Installation and Case Cooling
I had to do a few prepatory things before I could install our mid-range, P55-based gaming system in the Tempest 410 Elite. One of those things was moving the back panel’s 120mm fan to the top panel of the case to make room for our Corsair H50 watercooling unit. Adding a "blowhole" fan is also a great way to help improve airflow in a PC case.
Next, I removed the PCI slot covers for the graphics card and installed the motherboard standoffs to mount the mainboard. NZXT made mounting standoffs easy when they included a small nut driver with a Phillips screw head to secure the standoffs.
I moved on to install our Antec 650W modular power supply using four thumbscrews. I’m glad most vendors have moved the PSU to the bottom of the case, which makes cable management a more pleasant experience.
Next, I installed the motherboard and system memory in the Tempest 410 Elite using nine screws that NZXT included in the accessories box.
After the motherboard was mounted, I secured the H50’s radiator to the back panel of the case using four thumb screws. (Note: I used my own thumb screws that are not included with the accessories to make installation go faster.)
I moved on to installing my primary solid state drive and secondary hard drive using two of the plastic hard drive cages. This process was very familar to me and the drive cage snapped right onto the four screw sockets on the 3.5" hard drive perfectly.
Mounting a 2.5" solid state drive to the plastic hard drive cage is a little more involved because I had to remove a couple of the rubber grommets and metal pins to secure the SSD with four screws through the bottom of the cage. This wasn’t as cumbersome as it sounds and I had the SSD installed in a few minutes.
After plugging in all the power and data cables, I was finally able to install my MSI 460GTX 1GB graphics card using two thumbscrews.
After only 35 minutes, I was able to prep and install all my hardware components in the Tempest 410 Elite. I didn’t get a chance to do all the cable management functions I would normally do with my PCs, but you can see there is plenty of room around the hardware for our airflow system to function properly. I booted up my system and was getting 29c to 30c temps on my Intel i7-860 2.8GHz processor under idle conditions. During PC gaming and video transcoding, my core temps jumped to 47c to 53c, which is excellent for this processor using a Corsair H50.
Lastly, I wanted to show our readers how the Tempest Elite 410 looks with the side window attached. I actually like the odd shape of the window and it definitely adds some awesomeness to a very unflashy, but highly-functional and minimalist case.
What would it take to see a
What would it take to see a dual radiator placed in the case? I see many cases with areas stated to be capable of supporting dual or triple radiators, and the grommets out the back for tubing, but rarely to i see a review that actually makes use of those features. They’re often brought up or mentioned, but not taken advantage of. I realize this would add some time to the review process for leak testing, tubing routing, etc, but with many new cases making some effort to accommodate watercooling setups, i’d like to see those aspects evaluated in reviews along with other parts of the case.
Ryan, make it happen!
I think one of the reasons
I think one of the reasons you don’t see sites using water cooling setups in case reviews is the simple reason that constant connection/reconnection plus twisting/pulling on all of the hose connectors is not very good for them and they won’t last long.
Would be possible of course just to show a radiator in place without all the tubing, but they probably place more priority on showing a fully installed system.
The NZXT preview video
The NZXT preview video contains a shot of an installed 2x120mm radiator. Perhaps the NZXT website would have more information on the installation/finished appearance.
I like the style of it…. it
I like the style of it…. it reminds me of a PS2 from the shape of the plastic and orientation of the USB ports, etc.
Is that h50 set up as intake
Is that h50 set up as intake or exhaust? I cant help but to wonder what it would look like with the H50 installed where you put the 120mill fan and attached a pull fan to the other side of the H50 in where the mesh is and had it exhausting, then you could use the rear fan as a cool air intake 🙂