Parts of the System Case
A system case should normally come with a number of physical components. This will of course vary widely from system to system, depending to some extent on the form factor and overall design of the case. If you buy a case by itself for use in building your own machine, you should be able to check for all of these items. If you bought a pre-built system, many of these components were probably already put into the case when it was assembled.
The front of the case contains a power button and sometimes a reset button. Small LED lights are also typical, representing the current power status, hard drive activity and sometimes other internal processes. These buttons and lights connect directly to the motherboard which is secured to the inside of the case.
Cases usually contain multiple 5.25 inch and 3.5 inch expansion bays for optical drives, floppy disk drives, hard drives and other media drives. These expansion bays are located at the front of the case so, for example, the DVD drive be easily reached by the user when in use.
At least one side of the case, perhaps both, slide or swing open to allow access to the internal components.
The rear of the case contains small openings to fit the connectors contained on the motherboard which is mounted inside. The power supply is also mounted just inside the back of the case and a large opening allows for the connection of the power cord and use of the built-in fan. Fans or other cooling devices may be attached to any and all sides of the case.
