Moneual Sonamu G100: Back to the Future
by Dustin Sklavos on June 7, 2011 12:01 AM EST- Posted in
- Cases/Cooling/PSUs
- mid-tower
- Moneual
Conclusion: Welcome Back to 1995
I have a history of being snarky whenever I don't like something or it bothers me. It's a history that's served me well doing stand-up, writing blogs, or just entertaining friends, but it's something I found myself having to try and rein in while working on this review. Opening up the case and discovering just how badly Moneual had cut corners, especially with how hard they push their "Green Button" and innovative power design, was disconcerting. Worse, it reeked of hucksterism.
Moneual has a lot of very slick looking HTPC cases available that I wouldn't mind bringing in to test, but the Sonamu G100 was outdated the day it shipped. Why do I keep talking about it like it's a relic? Simple: because despite their press release and all the talk of proprietary technology, what they've essentially done is install a bridge between the power supply and the wall plug and allow the computer's power state to govern whether or not peripherals plugged into the case receive power. That's not innovation, that's something monitors in 1995 were doing. And it's true, if you press the main power switch on the front of the case, it'll cut power to the computer and everything plugged into it, but you know what else will do that? Hitting the switch on your surge protector.
None of this would bother me anywhere near as much if the price tag on the case was reasonable, but it's not—it's nowhere close. $139 is highway robbery for a case with a power switch on the front and an included $20 power supply. It can't mount a 2.5" drive on its own, the power supply's connectors are brutally outdated, and just to put a little stank on it, the expansion slots have to be punched out. If Moneual sold this case for what it was worth, between $50 and $70, I could take a lot of these cut corners on the chin. Yet the marketing and high price tag make me feel like it was targeted to poor rubes who just wanted a more efficient computer and are willing to buy anything with the word "green" on it.
You'll note I haven't even really touched on the "Green Button" functionality, and the reason for that is two-fold: first, I've already explained how most of it works and taken the magic out of the equation. Second, Moneual doesn't tell you in the documentation that comes with the case anyhow. And third, with such a low efficiency power supply installed, how much does it even matter? Most peripherals draw very little power when they idle these days, so a healthy amount of whatever you hoped to save is going to get gobbled up by the low efficiency power supply when you do deign to use your computer for work. So yes, theoretically the switch allows you to shut down everything connected to the computer while the computer itself is asleep, or you can set a timer for the computer to idle out and put everything to sleep (how to do this isn't readily obvious or even explained in the documentation either), but does it honestly matter?
The Moneual Sonamu G100 works as a basic enclosure, but it does the same job any $60 case can do. They took old technology, tarted it up a bit, wrapped it in a big green bow, and asked you to pay $139 for it. If they really cared about being green, they should have put in an efficient PSU as the first criteria. Seasonic has a 300W 80 Plus Bronze that would do the trick (and still leave plenty of room for profit)—but it doesn't have an AT-style monitor plug.
Update: Moneual seems to have heard at least some of our complaints, along with those of our peers. They've released a revision on the Sonamu G100 that includes an 80 Plus Bronze certified power supply. It's $10 extra, which seems a bit steep given the G100's already high price, but it's definitely a step in the right direction. That revision can be found here.
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tomoyo - Tuesday, June 7, 2011 - link
Wow this case sounds like one of the worst ripoffs in a while. At least crap cases like Raidmax with low end power supplies are actually priced properly. I feel like any 3 year old antec case is far more worthwhile then this, at least they mostly all come with decent psus, versus a psu you would only give your worst enemy. Definitely not a company I'll be recommending.Operandi - Tuesday, June 7, 2011 - link
Looks like your typical lump of plastic and steel to me, I see no out standing features to justify the ridiculous price tag. I for one don't find overprices low-end cases very exciting.Lian Li is making some pretty interesting iTX cases, review one of those.
Dustin Sklavos - Tuesday, June 7, 2011 - link
If everything we reviewed was a winner, how would you know what was bad? :)ppeterka - Tuesday, June 7, 2011 - link
Thank you for occasionally reviewing bad products! I think the answer to the "what's bad" question is more important than the question to the "what's good", given I want to shell out money for something I'd like to use every day.And I like the style too. Reminded me of Top Gear's Jeremy Clarkson reviewing FSO Polonez. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x5gETRjT470
Operandi - Tuesday, June 7, 2011 - link
Really?Just browse Newegg and look around, 95% of it looks just like this piece of crap and is just as bad, are you going to review all the POS cases out there?
Review the stand out products, high quality, innovative, or at least interesting in some way. Ignore the mediocrity and shitty, nobody cares.
Dustin Sklavos - Wednesday, June 8, 2011 - link
Sometimes it's difficult to really know how bad something is until we have it in-house. Moneual offered this unit for review, why would we assume it wasn't at least halfway decent?As it turned out, it wasn't remotely decent. I honestly feel like we're doing the readership a solid by pointing out what a bad deal this case is.
A reputable site publishes the good and the bad, that's how you know they're not in someone's pocket. If everything we published was golden, we'd be the hardware version of GameSpot.
Operandi - Wednesday, June 8, 2011 - link
Negative reviews are indeed essential and valuable to the readership but I don't see the point in reviewing out right junk. Perhaps there is something there that caught your interest before reviewing it but I can't imagine what it was, I saw the picture on the front page and thought "that looks like a piece of crap", the review pretty much confirmed it.I guess my main point is there isn't any purpose in reviewing mediocrity. Every product has design goals, and on a case like this the goal was obviously set pretty low. Even if it had not utterly failed, it would still not be an interesting product or review.
Impulses - Tuesday, June 7, 2011 - link
Plugging all your non-essential peripherals into a surge protector and turning it off does a far better job of being green, total cost: about $10 for the surge protector. Doesn't everyone do that these days? You would think all the TV commercials urging people to unplug their chargers and whatnot would be taking us in that direction, I guess Moneual's just trying to make a quick buck off the green trend tho.GeorgeH - Tuesday, June 7, 2011 - link
I was actually thinking that this was a perfectly serviceable, if ugly, PC case for those on a very tight budget, thinking that $140 was a typo and you meant $40. I was getting ready to thank you for taking the time to review a "cheap" case - then I finished reading the second page.W-T-F. You're being far too generous throwing this case in the $50-70 range; it's only worth more than $45 if you're blind and like the way it looks. $140 is so ridiculous it's almost funny.
L. - Tuesday, June 7, 2011 - link
Well .. You're still being generous.This is a 100% "made and designed in china" piece of crap, the likes of which cost 40 bucks WITH a 450watt (lolwatts, not real watts) PSU and an integrated LCD + fan control.
Considering this one has an even worse PSU than the one I'm thinking about, and also lacks the LCD / fan control.. I believe you can at best consider it's worth 30 bucks.. and still -- for 30 bucks you can get a very decent chinese box that has a lateral 220mm fan and no PSU - as you'll have to change it anyway who'd want to pay for that.
By the way, if you're interested in reviewing cheap, you might wanna take a look at real contenders, because there's quite a few unkown brands that produce stuff much better than Tt / CM / Si / Antec -- Just a bit hard to find sometimes.