SPCR

Walkthroughs and reviews:
Techpowerup
Guru3D
Hexus
ComputerBase
Tom's Hardware
HardwareLUXX
Gamer's Nexus

First thoughts:
- The fan controller of the R5 turned into a mobo controlled fan splitter on the R6. Cool.
- Not sure what I think of the 3.5" HDD sled mounts, yet. Vibration potential due to the open corner.
- Too bad USB C is an optional add rather than built in.

Hey - the optional Flex VRC-25 kit looks awesome!

Hope they release a version with solid side panel, would love to have to movements on it to get direct air to the GPU.

Abula wrote:Hope they release a version with solid side panel, would love to have to movements on it to get direct air to the GPU.

There is a solid side panel version.

Hexus:

The base model, priced at £120, will come in black, blackout (no white elements), white or gunmetal. Moving with the times, each colour is also available with a tempered-glass side panel, raising the price to £135.

I'd be curious to know how silent the new harddrive mounting solution is in practice. I have a total of 6 5400 rpm drives in my Antec P280 and the hum from the drives is the only noise I hear from my case. It would be nice if this case could take care of that.

For context, I resold the Define R5 case I bought on sale last December within a few weeks of purchase due to harddrive noise.

blunden wrote:I'd be curious to know how silent the new harddrive mounting solution is in practice. I have a total of 6 5400 rpm drives in my Antec P280 and the hum from the drives is the only noise I hear from my case. It would be nice if this case could take care of that.

For context, I resold the Define R5 case I bought on sale last December within a few weeks of purchase due to harddrive noise.

I dont think you will ever find a case that can dump that hdd noise of so many drives, you probably would be better on cases that can suspend drives like the ones that come with full 5.25 fronts and mod them to suspend them, personally i think its best to move toward a NAS and have it outside your hearing range. That said, im about to rebuild on my Define R4 with 8x hdds a hardware raid6 setup for editing, will see how it turn out, but i dont have much hopes on it.

ComputerBase, Tom's Hardware, and HardwareLUXX reviews added.

Gamers Nexus also has a review for it https://www.gamersnexus.net/hwreviews/3 ... -mid-tower (also in video form).

Would love to see SPCR's take on it sometime though. The R5's final result in the gaming build (after the tweaking) was amazingly good, and I'm hoping the R6 would be comparable or better.

MHLoppy wrote:Gamers Nexus also has a review for it https://www.gamersnexus.net/hwreviews/3 ... -mid-tower

Yeah - just finished reading it before I popped in here.

Added.

So, putting the video card on the bottom of the case is pretty awful for GPU temperatures. It is too close to the side, which reduces air flow into the fans.

But if you put LEDs on, it'll look purty through the window

NeilBlanchard wrote:So, putting the video card on the bottom of the case is pretty awful for GPU temperatures. It is too close to the side, which reduces air flow into the fans.

Its like this in all cases that have this type of vertical orientation, all have higher temps due to the low airflow the gpus ends up with, if someone is going for that alone, its better to go with a slot cooler design or where it doesn't affect it is watercooling, personally i would never use it for a GPU, but for a another card that dont need the cooling.... will open the ability of using a 2.5 gpu and still used the 16x that will be beneath the gpu.

I found the video review by Gamers Nexus quite substantial, and helpful.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cHGAJYcgBHI&t=214s

NeilBlanchard wrote:I found the video review by Gamers Nexus quite substantial, and helpful.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cHGAJYcgBHI&t=214s

Thanks for the link. It looks interesting but I am puzzled about the conclusion. I liked to believe the R5 is the best airflow/temp/noise option. According to this video the Thermalake Core P3 which is totally open is 0.3dbA more quiet and 2.3°c more cool than the R6. How can that be ? Is it really useless to have a case ?

Fractal Design R6 (Stock) 56°c 33.8 dbA
Thermalake Core P3 (Open) 53.3°c 33.3dbA

The more open the more efficient cooling.
For a given amount of cooling you can therefore make it quieter. (Remove fans or have them run at a lower speed.)
BUT...
A wide open mounting will expose the parts to:
* Electromagnetic interference, that can cause all sorts of problems.
* Electrostatic discharges (ESD), that physically damage the electronics.
* Mechanical damage, if/when accidentally hitting parts.
* Dust, that impede cooling over time. Removing the dust means a risk of ESD...

I agree Olle, with most of your points. Dust is almost always going to be a problem, with any system. The only system type that can exclude (most) dust, has to have a massive filter. And in order to overcome the restriction of the filter, it would have to run its fans faster. If those fans are muffled by being inside the case, then the system can be quiet. But this system would have to be heavily modified to get the performance.

Another thing to consider is the characteristic of the noise. The Core P3 might be a tiny bit quieter, but if that's from the most annoying frequencies, like a pulsating coil whine, I'd take a more subdued, slightly higher dBA any time.

Open cases tend to lead to systems that have a higher high-frequency noise component, while insulated, closed ones tend to have be low-end heavy. But that really depends on the components, the case and loads of other factors.

NeilBlanchard wrote:... The only system type that can exclude (most) dust, has to have a massive filter. And in order to overcome the restriction of the filter, it would have to run its fans faster. ...

That's how I do it. An additional pollen filter behind the stock mesh on my Antec P183.
A Scythe Gentle Typhoon at 1800 rpm provide some airflow through the filter.
Still some very fine dust do get in and is a PITA to remove...