Gadgetory

I'm always a sucker for something revolutionary in PC case design and a thermaltake view 37 is no exception you're looking at a full tower with eight PCIe slots plenty of space at the rear for cable managing and a very unique side window that's not the first time that they've done something like this with acrylic that's what this is by the way not tempered glass that would make this case much more expensive than it is but it is implemented very well in this chassis I'll tell you upfront that this isn't my favorite case by any means but I certainly like the direction thermal takes taking here let's start with the exterior and work our way in this chassis screams Thermaltake with its many transparent panels steel and plastic mixture of the frame and RGB accents included with the RGB model of the vu 37 though which is the one you're looking at here are three ring plus one 40 millimeter fans with 12 addressable LEDs along with an analog controller and sync function to be used in conjunction with various asus gigabyte and msi motherboards I explain this in more detail in my CES coverage right here but in a nutshell this box and its corresponding software allow for full RGB syncing with various vendor hardware also included with the case is this PCIe switch board of sorts it does not connect to the motherboard in any way instead it connects to the box which is going to be more than likely on the right side of the case so instead of having to remove your right panel in order to change the color scheme or the fan RPMs you can control all of that with this switch board here all in all it's a very cool concept on paper and I'm glad to see that they're able to work with MSI gigabyte and asus here to get their hardware syncing up all in one software package which is really nice you don't have to have four or five different icons on your desktop that control different things you can control all of it with one single software package and that's what Thermaltake seeking to do make that much simpler so I like where they're going with that now let's talk about some things that I don't like about the case now while Thermaltake have definitely focused on accentuating the color coordination in the view 37 they've had to certainly compromise in places that I would not have personally compromised I want to state though at this point if you're wondering this panel here is not tempered glass I think it's paraphrased a bit earlier this is actually acrylic and they've thickened the acrylic to make it look like tempered glass I actually thought it was at first I must confess I didn't know anything about this case except for what I had seen briefly at CES but they had a few tempered glass panels like this too on other cases so I wasn't sure which one it was it is acrylic it will scratch it just like any other acrylic despite it being slightly thicker than most acrylic panels and some of the older cases and the cheaper models out there right now so something to keep in mind this is why the case is not you know 250 bucks it's around 160 170 USD if you want the RGB model if you don't want the RGB model you're looking at around 110 bucks which i think is fair for a full tower you're gonna pay a bit more for that anyway just because you're gonna have that extra hardware support the front panel is tinted significantly more so than the side panel which is fine all you can see through the front in most cases anyway is the fan array and since these are RGB the tint provides a special kind of subdued character to the otherwise bulky chassis and while we're here front i/o spans the top portion of his face consisting of the usual two USB 3.0 ports two 2.0 ports mic and headphone jacks and dedicated power and reset switches ok now i've prolonged to the inevitable the negatives of this case i am disappointed in the lack of a power supply basement especially seeing as though this is a really big curved acrylic panel that spans the entire height of the case i understand why thermaltake went this route making room for water cooling enthusiasts and larger radiator configs but even a half or segmented basement in my book is better than no basement it just looks too bare and months is 2018 something else I have to mention in 2018 is air flow and this case is not optimized for it I don't even need to run tests to tell you that this thing is gonna have a tough time pulling in air you have just very fine grill slits on the left and right side and those are really the only access points for air flow the acrylic front panel the slightly tinted panel up front that I was just talking about spans the entire height of the case up front so no air will pass through there and anytime air has to make a 90-degree turn to be pulled in through fans which are already pushed between the chassis and that front panel you're not gonna really have a good time in terms of air flow this is we're talking maybe 2 centimeters worth of clearance between the front of the fan they put to bring fans up front but I went ahead and moved all three to the front just because it looks a bit more uniform all three of these are gonna have a difficult pulling an air period because they are so close to this front acrylic panel I really wonder what Thermaltake was thinking here they probably already decided way in advance that this case wasn't gonna be very well airflow optimized and that's fine I mean that's what you're going for okay people are probably gonna compromise on that anyway for a case it looks like this and hey look up top you're also compromising on a radiator and fan compatibility because you have no mounting points up top this is just one solid piece of acrylic that spans the left side panel and the top panel and yeah you can't pull air through an acrylic panel right so they didn't put anything up top it's purely aesthetic and that's what I think this entire case was going for was just like that wow factor other purely aesthetic things the V 37 opts for include a vertical graphics card mounting support so you don't get a riser cable which I think defeats the purpose of even having that option there but you can buy one separately they're pretty expensive but I found that Thermaltake riser cables are among the best out there they're very consistent I had Jack send me three of them and all three worked beautifully I saw literally no degradation in graphics card performance so if you want to pay that extra premium that's fine you can do what I've done here with the gtx 1070 mounted sideways but it is awfully close to that left side panel so you might be suffocating a graphics card just a bit more than you would otherwise have you had mounted it horizontally but okay enough with the negatives I think that I've pretty much gotten most of them out of the way anyway most