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Yoyotech Dragon F-58 review

in Desktop PCs

Verdict

An ingenious upright chassis design, a solid specification and a keen price make this PC a real marvel to behold

Review Date: 20 May 2011

Reviewed By: Mike Jennings

Price when reviewed: £499 (£599 inc VAT)

Overall Rating
5 stars out of 6

Features & Design
5 stars out of 6

Value for Money
5 stars out of 6

Performance
5 stars out of 6

PCPRO Recommended

Silverstone has produced some exciting PC enclosures in its time, but the new FT03 – which houses the Yoyotech Dragon-F58 – is truly outlandish. Abandoning the conventional layout, its motherboard has been rotated 90 degrees and its components arranged from top to bottom in a tall, towering column design unlike anything we’ve seen.

The PSU sits at the bottom of the FT03 and acts as ballast for the thin body. It’s fitted so snugly that the power socket isn’t readily accessible, so an extension cable connects it to a secondary input at the bottom of the case. Four feet keep the base raised to allow air to be drawn in, and cables are hidden away in the side of the case behind the motherboard tray.

Yoyotech Dragon F-58

Beside the PSU is one of the FT03’s two 120mm case fans. It’s angled at 45 degrees, and draws cool air from a vent on the underside of the machine upwards towards the graphics card and CPU cooler. There are a couple of neat additions on top of the PSU, too: room for a slot-loading optical drive and a bracket for an SSD. It’s a shame that the FT03’s minimal façade means the eject button on the drive can’t be used, though.

The FT03 can only handle micro-ATX motherboards – Yoyotech has chosen the Asus M4A88TD-M EVO – and the interior is necessarily cramped. The vertical graphics card next to the side of the chassis blocks access to the empty PCI slot and trio of spare 6Gbits/sec SATA ports along the bottom of the board. You can get to the two vacant RAM sockets behind the Thermaltake Contac29 cooler, but it’s a bit of a squeeze.

The hidden cable area ensures the Yoyotech is tidy, and it also includes a couple of hard disk bays. The main 3.5in bay is hot-swappable and can be opened using a switch at the top of the case, and there’s a second less simple bay too. Silverstone has even found room to include a third hard disk bay that hangs down from the top at a slight angle.

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User comments

Actually based on the principle that hot air rises naturally.Its a wonder why this approach has not been done before.

By Jaberwocky on 21 May 2011

Air intake at the bottom?

Hot air might rise, but the floor is where all the dust gathers. I always try to keep my PCs off the floor and I'd be worried by a model that hoovered dust up into its innards.

By Noghar on 21 May 2011

dust shouldnt be a problem with filters in place

I like the concept. It would have been nice to have seen additional pictures of the other hard drive bays and how they are fitted. but I guess that is not possible because of the case construction. Washable Dust filters should be fitted after market if not installed by Yoyotech on intake fan(s). They are very cheap and save a lot of hassle.

By mr_chips on 22 May 2011

Nice machine - just one reservation.

I'm just wondering how it'll look with a wireless card antenna sticking out the top.

True it's a good location for one but it's going to look a bit messy, I suspect.

By Tomble2 on 23 May 2011

wifi in system

There's enough space to put a wifi card in the pci slot, it then comes down to which way you want the ariel to be, messy? deffinitely not..

By Assassin on 31 May 2011

wifi in system

There's enough space to put a wifi card in the pci slot, it then comes down to which way you want the ariel to be, messy? deffinitely not..

By Assassin on 31 May 2011

wifi in system

There's enough space to put a wifi card in the pci slot, it then comes down to which way you want the ariel to be, messy? deffinitely not..

By Assassin on 31 May 2011

wifi in system

There's enough space to put a wifi card in the pci slot, it then comes down to which way you want the ariel to be, messy? deffinitely not..

By Assassin on 31 May 2011

70 quid difference

I just want to point out that 599 is a price without windows.....
So it makes well over 6 hundred with windows on it.
Please correct your spec

By slav80 on 1 Jul 2011

Value for Money? Fine Piece of Engineering?

£600 for a 'value' PC with no monitor, no OS? Can't get access to the SATA ports, PCI slot, RAM only with difficulty? PC Pro recommendations are beginning to lose all credibility.

By AdrianK_IT on 26 Aug 2011

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