If you follow PC components, you’ve probably heard the name Super Flower before—but associated, we bet, with PC power supplies. Of late, the company has broken into other categories of PC components, and we’re partial to one of its early PC case efforts. The curiously named Zillion Direct ($149.99 as tested) doesn’t feature one to the millionth power of anything, but this big tower delivers decent value with four ARGB fans installed, a fan controller in the box, and an attractive, solid chassis body covered in copious mesh and perforations for lots of airflow. (Super Flower also offers a $129.99 version without the fans.)
One note: The company informed us, after sending our sample, that the version of the Zillion Direct that reaches buyers will be slightly revised to support thicker radiators. Thus, we “revised” ours to match prior to testing. We think you’ll like the results. Our top general-use pick for ATX towers remains the NZXT H7 Flow, but the Zillion Direct has a distinctive look and good airflow-minded design that should please most builders willing to look beyond the big brands.
Design: Another Fine Mesh You’ve Gotten Me Into
No, it’s not a zillion of them (not that we counted), but the Zillion Direct is covered with so many tiny holes that we can see through its steel side panel without even relying on lighted components to breach the shadow of the steel that remains. This pattern, so finely perforated that it resembles a sheer window curtain, almost entirely defines the case’s design, aside from a small, irregular-angled accent panel in the upper right corner of its face to attract the eye. It’s otherwise a traditional mid-tower shape of the usual proportions. The solid edges give it the somewhat sturdy, stolid appearance of a mid-market model.
The “front panel” ports are on the right side of the top panel’s front edge. Super Flower shapes its reset and LED controller buttons, cleverly, to parallel the oval USB Type-C port and the round headphone/microphone combo jack nearby. Other highlighted features include two USB Type-A ports, an also-oval aluminum-faced power button (it has a power-indicator LED shining through a slit), more of that ultra-fine vent pattern on the top panel rearward of these buttons and connectors, and a tactile pattern on the top edge of the front cover’s removable dust filter cover that tells you where to grip and pull.
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
A second dust filter covers the entire bottom panel and slides out from the side, though it fits so tightly in its track that you might have to lay the case on its side to get the filter to slide back in straight. Also, unlike the filter on the front panel, this one isn’t bound to a decorative mesh beauty cover and should therefore be washable.
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
Around the back are seven inset expansion slots, a flush-mounted exhaust fan, and a removable power-supply mounting plate. Keen eyes will notice that some of the back panel’s vent holes (subtly interspersed in the mesh pattern) are round and arranged in patterns to fit either a 140mm or a 120mm fan at two different heights. Mounting screws don’t hold on the side and top panels; instead, Super Flower uses snap balls at the top and hook tabs at the bottom for the side panels, while the top is secured exclusively via snaps.
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
You have to use mounting screws for the power-supply bay, however, as the case’s interior design necessitates sliding in the power supply from the back. Also notice the screw above the power supply’s mounting plate: The slot panel may be removed and rotated to support a graphics card mounted in vertical orientation, if desired, though you’ll have to purchase a PCI Express x16 riser cable separately.
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
Because the right side of the case is also mostly mesh, Super Flower gives builders a decorative underlying cover for the forward half of the right side, behind which they can hide most of their cables. Closer to the case back, the space not shrouded by that cover holds a drive tray that can host one 3.5-inch or two 2.5-inch drives. (It’s mounted over the CPU cooler cutaway.) Also back here are two separate drive trays that can each host a 2.5-inch or a 3.5-inch drive.
The below side-by-side also shows the front panel’s center section removed (the left image), and the entire front-panel frame removed (on the right).
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
There’s enough room for a 360mm-format radiator up to 48mm thick within the frame or up to 32mm thick completely behind it, but using that space as configured requires you to place the fans on the back side of the radiator. Most builders instead prefer to have their front fans on the outside of their radiators, blowing in.
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
Looking in from the other side we see a factory-mounted horizontal video-card support bracket and a bunch of extra threaded holes that allow the bracket to be moved around to accommodate different card sizes. Also up here is a concealment cover over the vertical cable passage near the front of the motherboard tray, and a 30mm gap behind the front fan bracket, into which the lower factory fan is mounted.
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
The curved, arcing slot that you might have previously noticed below the back of the motherboard tray is designed for adjusting a part called the “GPU Deflector Wind.” (It’s a GPU air router.) Above it is a small panel that creates a big hole when removed.