people are gonna prioritize airflow so that's gonna be a pretty big negative and then the fact that this is acrylic so it scratches this is acrylic so it scratches nothing really premium about the case in that sense that could also be taken as a negative but hey it keeps the cost down I want to focus now on something that the view 37 does very well and that is cable managed particularly behind the motherboard tray this right section is immense so big in fact that you can fit up to four three and a half inch hard drives here I'm seriously talking about hard drives right behind the motherboard tray the thickness is plenty for even the most extensive of cable routing a format other manufacturers should follow an extra few centimeters back here goes a long way I'm looking at you specifically Corsair the building experience is just as crucial in my book as the end result and the view 37 capitalizes on its many rubber grounding cutouts as well keeping things concealed and clean for viewing through the curved acrylic on the left so my building experience was a great one thanks to that space offered by the right-side about an inch and a half of clearance there is more than enough I would say an inch is gonna be optimal if you have more than that it's just gravy and I really took advantage of it if you have extra cable links maybe cable extensions you're not gonna have a problem at all fitting those into the view 37 one bit like most thermal take cases this one has ample space for water cooling gear in particular you can put a reservoir up front easily no problem you don't have again mounting support up top you can put a radiator up front you can also put a radiator along the right side panel there is actually space for air to pass through that panel so it's kind of funny to say this but you might actually have better air flow moving through that right panel than you do up front which is a little weird so if you wanted like an intake system you could do that but it would look weird having a radiator there without fans being on you know the left side right so I don't know how you'd want to do that but you have the the option there to mount three up to three fans three 140mm fans along that right panel also 300 140 up front along with their radiator counterparts and then either a 120 or 140 fan radiator config at the rear that is pretty much it with the front panel and the rear panel can the top panel can't put anything but you also have space down below if you want to put one or two intake fans below that is certainly an option as well so those are my thoughts on the view 37 I expected a bit more just from like the hardware side I think that the acrylic is just it's one of those things that you understand why it's there and I get it because of the price of like a curved tempered glass panel would bring this thing in a 200 250 dollar territory I get that but if you're if you're trying to promote this case is like an aesthetically pleasing case but you know in the back of your head that you have only acrylic for the front and the side like if they had put you know timber glass up the front and then acrylic on the side I would have understood that just a bit more but you have acrylic upfront which is a cost-saving measure and on top of that it's tinted and then you also have that left panel which is acrylic which is already scratched to hell I think it's it's really bad right here I don't even know how I did that but that's how a critic is for you I I just I know that it's not a very premium case in that sense because it's not using glass and that's just how it is in 2018 right if a case has tempered glass it's gonna feel a bit more premium then it's acrylic counterpart so it's hard to dock the view thirty-seven for that but I kind have to because of the situation they put themselves in particularly with this curved panel which I don't think is necessary it looks cool but from a practical standpoint it eliminates a lot of support especially for custom cooling enthusiasts who want to put something up top like a radiator or even just a few fans so is this case sexy oh yes I give the sexy factor a 10 out of 10 is it functional maybe 7 out of 10 because it's missing that top you know the top support right for rads and fans and it's got acrylic which means it's gonna scratch a lot and then is it premium this one's difficult to gauge because premium is more or less in the eye of the beholder in my opinion I don't think it's very premium I really don't because I know that it has acrylic front and side panels and it just I mean there are just things about this case that weren't thought through all the way or that don't line up perfectly that bothered me to an extent if you're OCD you'll agree with me for instance the curve of the acrylic doesn't line up flush with the curve of the chassis there was actually a pretty big gap at the rear of mine and I think that's what bothered Thermaltake too since I decided to cover it up with a piece of plastic held on by four screws a bit of a cheesy cover up here I mean you can see it right when you take it off you have to take this off you want to remove the entire acrylic panel but it's just something that they really didn't see all the way through and it shows the the quality right the workmanship that went into this case wasn't top-notch so knowing these things again at the back of my head bothers me and that's why I'm not gonna say that it's a premium case at 160 or 170 USD that's asking you a bit much the non RGB model is much more reasonable in my book closer to a hundred bucks I think thermal takes charging a bit too much for the control software and the the little control box that you're gonna get with the ring fans to be able to sync everything up color wise I think that's too much of a premium this price might shy people away knowing that there are compromises in the chassis itself with that if you appreciate the review or the opinions presented let me know that giving someone a thumbs up I appreciate it if you disagree with me in any sort of way I want you to disagree with me openly and publicly in the comments below I don't know what you think I got wrong about this case or what you see in this case that I don't maybe see after building in it I feel pretty confident with my opinions but you might change on mine and I might have to come back in the comments section later and pick something you know you never know people bring things your attention that you don't see right away and I when you guys do that for me because it allows me to kind of just come out take in multiple perspectives not just my own if you want to subscribe I would appreciate that click that red button down below and stay tuned for more reviews like this one this is science studio thanks for learning with us