The Corsair Carbide 275R - Sleek and Sassy
Corsair a brand with over 20 years of experience in the filed of PC peripherals ranging from cooling solutions, chassis and even system memories recently or best to say last year went into an all peripheral focus which was criticized by a few since most people out there including me like their gaming chassis. So finally in 2018 Corsair heard our pleas and has started rolling out some very impressive cabinets the first of which was the Corsair Carbide SPEC Omega which we reviewed a few months back, then came the Obsidian 500D and now we have the Corsair Carbide 275R which all thanks to Corsair India is on my table for review today!
Priced in at $80 for tempered glass and $70 for acrylic side panel the Carbide 275R is a direct successor to the older 270R and aims to be the compact and elegant solution for power builds in an attempt to continue the ongoing trend where people like to stuff the biggest of hardware in the smallest of chassis, which sometimes I don't understand but that's how it is these days. Coming in two color options of white and black the case sports support for four 2.5" drives and two 3.5" drives along with plenty of cooling options including support for a 360mm radiator in the front. All of this is backed up by the Corsair 5 Years warranty which is applicable on the glass panel aswell!
What's in the Box!?
Corsair stuck to the usual outer packing with the Carbide 275R and we have a plain brown cardboard box with the product name, images, specifications and even a detailed diagram of the dissembled case printed in black all over the box.
The box is quite heavy for a product of this size and this is mainly due to the weight of the tempered glass used which tends to be a thick heavy slab of, well glass! Glad to see that Corsair has opted for thick blocks of styrofoam here over normal thermocol blocks that tend to break at times during rough transit risking bending of the side panels which over here would've resulted in catastrophic cracked glass so good move by Corsair here.
Inside the box apart from the Corsair Carbide 275R we have the installation guide, warranty manual, a hex key or allen wrench for the tempered glass screws along with a bunch of cable ties, motherboard screws, fan screws, SSD screws etc all of which can be found inside a small brown box located inside the case in the first drive caddie.
A Closer Look at the 275R
Being a direct successor to the 270R the 275R steals similar looks form the former but with the much refined finish along with that touch of tempered glass to match up with time and trend. The entire case is white in every corner with trims of silver on the feet below and has well rounded edges giving it a nice appeal and stance from the outside. Its just too clean and classy, I mean I feel and even did dirty the case even by putting my fingers on that smooth white edges and boundaries while taking the pictures! Its so Steve Jobs like thing to be honest.
The front of the case is removable with a little force and is made out of solid-premium plastic which is mildly textured and has a neat Corsair logo at the bottom. Behind that you'll find a magnetic dust filter to keep the inert clean since the air is sucked in from the 5mm gap on the sides which is non-vented and I'm fine with it since the look is worth it & the dust filter inside is quite thick and fine to block most of the dust and finer particles.
Also at the bottom we have a white LED strip which gives a white halo at the bottom when the system is turned on to complete that whole minimalist and sophisticated stature.
Looking at the top section we have a removable dust filter which is all white and magnetic like the front one. Its fine but obviously not as fine as we have on the front but that'll do for most of us. The top section of the 275R supports upto 240mm radiator provided you use low profile memory stick like the Corsair Vengeance and likes which is a bit of a trade off here obviously.
For connectivity we have the white LED illuminated power button, a reset button, audio jacks and a two USB 3.0 ports with no USB-C type. Now this is something which I'm not a fan of, no not the USB Type-C as I can live with that but I was expecting more USB ports in the front provided how the present market is of gaming peripherals where even gaming headsets rely on USB ports for connectivity & this is a premium case so atleast one more USB port was expected.
Turning our glance at the back we have the standard seven expansion slot arrangement here along with a 120mm exhaust fan mount which already has a SP120 installed out of the box and is non-RGB. Along with the standard seven expansion slots we also have two vertical mounts for graphics card which would easily support a two slot graphics card in vertical fashion provided you have a PCIe riser cable which has to be brought separately and is not provided with the case nor by Corsair through its online or offline partners. This is an extremely welcome move since this not only completes the whole studio look of the 275R but also vertically mounted cards are a thing now with all those RGB decorations on the fan sides worth showing off and this comes right out of the box and no extra accessory is needed for this unlike other brands giving user the much needed flexibility.
PSU mount is standard with no tray or bracket system and comes with a removable dust filter at the bottom which is yes you guessed it right white! The Corsair 275R on paper supports a PSU of upto 180mm which is ample for almost every PSU out there but if needed one can remove the HDD cage underneath the shroud to gain more space obviously at the cost of two HDDs so its a call to be taken at the user's end.
The bottom side is plane and simple with no projections or caveats but a notable thing are the feet that the 275R stands upon which are not only oddly thick but are rubber padded and have a nice silver trim to them showing the attention to detail paid while designing the case.
A peek inside and we see a clean and I mean exceptionally clean and white area with just the rubber grommets on the caveats the only thing which is not white and is adding some contrast to the space. The Corsair 275R supports upto ATX motherboards and graphics card lengths of upto 370mm which covers even the longest cards in the market today including the Zotac AMP or the MSI Gaming X Trio. The front has one SP120 fan pre-installed like the one at the back but one can install a radiator of upto 360mm in the front so this paves way to stuff even a HEDT processor inside since the front 360mm would be drawing air directly from the outside. On the downside a push pull configuration is not possible here since the PSU shroud just doesn't leave that much gap to fit in a solution that thick.
