediocre. You can install just one 3.5" HDD and one 2.5" SSD. There's room for two 5.25" opticals though, but anno 2016 who uses two ? For a product that is advertised as full tower it remains a fairly compact chassis (which is not a negative thing), you can house a motherboard in there up-to your standard ATX form factor size. Die to the size you'd expect that airflow would be a conundrum, yet that works out to be pretty okay.  The Spitzer covers the bare basic you need or require. The airflow is good enough, the space (albeit limited to regular ATX motherboards) is reasonable. It's just that modern features like multiple SSD/HDD spaces in there are limited, a single USB 3.0 ports is available as well. Lacking however is an integrated fan controller and if you want a side window version or that SD Card reader filled, it comes as optional.
 

To the left side a chassis product photo (as advertised) - to the right side the sample we received - quite a difference.

Aesthetics

A concern we stumbled into was  that the Spitzer 20 looks different from the advertised product photos. Somewehere down the line they dropped that ncie matte black finish and went with shiny reflective plastic. And then of course, that X2 logo wasn't (and isn't) on the product photos either  ... it totally ruins the looks. In a dark or twilight room I like the X2 Spitzer 20 model as with its dark feel and see through front finish with active FAN LEDs it looks fine, you can't argue taste as it is the most subjective thing and does not make the job of reviewer any easier. Some will dislike it, and others will love this chassis for its looks. 

The Verdict

The X2 Spitzer 20 leaves me with questions and mixed feelings. Why such limited storage options and then include two opticals ? Why is the internal cabling not black, why is there only 1 cm room for cables in the rear and why only 120/240mm fan/rad mounts ? Overall the chassis does look nice in a dim room as the front side fan LEDs make all the bling. The product itself, I cannot call it very sturdy either as everything feels like it can bend if you use apply too much force. Conclusing, at 70 EURO we feel the Spitzer 20 is priced too high. This reallly is a 40~45 EURO product at maximum. At that price I'd give the X2 Spitzer 20 a thumbs up, but other then that I expected more in terms of build quality and features.

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