Why do most of the chassis have the motherboard facing left?

[1461748123]

As title, I'm just wondering why most of the cases are having the motherboard facing left. If there are tempered glass or acrylic side panels, they will be likely positioned left as well.

Do you guys mind a chassis with the motherboard facing right instead? (with glass side panel)

 

[confusis]

The facing left thing is a hold-over from the original ATX specification, where the top mounted power supply was used to cool the system.

 

[tinyitx]

When the motherboard is located at the right side and the opening panel is on the left, I think it is called 'inverted' layout. Larger cases like Silverstone FT04 and smaller cases like Raijintek Thetis/Silverstone TJ08E and BitFenix Mini-ITX come to mind. Not many but there are some.

Desktop cases used to lay flat on a desk with the monitor sitting on it. Then, desktop cases are flipped up as a tower to give a smaller footprint on a desk. When this trend came along, I think the reason why the opening panel of the case was designed to be the left one is because, from an industrial design point of view, most people would put the tower case to their right hand side on the desk because most people are right-handed. Therefore, it makes most ergonomic sense when people reaches to their right with a right hand, say, pressing a power button or inserting a CD into the drive.

 

[BirdofPrey]

The facing left thing is a hold-over from the original ATX specification, where the top mounted power supply was used to cool the system.

It predates ATX, though. When AT and later, Baby AT was the defacto standard, systems were set up like that when tower cases started coming about (the original systems being horizontal, desktop cases). Even other systems such as the PS/2 were initially set up like that (some later versions were set up the opposite way, I believe)

The Motherboard at the right side and PSU on the top seem to just be one of those things widely agreed upon but not codified. (though, at least in the case of the PS/2 this was because the PSU ran the full lenght of the case and the switch was on the front as part of the PSU, and it wouldn't work out ergonomically to put it at the bottom and have to reach for it if the system is under a desk. Early ATs similarly had the switch as part of the PSU, though the switch was o the back in that case Later model ATs and PS/2s don't have that requirement given they have remote switches, but it was still a common layout)

 

[confusis]

Valid points! @BirdofPrey

 

[BirdofPrey]

I SHOULD also note there was a form-factor from the mid 2000s called BTX that flipped everything so the motherboard was on the right, but it, obviously didn't take off with ATX being so well entrenched at that point.

 

[confusis]

BTX - the beloved of HP, Dell SFF prebuilts.. and the bane of many an IT professional's existence!

 

[BirdofPrey]

Indeed, though nothing is more frustrating than Gateway machines that LOOK like an ATX system, but are pinned out differently. The other fun one was LPX since it was an ideal, rather than a standard. Everyone generally agreed on what it was, but nobody made a definitive design document, so even motherboards from the same manufacturer weren't always compatible. The power supplies were good, though, and that's what ACTUALLY ended up in most later AT systems (despite being called an AT PSU) and formed the basis for the ATX PSU.

Speaking of PS/2, It's kind of a shame IBM's insistence on a closed ecosystem doomed the standard. Every once and a while I see ATX cases purporting to have tooless installation, but that was a specific design feature of PS/2 systems (well, there was SOME tool requirement for a couple components, but the tool came with, and was stored as part of the case), along with drive backplanes making recabling not a thing.