Final thoughts and rating
We wanted to love the LanBoy Air, and in some ways we still do. The eye-catching design is brilliant, the semi-modular approach is unique, and there's ample room to house plenty of high-end kit.
But given the £150 asking price, it's hard to ignore that this once-intriguing concept has evolved into a retail product riddled with flaws. The modular approach allows for certain hardware components to be moved and rotated, but there's little real-world need to do so. Yet, in providing the option, Antec is left with a confused chassis littered with literally dozens of mismatched screws and foibles that make it difficult to build into without regularly referring to the manual and built-in toolbox.
For a chassis that should be fun and interesting to work with, the LanBoy Air ultimately proves to be a tad too frustrating. A fun pet-project with limitless modding potential, perhaps, but there are functionally-better chassis available for less.
Should Antec opt to take the modular approach a step further and create Lego-like components that enable consumers to build enclosures of all shapes and sizes - with the option for mesh or solid panels and standardised screws - it might be onto something. As it stands, the LanBoy Air is an opportunity missed.
The Good
Good cooling performance
Looks different to the norm
Modular approach has potential
The Bad
Expensive for what it is
Not the easiest to build into
Becomes evidently noisy
with fans at high speed
Mesh paneling offers little protection against the elements
Makes use of over 100 screws (and only 14 are thumbed)
HEXUS Rating
Antec LanBoy Air
HEXUS Where2Buy
The Antec LanBoy Air modular chassis is available to purchase from SCAN.co.uk*.
HEXUS Right2Reply
At HEXUS, we invite the companies whose products we test to comment on our articles. If any company representatives for the products reviewed choose to respond, we'll publish their commentary here verbatim.
*As always, UK-based HEXUS.community forum members will benefit from the SCAN2HEXUS Free Shipping initiative, which will save you a further few pounds plus also top-notch, priority customer service and technical support backed up by the SCANcare@HEXUS forum.
