The Basics (continued):
A couple views of the DigiPanel are shown below, and it can be seen that the sides definitely have the appearance of a hard drive cooler, or perhaps even an optical drive with the four typical mounting holes. The aluminum housing has small ridges in it that may serve to help dissipate even more heat from the drive mounted to it.
 
The face of the device is shown below, and I for one like the uncluttered and attractive appearance. The use of one knob/button frees up a good deal of room and allows the display to be much larger than other other panels. Other than these features, there are the two USB ports, one Firewire port, and two audio jacks. The translucent blue face plate is detachable, making me think it could be interchangable, but there are no other face plates included.
Another nice feature of the device is that nothing protrudes too far, making it ideal for cases with a door over the drive bays. The one knob is the only thing that isn't flush with the front face of the device, and its height is minimal.
On the bottom of the housing we can see the 70mm cooling fan described in the specifications. The fan has a very low profile (10mm thick) and uses a total of thirteen blades to move air onto the bottom of your hard drive. Two rails are integrated into the base of the housing that feature a few different mounting holes to accept just about any typical hard drive.
 
As you can see, nothing is hard wired to the PCB of the DigiPanel. Even though the 4-pin power connection for the device comes pre-installed, it is also socketed for easy removal, if necessary. Checking out the enlarged version of the above right image, in addition to the socketed connections bonly being able to accept the correct cable, each is labeled with the correct device description as well.
Installation and Operation:
The installation of the Spire DigiPanel started out with the connection of all the necessary cables, which went just as well as I anticipated. Once connected, the troughs on either side of the hard drive area allow for simple wire management. The main power, fan leads, and thermal sensors run down the left side, while the audio, Firewire, and USB run down the right side (as pictured in the below left image).
 
In the above right image I have installed a typical ATA-133 hard drive, and it couldn't have been easier. There is plenty of space for the drive, and some initial concerns I had about wires interfering with the drive were unnecessary.
The image below shows everything connected and the aluminum cover slid back into place. The cover slides down a track and is held securely in place by two clips near the front of the housing.
With everything connected, I first powered up the DigiPanel for testing while connected just to a power supply and two 80mm fans. The panel gave one beep on start up and everything came to life instantly. The LCD display is backlit in blue, but the lighting is not overpowering; just enough mellow light to make the display easy to read from a variety of angles, and at a distance that was much greater than other displays I have used. Switching between fans by pressing the button produces another beep to acknowledge your request, and after a split second the display updates to show a new set of fan speed and thermal data.
 
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