Introduction and Case Exterior
Glass and RGB fans are front and center with FSP’s latest case offering
FSP is a familiar name in power supplies, and in the last year we have also seen the company branch out with CPU coolers (with the excellent Windale series reviewed last year) and cases. The latest of these enclosures is the CMT520, the second in their CMT series and featuring front and side tempered glass panels to showcase no fewer than four included RGB fans.
Glass can of course present some obstacles to cooling performance, particularly when the front intake is covered (as the gap between glass and fans becomes crucial), so we will see if the case's performance is equal to the elegance of its looks in this review.
The CMT520 pictured sporting very colorful fans (image via FSP)
First a look at specifications from FSP:
- Type: ATX Mid Tower
- Color: Black
- Materials: SPCC, Tempered glass x2
- M/B Type: E-ATX, ATX, Micro ATX, ITX
- Expansion Slots: 8
- 3.5-inch Drive Bays: 2
- 2.5-inch Drive Bays: 4
- Power Supply Type: ATX
- Component Clearance:
- Maximum CPU Cooler Height: 163mm
- Maximum VGA Card Length: 423mm
- Cooling System
- Front: 120mm RGB Fan x3 (included)
- Rear: 120mm RGB Fan x1 (included)
- Fan & Water Cooler Support:
- Front: 120mm/140mm x3, or 360mm Radiator x1
- Top: 120mm x 3/140mm x2 or 360mm Radiator x1
- Rear: 120mm x1
- I/O Panel: USB 3.0 x2, USB 2.0 x2, Audio
- Dimension LxWxH: 495 x 215 x 510 mm (19.49 x 8.46 x 20.08 inches)
- Weight: 8.5 kg
Pricing and availability:
- FSP CMT Series CMT520 Case: $104.99, Amazon.com
Continue reading our review of the FSP CMT520 RGB tempered glass case!
Case Exterior
The CMT520 is a mid-tower case that nonetheless supports up to an EATX motherboard, and it stands just a bit larger than many recent mid-towers at about 20 inches high, 8.5 inches wide, and 19.5 inches deep.
The tempered glass panels adorning the side and front have a dark tint, and the ventilated top of the case offers a magnetically-attached filter for any top-mounted fans. While mainly a peice of solid glass, the front panel offers some accommodation for airflow from the beveled space leading to the sides of the glass, as well as slots in the plastic on each side of the surround.
The top I/O is is flanked on each side with USB ports (both 2.0 and 3.0), and the center is occupied with standard audio jacks, the central power button, and a reset button and lighting control (more on RGB lighting effects later).
Around back we have a pretty standard mid-tower design, with 8 expansion slots and the occupied 120 mm rear exhaust fan mount. There is also a sliding retention bracket to help secure expansion cards during installation which is secured with a single thumbscrew.
The base of the CMT520 offers rubber tipped feet and a pull-out screen filter for the bottom-mounted power supply.
Finally a quick look at the included hardware, which includes the needed screws as well as power and RGB header cables.
This plastic-covered panel was also included – and its purpose will be revealed during the build process!
Next we will take a look inside the CMT520 and cover a build using our standard enclosure testbed components.
| Review Terms and Disclosure All Information as of the Date of Publication |
|
|---|---|
| How product was obtained: | The product is on loan from FSP for the purpose of this review. |
| What happens to the product after review: | The product remains the property of FSP but is on extended loan for future testing and product comparisons. |
| Company involvement: | FSP had no control over the content of the review and was not consulted prior to publication. |
| PC Perspective Compensation: | Neither PC Perspective nor any of its staff were paid or compensated in any way by FSP for this review. |
| Advertising Disclosure: | FSP has purchased advertising at PC Perspective during the past twelve months. |
| Affiliate links: | This article contains affiliate links to online retailers. PC Perspective may receive compensation for purchases through those links. |
| Consulting Disclosure: | FSP is not a current client of Shrout Research for products or services related to this review. |
Great review but they lost me
Great review but they lost me at only 2 3.5″ drive bays yet again. I am sorry but I am not willing to put 2 of my 4 4TB drives just sitting on the bottom of the case without any sort of way to make them safe in the case but hey it is a good thing I also have a 2.5″ Sata drive at least it will be safe.
PCPER if you are reading this can you please do a list up of case from 2017-2018 that support at least 4 3.5 drive bays and yet still offer all of the modern features such as tempered glass etc…if so Thank you.
I do not think I am asking much form these case makers they have all this room to play with but yet all they worry about is lights and stuff most people do not care about. In the real world most users want a fully functional case that looks good and works well. These toy cases are getting a bit tiresome.
Hmm, I seem to be hogging
Hmm, I seem to be hogging this article’s comments with very little about the article 🙂
I recently bought the Phanteks Enthoo Pro M with tempered glass – a very nice mid-sized ATX with mesh front, lots of filters and space for an external drive. It’s around $100 with no RGB and just 1 SSD tray provided. It fits 2 or 3 HDDs under the PSU shroud but you can buy optional drive trays that let you mount a LOT more HDDs out front (looks like room for 5 or 6) and place them wherever won’t block your airflow. I have a 2nd SSD but just tucked it in out of the way with the cables, it’s fine.
@Rocky123
If you use 4 x 4TB
@Rocky123
If you use 4 x 4TB drives you should seriously consider getting a NAS. I use a Synology 4-bay NAS on my network and can access it with my phone and tablet as well and also remotely as they provide an external IP. Having a PC with only SSDs is great – quieter and lighter. Have a look at your options.
Yea I thought about that as
Yea I thought about that as an option but I decided I wanted my storage to be local to just that system which is also a lot faster than going through the network plus I have about 4.5TB’s of just games alone installed so I would rather have the faster access to them when I run them. I guess I could take 2 of my 4TB drives out and put them in a NAS setup since they are just storage drives that hold things like the game file installers and content from when I buy the games and store the the content for a alter install. Those 2 drives also house media content and having them on a NAS would allow everyone in the house hold to be able to access that content when ever they wanted to. Hmmmm…lol
Having a NAS on the network
Having a NAS on the network means your Smart TV can probably also view the media content. It does for me. Synology has lots of apps for playing music, running a media library, etc.
Regarding the games, I tend to use Steam a lot. When I’m not going to be playing a game for a few months, I uninstall it and then I can download and install it later when I want to play it again (assuming you have a decent internet connection). In this way I can get a lot of use out of my 500GB SSD. Of course there are games that I don’t want to delete such as games not on Steam or games I have heavily modded so I understand that managing all games on an SSD is not for everyone.
My goal was to only have SSDs in my gaming PC and I’m happy with the results. I have 6TBs of space in my NAS that I now rarely use. If privacy is a concern you can create users and passwords on the NAS and limit which folders or partitions they have access to and whether they are allowed to make changes. I have had the Synology NAS for about 4 years and it’s still going strong with many software and security updates.
The lack of a front filter is
The lack of a front filter is a problem, especially on a case with so much glass where you will see the dust on the inside. It may be best to use the top fans as the intake as they have a filter but that would prevent cool air getting to the GPU and render the front fans almost useless. It’s difficult to find an optimal cooling solution for this one.