Building with the SuperChassis S5
Interior
With the side panel open we see the internal layout, and there is quite a bit of storage support here with multiple drive cages on the right side. Optical drives are supported with the S5 as well, with two 5.25” bays up top. This is a traditional ATX layout so nothing too noteworthy here, but the large CPU cutout is appreciated.
The side panels are just average, with thin steel and captured thumbscrews
All of the drive cages can be removed to provide more room inside the enclosure, and with their modular nature it’s easy to install cages on just the top and bottom if extra clearance is needed.
A stack of removable drive cages dominates the right side
The 2.5” drive cage is positioned in the middle by default to permit the installation of many longer graphics cards without removal. And here are those drive cages, with two supporting 3x 3.5" hard drives each and one supporting 4x 2.5" drives:
These drive cages are pretty flimsy, unfortunately. The steel is thin and they were all a little out of square before I bent them back. The plastic toolless trays are better, and worked as expected.
Toolless trays for everyone!
For cooling support we have space for dual-width radiators on the top and front fan mounts, and a pair of 120 mm fans arrive preinstalled as intake fans in the front.
At the back of the enclosure we have the usual single 120 mm fan mount, and another fan preinstalled for exhaust here.
I chose to install the same Corsair H105 cooler I’ve used for the last couple of builds, and it fit on the upper fan mounts without interfering with the motherboard or rear fan.
Moving on to the motherboard installation, this was uneventful – which is always a good thing! With my motherboard and cooler in place it was a simple matter to install power and rout cables, as there are plenty of cable routing openings (with soft grommets) to keep things clean.
One snag came with my MSI R9 290X Lightning card, though this is probably specific to this gargantuan video card. My card was too long and sat too high (thanks to the backplate on this model) to allow for the middle or uppper cage to be installed.
I had no plans to use all of the storage and I prefer to keep things as open as possible for good airflow inside a case, so I always remove extra drive cages anyway. In this instance the R9 290X Lightning is such a big card that it restricts a little of the storage available – but this is unlikely to happen with most cards.
Rounding out the build power supply and all cables were simple to install, though I ran into the problem that affects most mid-tower cases these days as my CPU power cable was once again stretched to the limit to reach the top of the motherboard. Cable management was otherwise very good, with plenty of openings for cables including behind all of the storage which made swapping drives easy.
Next we'll look at the finished build and see how the SuperChassis S5 performed!
Looks like a computer case!
Looks like a computer case! Just wouldn’t pay $94 for it.
Did the case have the usual
Did the case have the usual non-standard Supermicro standoffs for the motherboards that they do in their server cases? I’m guessing not since I’m not seeing that mentioned as I glance over the article.
It has regular standoffs
It has regular standoffs
Believe i’d choose the
Believe i’d choose the Fractal Design Define S over this.
I don’t know why, it looks
I don’t know why, it looks like last generation case. Is it the side panel (nothing more to say, bro?) or those square 5.25″ cuts on the front. Just a glance, it’s just unappealing although close-up I admit that is a nice brush on the front panel.
Looking at the inside, wow this case has 10 hdd trays in total plus that two 5.25″ that can be converted for hdd too. I say this case is more for a media/ database server, that is tucking it away somewhere and not for show. Also, rubber grommets but no window seems pointless, a plus and nice to be tidy but nobody will visit anyway.
Nice review, Sebastian, you’re PCPer’s employee now? ;D
Cheers.
I agree on the last-gen
I agree on the last-gen looks. As far as being a PCPer employee, all I am able to say is there are ongoing negotiations with JoshTekk.
Generic case for a slightly
Generic case for a slightly expensive price? No thanks… Sebastian, how are those Naidec fans though? Those caught my interest.
Very good, actually. Moved a
Very good, actually. Moved a lot of air without much noise. If I put an ear close to the fan I could hear a slight rubbing sound in time with the revolutions, but nothing audible from a couple of feet away.
For me the red accents make
For me the red accents make it look cheap. Take that away and it would look like something from Lian Li.
Looks like it’s “inspired by”
Looks like it’s “inspired by” an H440 but with 5.25″ drives and no side window.