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MasterBox or MasterOven? Cooler Master Q500L Review

2019-04-28
good people I'm Dimitri and what do you think about the space-efficient case layout what elements do you think comprise to make that perfect space efficient enclosure I think for 2019 hopefully more companies will tackle that exact question seeing smaller cases fit larger hardware without compromises that normally accompany the small cases and hopefully that is what we'll experience today with the Cooler Master q500l didn't realize just how bad I am with inboxes but check this out we have the Hardware Canucks dust filters there we go doesn't look very good see this kind of strange so the reason why this case is exciting is because its original intent was for a micro ITX enclosure but now they've added additional PCI slots and move the power supply to the front so that you can use a full ATX system inside of it and that is exciting the curve at least you know beefed up the steel litter because it's very thin doesn't give you a lot of confidence in the actual structural integrity of this in case oh wait a second this is acrylic it will totally get scratched up before I finish building let's leave the plastic own also a mis glass I don't miss acrylic hello I'm looking for some fans well are you married yeah I have a ring what is your favorite number I would say 3 do I have the perfect fan for you this is the new thermal tech ring trio 12 fans with good static pressure for radiators it is a beautiful frame with double side and center ring illumination with soft and super bright spill with razor chrome and compatibility control it through your smartphone the RGB plus software on the PC or Amazon Alexa well I'm gonna take these home perhaps you should to check them out in the scription below alright so what is so exciting about the Q500L so first of all the price point is 59 bucks it's affordable it's pretty compact yet it supports all of your ATX hardware so in ATX PSU the front ATX motherboard you can mount a 240 right at the top given you move the power supply bracket slightly down and allocate some of that space for the radiator although it's pretty compact and I probably advise against it just stick to a normal CPU cooler like I have here as for the GPU clearance so because the power supply is right in front of the motherboard that limits your GPU compatibility to 11 inches even if you have like a slightly shorter power supply that does not span into the first PCI slot the cables will still be exiting so I would say 11 inches to be safe and slightly more if you have a shorter power supply or if the Cape like exiting from one of the sides so yeah now the build quality as I've mentioned is not fantastic and they also wish they've done something with the dust filters it's kind of cool to customize the exterior using dust filters but be nice for them to include like a different kind of design variation but I guess maybe those come as accessories now the cool thing about this whole perforation design for the top front and the bottom is the fact that you have some flexibility on where you can mount things for example the PSU bracket you can move it up and down depending if you are installing anything at the top or at the bottom if you need extra clearance for the GPU for example that's pretty cool the same thing goes for the fan installation for the top and the bottom depending on where you want to kind of install it you know you're not logged down to one particular orientation or mounting location furthermore you can actually move the side IO either to the top or the bottom depending if you like that orientation I like it in the default position because it hides the power supply area otherwise you can have see the cables and Lumis behind it in terms of cable management this is one of the easiest cases I've dealt with and last while because there's plenty of room behind the motherboard the cutouts and all the appropriate positions or where the cables exit from the power supply you can route them directly to the back so they don't occupy any other space and so that brings us to cooling and there are multiple issues with the Q500L unfortunately so first of all the included 120 ml rear exhaust fan is not good it does not push air and also the actual frame blocks a lot of the fan looks like it was designed for like you know 92 millimeter spacing instead of the 120 / spacing it be nice if Coolermaster open up that area I don't know why it has to be so restrictive and second of all there are no intake fans included so the power supply covers that entire front section so you can't really install fans there unless you're going for like an SFX power supply at the top you can still mount a 120 or 140 at the bottom but you kind of almost rely on like passive intake based on the CPU cooler and the exhaust fan and a GPU cooler but generally you'd have this kind of heat accumulation below the GPU that you could combat by installing additional intake fan but the issue here is that the case feet are way too short it kind of chokes the bottom fan and also the dust filter is ridiculous they should have just included the same filter at the bottom as we see in the top in the front you could orientate the case line down giving you a little extra breathing room from the bottom then then the side but the looks of that orientation they don't really work for me personally and so that brings us to temperatures which unfortunately this is a bit of an oven at stock configuration the CPU is pretty toasty adding a bottom fan helps to cool down the GPU slightly now we're placing the stock fan completely gives us much better CPU and GPU temperatures and here's the open configuration with the side panels off just so you get an idea on how cool this case is without any side panels and when compared to other cases at stock configuration we have the hottest CPU temperature in this entire stack as for noise levels given that only has a single exhaust fan it's not too bad but given it's basically fully open you know the ventilation design yeah everything will be audible it doesn't really lock down the noise too much and so based on this poor thermal performance it's got me thinking who is this case for so first of all it's affordable second of all it's pretty small for an ATX size and it supports standard ATX hardware the only limitation would be your graphics card length but you're probably are not going to be installing any monstrosity inside this thing given it's only $59 now the thing is it's not a replacement for your ITX users you know the ITX direction is a lot more expensive normally while here it's like a medium-sized actually would be smaller than the medium-sized enclosure and that it's its main advantage for $59 though I was hoping to see a better dust filter at the bottom more designs available for the user and not just like what comes at stock here the rear fan section to be opened up so it's not as restrictive but I am impressed with the cable management situation that we've got going on here very easy to work in and the side panel closes just fine alright so that's it for the Q 500 l and honestly I was expecting slightly better thermal performance given it's just a ventilation box but it all comes down to that rear exhaust fan which is not good and also having no intake so there you have a little oven inside for your hardware unless of course you remedy that by installing additional fans which I would highly recommend you do get a good sense of grip with Corsairs iron claw RGB Gaming Mouse featuring a lightweight design ultra durable Omron switches paired with pig 33 91 optical sensor and some RGB lining for some extra Flair the iron claw ensures gaming at its best check it out down below all right guys I'm Dimitri thanks so much for watching let me know what you think of the Q500L comments below make sure to check out the cell the relevant content thanks much for watching I'll see you next video you also what do you think of the color we're shooting raw
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