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
Here’s a picture with the giant hole open, and the air duct raised…
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
And here’s a picture with the duct lowered…
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
Not only does this direct more of the front fan’s air toward the graphics card, but it also opens the space behind the fan bracket to fit radiators up to 58mm thick. Super Flower also includes a plastic backing cover to block the duct holes, for those who would like more of the front fan’s air to be guided upward, toward their graphics card.
Here’s what the case looks stripped (the holes for mounting EATX standoffs are on the removed portion of the motherboard tray)…
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
Below are the parts we removed for the above photo. In addition to having threaded holes for the extra standoffs of 13-inch-deep boards, the removable portion of the motherboard tray includes a cable-passage cover that must be removed to fit motherboards greater than 10.4 inches deep. But also notice the top-panel fan mount in the upper left corner: That’s not likely to be included in the shipped product.
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
And so, here’s the picture of the top panel, with its mesh outer cover removed, as we received it. Notice that it has two layers of fan brackets, with the lower layer sitting on a pop-out tray that’s secured on the outside via two tabs and two screws. A couple of locator pegs keep it properly positioned at the top of the motherboard tray on the opposite (inner) edge.
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
The inset (white case) photo shows the change Super Flower tells us it has made to the retail product: It’s ditching the removable tray and relying instead on the fixed fan mounts to, as representatives said, provide support for thicker radiators. We drew green arrows on our own photo to highlight the height difference that Super Flower was talking about and noted that the mounting gap is only 392mm long, which is only a few millimeters too short to fit most 360mm radiators
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
Building With the Super Flower Zillion Direct
The Zillion Direct’s installation kit includes a fan/ARGB controller, a piece of double-sided adhesive foam to mount the controller, a motherboard signal cable for the controller, the GPU air deflector cover, and a boxed hardware kit containing screws, standoffs, cable ties, and a panel plug. The Zillion Direct’s slot panel is rectangular, and the plug is designed to fill the gap that’s created whenever a builder rotates the panel to enable a vertical graphics card orientation.
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
Supporting up to six fans and six ARGB devices, the fan controller is also able to take control signals from the motherboard’s PWM-fan and ARGB headers. We tried both methods and also noted that users who have lost the bundled controller remote can still switch to motherboard sync mode by merely holding in the LED control button on the case’s top panel.
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
As for the interior cables, they include the front-panel button/indicator LED group, HD Audio for the headset combo jack, a 19-pin USB 3 header cable for the two USB Type-A ports, and a Gen 2×2 lead for the Type-C port.
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
We reinstalled all the removable pieces and moved the factory-installed intake fans to the front side of the front fan bracket. Why? What Super Flower told us about the top panel supporting thick radiators in this configuration is true, but as the image shows we really didn’t need 70mm of vertical motherboard clearance for our 52mm-thick cooler. The 57mm of space that would have been left with the tray installed still would have been more than sufficient.
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
Even with the front fans reinstalled closer to the front panel, they’re still more deeply inset than they have been on most of the cases we’ve previously tested. And that’s fine for us, because we think it looks great.
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
Testing the Super Flower Zillion Direct
Here’s a rundown of the test parts we used…
The Zillion Direct’s temperature results hover at around fourth place out of six similarly shaped case samples, among them the APNX V1, Lian Li’s Lancool 207, and SilverStone’s Fara 514X.
Even though it doesn’t have glass panels to block the noise, the Zillion Direct moves up to second place in noise containment. That’s impressive, considering the four included fans and all the perforations.
Verdict: A Solid Entry From a New Face in Cases
The Zillion Direct doesn’t stand out as either a great- or poor-performing case in our formal thermal tests, so our consideration criteria are reduced to its feature set and to harder-to-quantify things like build quality. We noted in its review that the Tryx Luca L70’s panels could slide off accidentally, which seems like a more significant problem than the Zillion Direct’s sticky sliders for its bottom filter. The Geometric Future M5 Vent’s quirky design makes it nearly impossible to compare from a quality standpoint, and both the Lian Li Lancool 207 and the SilverStone Fara 514X are in a slightly lower price class that helps to justify their slightly less robust materials.
That leaves the APNX V1 as the Zillion Direct’s closest competitor in quality in this comparison set. It’s also the case with the least in common with the Zillion Direct’s design, so most people considering one of these probably aren’t giving the other a second look. Much of the appeal of the Zillion Direct comes down to the four preinstalled fans and the copious airflow made possible by all the perforations. As ever, if you like the look, that may well be the big difference-maker. But either way, the Zillion Direct is a respectable value from a new maker that clearly put a lot of thought into what makes a case great.
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About Thomas Soderstrom
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