Gadgetory

this video is brought to you by NCI XCOM great technology selection and service after a very long week I was about to start my third I TX build for this week and it was really excited to see how the new core 500 from kracko design would stack up with my usual reference system and then I asked what makes a good I TX enclosure it's definitely a combination of things like hardware support how many drives can you mount and wouldn't support me or beefy GPU but what about a power supply and any overkill all-in-one coolers that you might want to mount just because you can and what about cable management or is the assembly process a total pain or will you preserve some nerves and so due to space limitations I thought at least one of these factors must fall short in the new core 500 and so I began my journey hoping for a good outcome to see if this is the best ITX enclosure yet at $60 the core of the core 500 is extremely well built solid steel joints no flex anywhere and the only plastic piece is the front panel with that staple brushed aluminum quote unquote look there's a single file in the quarter inch drive bay at the top with dual USB 300 jacks and PR buttons ventilation all around small one for the power supply venting strip's spending the entire panel near the GPU and also the top panel that are both covered with this magnetic dust filter which is awesome plus a removable filter underneath the power supply is available the only minor annoyance is reinstalling that the exterior panel which is more difficult than it should be as you need to align all the clips on all the sides from the panel to fit in place properly behind the front panel we find no intake ports instead a single SSD mount that if installed facing up interferes with the five-minute quarter inch drive bay but is easier to route with the your SATA cables but the cutout on the bottom left would allow appropriate routing for those SATA cables if the SSD is facing down at the back it's a standard ITX setup motherboard IO and dual PCI brackets a power extension plug is on the left side that you have to plug into the power sub internally and a 140 millimeter exhaust fan is included the idea for this ITX build was to utilize the 240 million radiator for the CPU that will also act as exhaust and that's the impressive design choice here as the fan bracket at the top that is totally removable by the way allows dual 140 or 120 million fans and their respective radiator sizes which suit this form factor really well and here's what the inside looks like without the GPU and I say that an all-in-one suits and ITX enclosure well because of cable management everything has to be concentrated to the side of the motherboard and handling any cables with a low-profile CPU pump would be easier than having to work around eight-hour CPU cooler which it does support by the way up to 170 millimeters in height the core 500 supports full-size ATX power supply that is installed at the front of the motherboard with recommendations of 160 millimeters in length or shorter for module units as that would mean no interference with the GPU there are cable - hoops on this side of the case if you'd want to secure some cables underneath the graphics card with maximum supported GPUs up to 310 millimeters in length or just over 12 inches which means you can easily build a suite ITX gaming system without sacrificing on cooling nor hardware compatibility for storage the main drive bracket can support dual three and a half and two and a half inch drives at the same time this as these are installed on the outside and the hard disks on the other side of the bracket with appropriate cutouts available to get in with your screwdriver plus non-restrictive mounting positions for either drive which I appreciate greatly you can unmount either drive without affecting the placement of the other the only challenging thing here I could see if all four drives are installed is managing all those SATA cables in this tiny cutout in the center you'd need 90 degree SATA cables for sure in order to fit everything now on the topic of challenging notice all these cables coming from the top io which are paying to hide they would be very difficult to work with if an optical drive was installed as there right about there and I like having top IO that are easy to reach on the exterior but in certain internal configurations these cables are frustrating to work with and finally installing the five and a quarter inch drive bracket back inside the case I'm happy to see no clearance issues with our H 105 radiator and a set of fans plus a third mechanical Drive can be installed right underneath for that additional storage bring total drive capacity to three SSDs and three three and a half inch drives so the core 500 at its core offers a fantastic foundation for enthusiasts ITX systems cable management will always be challenging in confined spaces and you just have to accept that and I feel this case is a good balance of making sure hardware compatibility is maximized and you have a great cooling options plus a storage is well incorporated although I wish the drive bracket was completely removable outside of the case to make installation and removal of drives easier when the system is fully assembled but in general I enjoyed working with the core 500 there were no deal breaking surprises along the way and we're giving it Haruka Knox diem get award so this is it for the Core 500 review let us know if you've been enticed to do an ITX build of your own with a comment below I'm Dimitri with Haier Canucks thanks for watching we'll see you in the next one