Also the PSU shroud which runs through the entire length of the case is pure white with vents on the PSU top and a caveat for easy wire routing like the PCIe power cable and the Audio cable.
At the back we can see that we have the HDD cage at the bottom which houses two tool less caddies for 3.5" HDD or 2.5" SSDs and can be removed if required. There are also two SSD mounts near the front end and also two more with black backplates to hold the SSDs in place. The bracket is made out of metal so there is no chance of breakage which is good and I expect nothing less at this price point. For wire management we have good clearance and it shouldn't be much of an issue here.
Time for the Fun Part - Installation!
Before I proceed further I'd like to say that I had a very limited time with this case hence I've concentrated more on bringing you a more detailed review and less of fancy photographs so excuse me for the bad photography here at times.
For this installation and build of the Corsair Carbide 275R I've decided to go with something different than what I usually do since this case can accommodate almost any AIO in the market today if installed on the front side so I wanted to try how it'll come out with an air cooler in place and also since the case provides for a vertically mounted graphics card then why not use it so we'll be mounting the graphics card vertically here for more or less aesthetics reasons. Also I've swapped the stock Corsair SP120 fan in the front with three 120mm high CFM blue LED fans to provide optimum air flow to this case and as most of you would be doing so when going for an air cooler build.
For the build I've used the following components -
CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 1800X
Motherboard: Gigabyte Aorus AX370 Gaming 5
RAM: Kingston HyperX Predator 16GB DDR4 3000Mhz
Cooler: Noctua NH-D14
Graphics Card: MSI R9 380 Gaming 4G
Storage: Corsair Neutron XTi 480GB
Power Supply: Cooler Master MasterWatt Lite 700
RGB LED Strip: Colors by TweakedPC
I'm pretty happy with how the build has come up here with everything in place. Talking about the air cooler first the Noctua NH-D14 is quite beefy and due to the tall memory kit that I've used I had to shift the front 120mm fan a few notches up and yet the case accommodated it easily with its 170mm clearance! The graphics card sits tightly into the slots provided and there was absolutely no hassle whatsoever in installing the card, just pop off the two metal strips that close the vertical expansion slots and screw in the card and tighten it to go ahead. The 2cm space behind the motherboard is ample for wire management and thanks to the shroud here its easier to hide the wires even if using a non modular PSU such as mine which has round thick cables.
Even while installing the cooler fans or routing the cables through the various locations I didn't find any difficulties even though I have thicker fingers than an average guy and even if my hand or fingers did get rubbed across the metal then also there were no cuts or bruises since the entire finishing is so smooth and clean without any rough edges making it builder friendly even for newbies. As can be seen the RGB LED strip glow is scattered and reflected beautifully by the all white interiors of the 275R which makes it even a better. Also if you look closely then we can see that the front slit without the vents does a great job in reflecting the lights from the blue LED fans installed in the front. Over all the build is quite clean and even with so much stuffed inside the case looks beautiful and exactly how I'd like it to be even though I'm not a fan of mid-towers but still I like how this entire build has come across in terms of looks aswell in terms of building experience.
Temperature Reading
To get the temperature readings across various components I've used HWMonitor and run every test twice taking the highest reading out of the two. Only on exhaust SP120 fan is used & CPU cooler is the Noctua NH-D14 and its set to default settings via the BIOS just as the exhaust fan.
Reading is taken with the AMD Ryzen 7 1800X overclocked to 3.8Ghz and fan curve for the MSI R9 380 Gaming 4G is set to default that is the fans would only spin after the card hits 60°C or more. CPU and Graphics Card are loaded for 15mins using the MSI Kombuster and FurMark suit respectively. Readings are in degree Celsius and readings are in delta temperature.
My Verdict
Refresh done right! Yes, that's the best way to describe the Corsair Carbide 275R chassis. Most people might take it just as a cosmetic refresh to the previous 270R but to be honest the 275R has not only picked up right from where the 270R left but has also made a mark for its own self in terms of an entirely new case.
Should I talk about the looks? Of course i should, the Corsair 275R is a thing of sheer beauty and much more. The all white interior and exterior is just splendid and something to fall for especially with the use of textured plastic wherever required and smooth edges and curvaceous front fascia. The silver trims on the feet is a testimony to the attention to details here & with that tempered glass this is the perfect studio or gaming PC case for this year and for a few more to come offering great looks on its own and adding value to the various RGB or non-RGB components used.
"The Corsair Carbide 275R has a sophisticated flare of craftsmanship due mainly to the meticulous designing and added tempered glass panel. Building a system using this case can make the most novice builder look like a polished pro at building gaming computers"
Pros - - Exceptionally designed
- Ample of Liquid Cooling options including a 360mm mount
- Comes with vertical graphics card mounting option
- Five years warranty applicable on glass break aswell
- Great air flow
- Only two USB ports in the front
- Push pull configuration in case of 360mm is not possible
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Hi. Just curious which pci-e cable you used to vertically mount the gpu in the Corsair 275r?
ReplyDeleteHello,
DeleteAt the time of review I didn't have a PCIe riser cable in spare so I had to mount the card vertically for illustration purposes while during taking temperature readings I had mounted it horizontally only.
Still for personal use and in spare now I use the Cooler Master PCIe riser cable which looks elegant and doesn't effect the performance of the card whatsoever.