bump
Since you're going to bump it. (don't bump stuff, ever. bad etiquette on forums)
I'm going to have to give a full review.
I put one of these together with a Rosewill 4500.
I would NOT recommend this to anyone.First of all, you have to take the entire 4500 case apart. You have to take all the fans out of it. You have to take the HDD racks out. You even have to take the frame and handles for the side of the case off so you can get the fan brackets out. You also need to take the middle row of fans out because there probably isn't enough space for your cables/cards... and this middle row is to help airflow through the case... so this leads to issues later on.
You need to have your expensive high cfm 120 mm case fans at this point as well because you have to put them back into the case in a way that you cannot get to them to take them out later. Without taking the entire thing apart. I didn't realize they were going to be put back in a way that they were mounted to the GPU brackets... so you have to take the entire GPU bracket out if you later want to replace fans. I just wanted to try it with the original fans first. I wanted to see how many high-end fans I'd need to buy.
Second of all, I'm a small guy with small hands. Your mounting brackets are made for people with even tinier hands. They are very difficult to put together with the tiny nuts and bolts. If you have large hands you'll need to hire your kids to put it together for you.
Third, although you put together a step by step guide and label all your parts nicely, it is still complicated to put together. My results didn't match your photos and based on my video cards (1070s) I was barely able to fit them. Also, you have a guide on putting your bracket together... not on how to take apart the Rosewill. I found that took me time to try and figure out exactly what all I had to remove. I didn't expect to have to remove the handles from the side to get to a bolt that held in a fan bracket at the front of the case.
Fourth, there is no way you're going to get large cards into this thing. You will want cards that have the PCIe power connector in the back, not the top.My 1070s barely fit and with the 8 pin connector being on the top of my card it would be impossible to get the case closed. The PCIe cable running to the GPUs sticks up out of the top of the case. I'd never be able to put the lid back on.
Fifth, cable management is a bitch. You really need special cables just for this case. Otherwise, you have cables that are too long and even if you wrap them all up nicely you still have a lot of bulky cables blocking the already limited airflow in the case. Really the only solution is a server PSU with several different sizes of PCIe cables and 6pin PCIe risers. (Of course, the case itself isn't designed for use with server PSUs.)
Sixth, at the price, why would anyone buy one of these? $200 for a 4500 case. $70 for the Spotswood bracket. $60 for fans. You're looking at over $300 for a case that you can't keep the lid on so it isn't as stackable and nice... I literally don't understand why anyone would want these. I can buy a 12 GPU rack mount for open-air mining for the same money.
Summary:These cases are a time waste. They are also expensive. Since time is money they're even more expensive. You can't use them as rackmount cases since you need to keep the lid off, so what is the point?
This isn't necessarily a slam on Rich and Spotswood. I wouldn't be able to use the 4500 case without the Spotswood rack. He can't predict what sizes our video cards are, etc. It's more a matter of the limitations of the case and the huge time suck that putting this together is.
In my opinion, the 4500 case is for a hobbyist that wants to try a build. It isn't for anyone building mining rigs at scale.
It all depends on what type of case you want or need for a space. I own 4 of these kits and while there are some drawbacks and cable management is difficult, they do work. As indicated you do need better fans than what it comes with.
For the space I had, 4 of these work perfectly and I didn't have the room for 4 open air rigs.
The fans can be removed while the rig is assembled, it's just not easy and you will need to be patient to line up the nuts to reinstall them but I've had to do it many times while dealing with rig issues.
The largest card I would recommend for this rig is the MSI 480/580 or the EVGA 10x0 SC series. I have both.
The ideal card for this rig imo is any of the Zotac mini cards or reference blower style cards.
Now when I bought my kits, there was really no other options but now that there are some options out there in this category, I will say this setup is still more cost effective if you pickup the 4500 on sale for $100 each as I did.