MacPro Case 5/5

Based on 2008 Mac Pro, this applies for the most part to the 2009 models as well.

Say what you will of the holy war of Mac vs. PC. When it comes down to the system enclosure the Mac Pro stands in a league of it's own.

Aesthetic:
The MacPro case is elegant and pleasing to look at, brushed aluminum, a mix of soft curves a rigid edges. It's looks will fit right in a designer furniture showroom. While there is other nice aluminum cases on the market, many don't get all the details right (like plain metal back plates) or ruin the whole look with huge glass panels with fans sticking out and neon lights struggling to imitate a rave scene inside the case.

Design:
Over the years little has changed in the outward design of this case, as the form factor has not changed since the G5 days. The conection ports have been adjusted to keep up with technology and and an additional optical drive bay was added to the front. The carrying handles are the only weak spot. It's very uncomfortable to carry this case with one hand, it's a little bit better with two hands, but the edges still dig into my hands. The older G4 machines were a breeze to pick up with theirr softer angled handles, and were easily carried with one hand. Not a big deal if your machine is mostly stationary. Since I work at a studio with 12 of these and it ads up to moving the machines quite a bit, I do notice this.

The interior of the machine is great, due to the fact that Apple does not have to accommodate various motherboards and power supplies. All the ports and conectors in the case are pre wired and covered with the case, you will never see any cables except for the optical drive. Working inside the case is a breeze. It's quick to access memory and drives which snap into the system connectors with the help of drive caddy.
I have been unable to find a PC case that will match this due to the neccessary cabling of the current motherboard standards.

Additional Observations:
The MacPro towers are generally pretty quiet, (they were quite loud during the G5 days), although I find this varies from machine to machine. The fans will definitely spin up when the machine is being stressed by applications consistently.

Overall, it's the best heavy duty case on the market. Some of it is due to the closed Apple platform that gives the engineers creative freedom to build what they want. Most of it is just good design and quality materials. There is many cases that try to imitate this, some of them get some of the elements right, but never all of them. This is definitely a benchmark product, that has existed for much longer than most tech products have, the design has stood the test of time and is still the best in it's league. It's easy to consider this Legendary (on our strange scale) 5/5.