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SUPER SIMPLE—AND THAT'S OK WITH US
The Fractal Arc Midi, part of Fractal’s gaming-oriented Arc series, is a mid-tower steel chassis lined with mesh on the front and top panel. The surrounding front panel is made of matte plastic, though the plastic has a nice, brushed texture surface.
The Arc Midi has two standard USB 2.0 ports, a single USB 3.0 port (with an internal header), and standard power and audio jacks. Almost every aspect of the case, from the two optical drive bays to the hard drive cages to the seven PCI slots (plus one, for use with the included fan controller) is attached via thumbscrews. The Arc includes three fans: a 14cm front fan, a 14cm exhaust fan, and a 14cm top fan. Removing the top mesh panel (with removable dust filter) exposes two additional mounts for 12cm fans or a 240mm radiator.
Building into the Arc Midi is a cinch, thanks to plenty of room and three large, rubber-grommeted cutouts for cable organization, and two smaller cutouts in the top-left of the motherboard tray. Three 14cm fans rendered the Arc Midi's cooling performance among the best of the mid-towers we tested. This case might be simple, but simple can be good.
Simple build; decent looking; organized
Plastic front panel; no toolless enclosures
$110, www.fractal-design.com
SLEEK, REFINED, BEAUTIFUL. STAY CLASSY, CORSAIR.
We don’t like to make recommendations right off the bat—part of the fun of reading these reviews (we’d imagine) comes from the buildup (ha!). But the Corsair 650D blew us away in pretty much every category.
For the 650D, Corsair took the guts of its 600T mid-tower chassis and married them with the looks of its Obsidian-series full-towers, a move customers (and we) have been requesting for years. The steel chassis features a very pretty brushed-aluminum front panel with a removable mesh fan filter and a push-down rectangular panel giving you quick access to three USB 2.0 and two USB 3.0 ports, as well as the two standard audio jacks.
Brushed aluminum makes just about anything look sleeker.
The chassis, which is painted matte black throughout, comes stock with one 20cm top fan, a 20cm front fan, and a 14cm exhaust fan—though you aren’t confined to that particular fan setup, as there are mounting holes up top for two 12cm or 14cm fans, or a 240mm radiator if liquid-cooling is your cup of tea (or liquid nitro, whatever). Also up top: a sliding panel revealing a drop-down SATA dock.
The 650D, like its spiritual antecedents the 800D and 700D, seems to go out of its way to remind you that simple is better. The four optical drive bays and the six 3.5-inch drive trays are toolless, and both three-tray hard drive bays are removable. The plastic latching mechanisms within the cages threw us off a little at first, though we found them to be easy to use once we started building. The hard drive trays, in particular, had the perfect amount of flexibility without feeling cheap.
The eight rubber-grommeted cutouts make clean case wiring a snap.
Our test build with the 650D was an absolute breeze. The steel side panels pop right off using a set of latches, and we had no problem comfortably seating 12.2-inch GPUs. The eight available PCI expansion slots are the only slots in the case that aren’t toolless. Cable routing was a snap, utilizing the 650D’s eight rubber-grommeted cutouts, including a handy cutout in the top-left of the case for 8-pin ATX power connecter cables (case manufacturers take note: This is rapidly becoming commonplace). And worry not, you’ll be able to ogle your highly organized innards thanks to a nice, big window on the left panel.
The motherboard tray, which supports ATX and microATX, is plenty big, and features a huge backplate cutout. Corsair’s 650D is an elegant, refined, and extremely accessible case that is easy on the eyes and the wallet. For $200, you get a case that’s technologically up to snuff, while being classy and sleek, to boot. The only things we could ask for are side intake fans—our test build got a little warm inside.
She's a beaut; nice stock cooling; entertains lots of cooling options
PCI slots aren't toolless; could use side fans
$200, www.corsair.com
Comments are closed on this article
delpi98
October 24, 2011 at 1:35pm
I like this I am new reader thank you to post Apple Black Friday Black Friday Apple
mocomike
July 14, 2011 at 3:12pm
ive been intersted in the fractal arc case since these guys reviewed it. Only problem is No One Sells It! Why must you tease us with a case we cant buy! fractal shows only Ncix.com and newegg as their dealers in the us but neither of them has it. I even tried amazon but no luck...
yancey42
June 14, 2011 at 8:48pm
I was wondering why no cases from NZXT. I just bought my first NZXT case for around $35 from Amazon. It was a GAMMA Classic Series ATX Mid Tower Interior Steel Chassis (Black). It was pretty barebones, without a lot of fans, but had places to mount them, if needed. It seems to have good build quality, and for $35 bucks it had both hidden cable routing and tool-less hard drive mounting, and included zip-ties (A nice touch). I bought this for a server build I was working on, but it would have worked well for a budget build as well. Don't know if you could get a large graphics card in there or not, but did I mention it was $35 bucks. I have bought cases in the past for much more without this ones build quality. I never worked with a NZXT case before, but was impressed. I know MaximumPC has reviewed NZXT cases in the past, I was disappointed that one wasn't included in this review.
