Lian Li Armoursuit PC-P80

Results, Conclusions

When installing our system into the Lian Li Armoursuit, we unfortunately ran into problems straight away. It wasn’t anything to do with the design of the case, the quality of the workmanship, the anodized aluminium construction or anything like that – it was something far simpler, far more fundamental.

The screws didn’t fit together.

Don’t ask us why and don’t accuse us of being simpletons – I double checked all the possible combinations of screws and standoffs for the motherboard and I enlisted Richard to ensure it wasn’t my typical lunacy at fault. It wasn’t. The standoffs required to mount the motherboard on the motherboard tray simply didn’t fit any of the required screws. We contacted Lian Li about the matter and they assured us it was just a simple mistake as the model we received had shipped without the full accessory box.

The problem got worse when it became apparent there were no supplied screws to fasten the PSU to the removeable plate on the back of the case and that standoffs from other cases would not match the Lian Li motherboard tray because of a different thread measurement..

Thankfully the bit-tech offices are full of technological treasures of all types and we soon found sets of screws that were compatible.

With the screw-crisis of 2008 narrowly averted, we plunged on successfully and had no further problems with the case at all. It was a shame that the lack of a manual and required screws slowed us down as the case was otherwise a sheer joy to work with – everything fit together perfectly and the light aluminium construction meant that the chassis could easily be hefted and flipped around when needed. The removeable tray sped things up an awful lot too.


With the system successfully installed without serious problems, we moved on to thermal testing – check out our results above.

Had a look? Then I think you’ll agree it’s thoroughly impressive stuff – the GPU temperature only fluctuates by half a degree across the board, while the CPU temperature never gets even close to out of control. The internal case temperature too is consistent across all the tests, matching the ambient temperature constantly.

The only downside in fact is the noise; no matter which way you look at it the Armoursuit is a pretty noisy case. It seems reasonable to suspect that the fans in the door of the case are responsible, so we’ll pin the blame there. The door fans certainly have their plus points, and the huge washable air filter which can be pulled out from the door and which covers all three fans at once is especially good, but without any noise dampening the case inevitably gets noisy.

Conclusions

The Lian Li Armoursuit PC-P80 is, despite the garish Spiderman look of this particular review sample in my eyes, a rather attractive proposition as a case. The overall design is simple, functional and to-the-point on the basic, non-branded model and the addition of fans all over the case means that the cooling performance is excellent... providing you can live with the noise (or kit the case out with rheostats).

There are only a few drawbacks to the PC-P80 in fact, though some of them are worryingly fundamental. For example, missing screws and the lack of a manual is a pretty basic error – one an accomplished manufacturer like Lian Li should never make and that doesn’t bode well.

The look of the case for this ATI model is also pretty dividing – you either love it or hate it, with very little middle ground for customers to sit in. This design isn’t for the faint hearted at all, but ATI fanboys will lap it up.

Still, if a cool running PC is what you’re after and you happen to think the Armoursuit PC-P80 looks as good as it runs then there’s absolutely no reason not to go for it. Although the recommended retail price for the basic model is £250 ($399), which is kind of steep in our opinion – the fact that Xcase has the standard version on pre-order for £199 (inc. VAT) makes things a little bit easier to stomach though. The ATI version shown here is even more expensive, at around about £299 – ludicrously expensive? Perhaps, but the PC-P80 does have an awful lot going in its favour to justify the cost.

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What do these scores mean?