Sunbeam Rheobus Extreme Fan Controller, Half a Review.

So, the Sunbeam Rheobus. Great little toy. I've been using it on my rig for a while. Each channel can handle up to 30w, with 6 channels, letting it handle pretty much any fans you want to throw at it. It retails below $30 usually, making it extremely affordable.

Now on the looks, there's a couple of things that are a bit hit or miss. The LED's in the knobs run off the same variable resistor as the fans... now this is amazing for telling where your fans are at a glance, but they're so damn bright. It's only a minor issue unless you sleep in the same room as your PC and don't shut down at night, though.

Also, the front is glossy, instead of some fancy little LCD touch panel that was built for about three cents, so while the front panel is less of an issue if it breaks, it also looks really inconsistent in most black cases, since these tend to be matte. Except for maybe a few really shitty things made out of plastic, that would be vastly improved if they included duct tape and baling wire in the design.

That being said, it's nice. It's a little tight when you're fitting it into the 5.25" bay, but it fits without a hammer, and the screw holes line up, so really, it's all good for installation. That being said, that's physical installation of the panel itself. I haven't said anything about fan control wires. The connectors are placed kind of awkward if you've got, say, an optical drive or the top of your case above it. But this should only matter once.

Speaking of wires, it comes with a lot more than most controllers, but still not enough. It comes with two each 3 pin extensions, 3 pin to molex, and 3 pin to 3 pin with mobo signal. It also comes with it's own power cable, but that's neither here nor there. It pulls off the 12v rail via molex, so it's got what you need to tickle bigger fans, although you do have to kind of turn them up higher than you want them to get them going from a stop.

Overall, I really like this thing, although I haven't used a whole lot of  controller panels so you might take that with a grain of salt. Photos shamelessly stolen from the manufacturer's website. But judging by the manual, they probably can't read this blog to complain.

Overall, this product rates an official JingleHellTech 

Non-Turd Award!