nedwards
June 14, 2011 at 10:51pm
We just reviewed the NZXT H2, and I asked if they had any cases we hadn't yet seen when I was collecting cases for the roundup. They didn't at that time. They did just announce some new cases, I believe, and we'll review 'em when we get 'em in.
yancey42
June 14, 2011 at 8:48pm
I was wondering why no cases from NZXT. I just bought my first NZXT case for around $35 from Amazon. It was a GAMMA Classic Series ATX Mid Tower Interior Steel Chassis (Black). It was pretty barebones, without a lot of fans, but had places to mount them, if needed. It seems to have good build quality, and for $35 bucks it had both hidden cable routing and tool-less hard drive mounting, and included zip-ties (A nice touch). I bought this for a server build I was working on, but it would have worked well for a budget build as well. Don't know if you could get a large graphics card in there or not, but did I mention it was $35 bucks. I have bought cases in the past for much more without this ones build quality. I never worked with a NZXT case before, but was impressed. I know MaximumPC has reviewed NZXT cases in the past, I was disappointed that one wasn't included in this review.
fallout330
June 14, 2011 at 4:41pm
Looks like the Corsair 650D would be my choice....if I had flexibillity with cost. Great looking Case.
Kazz
June 14, 2011 at 8:04am
Sub-$100 is where it's at for me. And I don't need a case to come with countless fans. I install my own. The BitFenix looks good...
newegg911
June 13, 2011 at 7:11pm
I'm with Neufeld. I actually consider tooless PCI brackets a minus. They are almost always uneeded garbage.
newegg911
June 13, 2011 at 7:09pm
I still don't like it, but the Thermaltake Level 10 is almost reasonably priced this time.
What's up with the Silverstone Temejin? $600? Are you freakin' kidding me? Does it include an expresso machine? It doesn't even look like anything special anyway. And what's up with the TEN bay slots? Cool... it can hold every optical drive I've ever owned at once! I can jam my 4x CD burner from 1997 in there!
I have a HAF 922 and I love it. It's heavy steel, has awesome cooling out of the box, and can be found for under a C-note.
Jasker
June 13, 2011 at 4:35pm
Since when is 57 degrees hotter than 59? Silverstone won system burn also.
MrSatyre
June 13, 2011 at 4:31pm
Huh? The Temijin's slots all point to the top?!? Who wants all their cables sticking out of their case's top like Medusa?
Marthian
June 13, 2011 at 11:52pm
to some, it looks cool. Others, why on earth are there cables up there?
I also believe the reason for the wierd mount is because the air moves better up so I hear. Vapor chambers in the nvidia gpus benefit from this I believe.
Cooketh
June 13, 2011 at 4:14pm
I'm sitting on the Thermaltake Xaser which is a massive tower. I believe it cost me around the $200 range and though it's large, it's all metalic, very little plastic, a ton of fan slots, excellent cooling, roomy, all the perks, but no USB 3 on front.
It's similar to the Silverstone one in alot of ways, but not as tricked out internally. I'd reccomend anyone who wants a big case for modding, cooling, etc take a look at it and the Corsair case featured in this review. My friend uses that corsair case and he loves it. And it looks beautiful in person.
plaskon
June 13, 2011 at 4:04pm
Cooler Master HAF-912 Advanced ... toolless, roomy, plus two very quiet 200mm fans.
Insula Gilliganis
June 13, 2011 at 2:45pm
Wrong about "early Dream Machine builds" not listing the case used.. take off the S on "buildS".. only the original 1996 boot 01 Dream Machine didn't list the case used. But a year later with the 1997 Dream Machine 02, the case was listed as the IW-A500 CompuDEX ATX Medium Tower and every case used in the Dream Machine builds going forward were also listed.
The one time I really cared that Maximum PC miss mentioning what case was used was in the November 2000 issue when reviewing the "Chamsalot P-III 1GHz". Josh Norem mentioned that it was the "Case of the Gods" and "The case is an ace!" but the model number wasn't listed in the specs and only mentioned that it was made by Antec. I hope Mark Miller (aka Chamsalot back then and I believe now roams the MaximumPC hallways as "Number Six") will tell us what model Antec that he used 11 years ago! If only that RAID array would have worked correctly, Mark would have had a Kick Ass 11 rig in his law office! BTW, that case would have fit in nicely inside a Cylon basestar. By your command!
Neufeldt2002
June 13, 2011 at 12:54pm
I really don't understand why you knock points off for a non tool-less design on the PCI slots. I have had tool-less and every one has been flimsy and cheap, that leads to breakage and loose cards. I would gladly take screws on the PCI mounts anytime over tool-less, unless they are thumb screws.
