Origen X15e HTPC case

The LCD

The LCD is a 7" model which has a maximum resolution of 1024x768, although it has a widescreen 15:9 ratio. This obviously doesn't jam, and means that the picture ends up looking a little stretched, although a good graphics card driver will go some way to compensating for this.

The kicker is that it's a touch screen, meaning that you can control the desktop or Media Center directly.

Because it runs on VGA, you can set it either to mirror your desktop or to act as a second display, depending on how flexible your graphics card is. You can also disconnect the VGA from the back of the display and hook up an S-Video source, meaning that you could plug in a console or other video device to act as device within a device.

There is a USB internal header which provides the input and connects to the internal USB headers on the motherboard. You can grab the software to power the touchscreen from the Origen website.

There's a menu system which allows you to auto-adjust the screen for best fit, change the brightness, switch video input etc. It's a little slow to respond to commands, but perfectly serviceable.

You could set up your video or audio player to display visualisations or the video itself as a secondary display. As a screen to actually work on, it's pretty useless because it's small, stretched and not particularly crisp. There are arguments to be made - for example, you could use it as a stand-alone MP3 player with just the small screen as an interface. We'd suggest that you might be better off buying a proper audio system! If you have a CRT TV, you could use the LCD as the interface for MCE and just output the video to the TV, since MCE looks horrid on CRTs. However, you'd be better off spending the money on a new HDTV!

Conclusions

The Origen X15e is a cool little case. We like the LCD on the front, although we might struggle to find an actual application that really makes a good use of it. The interior is laid out fairly well with plenty of space, and there are lots of nice touches - like black screws and rubber grommets - that indicate that this is a well thought out case. However, we do have our niggles - problems with the DVD drive being top of the list.

The build quality is exceptional and the design is also slick. However, we do have a stumbling block at the price. The X15e comes in at £465 from SpecialTech which is very expensive. Yes, you get a gorgeous case and yes, you get a touch LCD screen in the front. But £465 for a case? The Zalman, which is every bit as good (in terms of aluminium and build quality), but lacks the screen, only costs £220. It's hard to justify more than £200 extra for the nice touches and the screen. Even for the hardcore buyer that wants the best the market has to offer, and has money to burn, it's hard not to recommend the Zalman over this, purely based on the fact that it's hard to really find a reasonable usage for the screen. Yes, it's cool, but there are plenty of cooler things to spent £240 on if cool is all you care about.