Corsair Obsidian 550D: Starting to Specialize
by Dustin Sklavos on March 29, 2012 3:01 PM EST- Posted in
- Cases/Cooling/PSUs
- Corsair
- mid-tower
Assembling the Corsair Obsidian 550D
Despite my misgivings with some of Corsair's design decisions (which could easily be argued as tradeoffs), there's one thing that Corsair's engineers have down pat by now: ease of assembly. I've said before that assembling a Corsair enclosure is like a vacation for me, and the 550D was no exception.
Once again Corsair includes standoffs for the motherboard built right into the tray, although our refreshed testbed's new motherboard is Micro-ATX and thus required me to add a couple of standoffs. That said, installing the board was relatively painless, and I appreciated being able to plug the exhaust fan's 3-pin header directly into the motherboard.
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Speaking in all honesty, it's nigh impossible to find any real point in the assembly that's worth mentioning as a standout, at least in terms of difficulty. Corsair has, over time, gradually assuaged every remaining issue I've had with building systems in their cases. The drive sleds now allow me to install a 2.5" drive without removing any of the pins, and a 3.5" drive snaps in perfectly neatly. Popping out the 5.25" drive bay cover was a little bit of a struggle, but barely worth mentioning.
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Depending on your perspective, you could argue that cabling is a bit easier with the 550D. The recessed area surrounding the motherboard tray proper only further highlights how well Corsair's engineers guide assembly within their enclosures; it's essentially a subtle suggestion that says "cables go here." And while I'm concerned about the long term use of the side panel release mechanism, it must be said that getting that rear panel back on to the 550D doesn't require the same kind of elbow grease some other cases do: there's enough space to fit your cables back here without too much trouble.
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The biggest problem I had in assembly was getting the AUX 12V line to connect, but that's not necessarily something you can fault Corsair for so much as a problem that's par for the course when dealing with this kind of ATX enclosure design. The AUX 12V line on our new motherboard is lower than it was on the old one, and as a result the modular cable that was included with our new testbed power supply couldn't make the journey properly. Thankfully SilverStone uses the same connects for all of their modular power supplies (a convenience Corsair should take to heart) and once I found a longer cable, everything was fine.
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Thus, as I said, there's very little to report in the way of assembly. Corsair somehow continues to get the placement of the cable routing holes in the motherboard tray just right, and I can continue to recommend cases from the brand as a whole as being excellent choices for consumers just learning how to build their own machines.
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earthrace57 - Thursday, March 29, 2012 - link
I kind of wish there was a grace period in which you guys would test both testbeds, and after x number of tests, the new testbed tests would be released, that way we have a frame of reference. (I hope this is easy enough to follow).sfroom - Thursday, March 29, 2012 - link
I can't believe I'm the first to mention this, but the card pictured (and presumably tested) is not the one listed in the testing methodology or description of the new test bed. What gives?The card listed in the methodology is an open air cooler whereas the Zotac pictured looks like a blower. This would surely affect the whole data set (CPU temps, etc).
Can you explain?
Dustin Sklavos - Friday, March 30, 2012 - link
Good catch.Photography was done before we swapped out the graphics card, and future cases will be using the ASUS, but the photos are still useful since they're intended to show how assembly goes. The photos have the Zotac, but the testing was actually done with the ASUS; this was the last piece I standardized on, and the reason was that the GTX 560 Ti that Zotac provided was unfortunately just too hot and loud and would've skewed all of our test results.
tilandal - Thursday, March 29, 2012 - link
I bought this case to replace my Lian Li V1000. There is a lot I like about it but I can't help but pine after the build quality of the V1000. The 55D is great to work in and keeps my system running silently without any thermal problems but the plastic does feel cheap and the side panels are a little on the thin side. I bought my Lian Li for $200 and I would gladly pay that much for a case with the same layout but higher quality panels. For $120 after rebate I feel I got good value but I doubt I'll keep it around as long as my V1000 (Almost 9 years).piroroadkill - Friday, March 30, 2012 - link
Still seems a better buy. I actually use ALL the 3.5" drive bays in the Define R3, but only have one HD-DVD/Blu-Ray/DVD writer drive in a 5.25" bay (although I have an SSD mounted in the other 5.25" bay).Who really needs 5.25" bays anymore? Posers with those screens you used to get for them? Seems like you need one, maybe two, tops. I just think the Define R3 represents a better use of the space..
Dustin Sklavos - Friday, March 30, 2012 - link
I actually use four in my tower.1. Optical drive.
2. Fan controller.
3. Card reader.
4. Hotswap bay.
I do understand reducing the number in modern enclosure and I'm definitely an unusual instance, but notice how I have a whopping one optical drive yet I'm using four bays.
ShieTar - Friday, March 30, 2012 - link
My fileserver box also uses four 5.25" bays:1. Optical drive.
2. 1x3.5" toolless hotswap bay
3. 2x2.5" toolless hotswap bay
4. Card reader.
Maybe not quiet typical, but not really a rarity either.
Of course I built it into my old Coolermaster Stacker 800, which does provide me with an overkill of eleven 5.25" bays, and only a single adapter for 3.5" units. With the Card Reader and the 2.5" Hotswap you do have some flexibility to use either sizing, I guess.
Rick83 - Friday, March 30, 2012 - link
No such thing as overkill.I've got the same original Stacker, and I'm left with one free 5.25 slot (and theoretically a disk I could put there, but ATA cables are too short to connect it, so it floats freely in the case :( )
I bemoan the loss of cases such as the Stacker, because right now, I'd be hard pressed to find a case that comfortably fits 12 hdd's below $250, with decent ventilation or hot-swap. There certainly is a use case for all those 5.25" slots. It's just, that it's not for the average user, who has between one and three 3.5" HDDs, and an optical drive or rarely two.
My current desktop has zero 5.25" bays, (no, I don't mean devices, I mean bays - ODD is SFF slot-in). Optical media is on the way down though, so this should hasten the demise of the three to four bay designs, which I find ugly and boring.
Anyway, it seems that case makers are loath to cater to more exotic needs, and will instead churn out the billionth iteration of a 20 year old design. There are very few makers who come out with avant-garde designs, and usually at extreme price points (that Lian-Li Snail is a brilliantly eccentric looking thing, but the price is out there), so the main stream is stuck with those 60-120 dollar cases, that all look the same, except some have got chintzy plastics and lighting.
Oh well, I haven't given up quite yet, and at least Lian Li is continuing to explore the cube, with it's more pleasing aspect ratios. All the while: Someone bring back the old school Stacker - style cases. That case is, for me, still the ultimate in understated performance and utility, excepting the odd choice of 80mm fans in some places. It's got the size and fittings so that you can do anything with it, and the price wasn't even that extreme (compared to some current 300$+ cases...)
Grandpa - Friday, March 30, 2012 - link
Thank you for acknowledging noise as an issue. So many times the important thing is how much overclock with complete disregard for noise. To me, I don't care how fast a machine is if I can't enjoy the experience. So noise is always a top consideration. I wish there was a standard method of measuring the noise so it could be used in every review, for every part, and every build.cactusdog - Friday, March 30, 2012 - link
A silent computer has more to do with the components you buy like CPU cooler and GPU cooler. The case just needs 120mm fans running at 1000-1200 RPM or under to be silent, but more important is your GPU fan, CPU fan and PSU fan.My case is silent even with the side off, and I have an overclocked 930 CPU and overclocked 6970.