Corsair Obsidian 350D Case Review
by Dustin Sklavos on April 25, 2013 11:00 AM EST- Posted in
- Cases/Cooling/PSUs
- Corsair
- MicroATX
Conclusion: Might Be What You Were Waiting For
I have to speak candidly: I haven't been particularly impressed with the last couple of releases from Corsair. Their initial enclosure offerings started out fairly strong; the 800D is a good halo product, the 700D made it more accessible, and the Graphite 600T continues to be an attractive and unique enclosure. There was a very clear chain of progress as Corsair gradually began fleshing out less and less expensive enclosures in their lineup, right up until it seemed like they jumped the shark with the Vengeance C70. The C70 isn't a bad case, but it didn't address what had increasingly been the major failing of Corsair's enclosures: thermal performance. Corsair's cases were never terrible at air cooling, but they were consistently getting co-opted for more forgiving liquid cooling.
After the C70 we had the Carbide 200R, which proved (to me, at least) that you could build a Corsair enclosure too cheaply. I know a lot of people really liked the Obsidian 900D and I can't hold court against it, but it wasn't what I wanted to see from Corsair. It wasn't what I was asking for, and it wasn't really progress for them, just the natural extension of what we already knew they were good at.
I may be heavily biased towards the Obsidian 350D, though. I like small cases, and I really like small cases with big ambitions. The 350D is yet further evidence that Corsair can produce a halfway decent liquid cooling case, but it also demonstrates more of a willingness to innovate than many of the previous enclosures have. A good liquid cooling micro-ATX enclosure is a lot dicier a proposition; you can gamble with a Xigmatek or one of the five million Lian Li models out there, but the 350D feels singularly purpose driven.
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There are some really daring decisions inside the 350D if you're willing to look for them. Including not just the mounts but the headroom for a 280mm radiator in a micro-ATX case is gutsy. Deprecating 5.25" drive bays is par for the course for a micro-ATX enclosure, but look at how Corsair deprecated the 3.5" drive bays. The 2.5" and 3.5" cages are removable, but in many ways it seems clear to me that Corsair doesn't intend for that bottom cage to stay there, and the fact that it only holds two drives further cements that notion. Meanwhile the 2.5" cage is an oddly stackable design, where individual trays can be added or removed as needed. It's also toolless, which pays due to the fact that 2.5" drives and especially SSDs are increasingly the direction things are moving in. This year is seeing the release of terabyte SSDs from multiple different vendors, all in that 2.5" form factor.
Ultimately I think the 350D is like a breath of life from a company that seemed like it was slowly becoming conservative and resting on its laurels. Corsair already fleshed out their case line; they're at the stage where they need to innovate (oh I do hate that buzzword) and while you can argue that the 900D fell along those lines, many of their other recent releases did not. But the Obsidian 350D is in many ways a case that I personally wanted. As I mentioned before, micro-ATX cases have an unusual tendency toward some kind of specialization, and Corsair gave us one that had at least some aspirations towards being a strong liquid cooling enclosure, something genuinely rarefied up until this point.
The price is right, the build quality is there, and the ease of assembly is there. Corsair was able to bring the Obsidian aesthetic and increasingly its philosophy down to a new price point, and while stock cooling is only slightly less underwhelming than the 900D's was, everything else lines up pretty well. No one else is going to give you a micro-ATX case with a 280mm radiator mount, let alone one as well built and easy to use as this one is, and Corsair's not gouging you for it, either. I'd say that makes it Bronze Editor's Choice award material.
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ghm3 - Thursday, April 25, 2013 - link
I do, I got a 5.25" drive cage to stuff 6 SSDs into my Silverstone TJ08-E.CrimsonFury - Thursday, May 9, 2013 - link
There are a few options if you are after a smaller mATX tower.Lian-Li do a very small matx tower. 1x optical bay, 7x HDD bays PSU is mounted over the motherboard (does limit tower heatsinks, but fits many mid sized heatsinks)
The Silverstone TJ 08-E is another option, it does still have 2x optical bays, but it mounts the PSU up top instead of leaving radiator space, so its quite a bit shorter in height and depth than than the Corsair 350D. Has a 180mm intake and 120mm exhaust (they also do a variant with 2x120mm intake, but I forget the the model name). Still has room for 1x radiator up front is you sacrifice some of the HDD bays.
Gunbuster - Thursday, April 25, 2013 - link
Does it come with a phantom tea cup like in the main photo?just4U - Thursday, April 25, 2013 - link
Did you guys notice? Even Dustin's wiring looked a little better. Damn Corsair is GOOD! (lol im kidding Dustin GREAT REVIEW!) I think your Bronze award was a little conservative, did you do that because you thought you might have gotten a little biased?Rolphus - Thursday, April 25, 2013 - link
This looks like a lovely case, but I'd have preferred to see it hit with a lot more thermal load in testing. I have a Silverstone TJ-08 with an i5-2500K (at 4GHz), and 2 GTX 580s in SLI. The case (just about) keeps up with that level of load, but I'd be interested in how well the Corsair does with something similar.scook9 - Thursday, April 25, 2013 - link
Great review! I have been very excited to see more about this case since the 900D came out. What you really need to do is compare this to the Antec Mini P180. I know it is discontinued but it was easily THE mATX case to build a system in back in its day (my server is still in mine as I grew to full ATX and a 700D). I do not even have a need for this case but want to just get one because hahamkygod - Thursday, April 25, 2013 - link
This is what is considered a Micro ATX case now? Good lord. It's actually a bit taller and wider than my Antec P150 full ATX case. Is the size increase the price you pay for having a case that supports water cooling? If that's the case, I want to see Corsair make some cases that aren't designed with watercooling in mind.antef - Thursday, April 25, 2013 - link
As I mentioned in the Fractal Design Define Mini review, I completely agree that cases like this should barely be considered "micro"-anything. They could be a lot smaller, and I feel like manufacturers are just afraid to because they think people want bigger everything. Then why even make a MicroATX case? Check out the SilverStone Precision PS07, it's only 14.7" tall, 15.75" deep, and 11.46 lbs. Can hold any size video card, 2 drives without the cage, a ton more with the cage, and plenty of spots for 120mm fans. I don't know why they need to make them any bigger.Jumpman23 - Thursday, April 25, 2013 - link
Does the optical bay include a face plate? It breaks the smoothness of the front view without a face plate to sit flush with the front cover.MadMan007 - Thursday, April 25, 2013 - link
I like this case, the layout and design decisions seem well-thought out and the front is attractive. It still includes 2 5.25" bays for those of us who use optical drives, for those who don't they allow for a radiator or 3.5" drives.The one shortcoming imo is the limited number of 3.5" bays. The 2.5" bay stack is a neat feature, but since it's completely removable using that space for 3.5" bays (which can obviously hold 2.5" drives as well) would give more options. It would make things very tight near the frint edge of a mATX board but it would still fit. With the low idle power draw of modern systems, using a main PC as file storage and serving makes more sense than it used to. If Corsair came out with an optional 3.5" rack to go where those 2.5" bays are the case would be even more flexible - add one, get 2 more 3.5" bays without blocking the intake fan, add 2 (for 4 drives) for maximum storage.