Corsair Obsidian 750D Case Review
by Dustin Sklavos on September 24, 2013 6:00 AM EST- Posted in
- Cases/Cooling/PSUs
- Corsair
- ATX
- Case
The script for Corsair cases is pretty much down pat at this point. You can expect ease of assembly, clean design, great liquid cooling support, and middle of the road air cooling stock performance. In these respects, the Obsidian 750D is a pleasant surprise; air cooling performance isn't pack leading, but it's slightly better than just competitive until you start really beating on the system. I'd come into this review having a clear idea of what to expect, but everyone loves when their expectations are exceeded, and that was true of the 750D.
To be certain, the 750D isn't a total, market-crushing homerun. Corsair has yet to really hit one of those, but this is at least an excellent entry in their portfolio. Usability has always been their strong suit and the 750D continues to improve on that; there simply isn't another company that makes easier cases to build in. The toolless 2.5" drive caddies hammer that home. SSDs continue to be a usability hiccup with modern enclosures, and only Corsair and NZXT seem to really be thinking outside the box here. We also continue to get solid build quality, good looks, and excellent liquid cooling support.
Corsair's seemingly ancient struggle with air cooling performance is starting to finally wane, but their balanced approach with the 750D's fans sacrifices performance in overclocked multi-GPU configurations. The old ATX standard is something Corsair continues to have issues with; only their exotic Carbide Air 540 is really able to offer a solid balance between liquid cooling support and air cooling performance. The cabling issues that spring up around their otherwise innovative SSD mounting system are also a small scratch on their otherwise excellent usability record.
The net result is that the 750D is exceptional, but still requires at least a little specialization. I think it's worth the $159 and I suspect any watercooling enthusiasts out there looking for something solid from Corsair that didn't cost an arm and a leg and weigh twice that much will be happy to see it; in some ways this is really a 900D for the rest of us. Corsair's case designs continue to grow and evolve and they're quickly becoming the new Antec (as that company seems to have unceremoniously ceded the case market they used to own), and the 750D is at least another interesting step on that road.
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alincioaba - Tuesday, September 24, 2013 - link
The 3.5" cages are stackable that's good... my question is can you add an extra one (provided that corsair will sell you one)?garadante - Tuesday, September 24, 2013 - link
Sure looks like it, as that's what they offered with the 900D. Perhaps the drive cages are even identical? I know the 900D came with 2 or 3 drive caves but you could have 5 installed total I think.Grok42 - Tuesday, September 24, 2013 - link
Not my choice of case for other reasons but I have to give them a lot of credit for being able to stack cages and selling additional ones. Now if they would only sell 2.5" in addition to 3.5" cages.BillyTheBigBone - Friday, February 14, 2014 - link
yes you can. I ordered one from them.Alan G - Tuesday, September 24, 2013 - link
In this day and age, two USB 2.0 along with two USB 3.0 ports on the front panel? Why?DanNeely - Tuesday, September 24, 2013 - link
At $159 "it's cheaper" isn't a good excuse; but I'm sure that's still part of it. Probably Corsair's explanation if asked would be that a lot of mid range mobos still only have a single USB3 header and very few people would be plugging in 3 USB3 devices at once anyway.IMO the better option would be to include either a short adapter cable to connect a USB3 cable to a USB2 header, or to wire the second connector onto the cable itself like the dual connector cable you often see on front panel audio. I'd prefer the first option because it lets people with 2 USB3 headers toss the adapter in their junkbox and have a cleaner build.
Liquid_Static - Tuesday, September 24, 2013 - link
What else is going to go there...LB-ID - Tuesday, September 24, 2013 - link
I was doing a fresh Win7 install on a new computer the other day, couldn't figure out why the keyboard and mouse kept going dead during the install process. Figured out it was lack of USB3 support on the OS, so was very very happy to have a couple of USB2 ports on my Nanoxia DS1. Sometimes it pays to have backwards compatibility available...Threnx - Tuesday, September 24, 2013 - link
I would like it a lot more without the gaudy window. It's 2013, who still thinks those look good? They should go the way of lighted LED fans.flemeister - Tuesday, September 24, 2013 - link
Not you, evidently! =DI love the look of a clean side panel window, free of any ugly fan grills. And anyway, it's 2013, where an all-black interior is now pretty much standard for ATX cases. More and more PSU's come with decent looking cables, whether just black insulation on the wiring, or braided sleeving installed by default. And it's *very* easy to find nice looking motherboards and video cards now, compared to ~2009 and earlier. There's been no better (or easier) time to show off the guts of your rig! =)