Corsair Obsidian 900D Case Review: Think Big, That's Only HALF as Large
by Dustin Sklavos on April 16, 2013 11:00 AM EST- Posted in
- Cases/Cooling/PSUs
- Corsair
- Water Cooling
- ATX
- XL-ATX
Conclusion: Highly Priced and Highly Specialized
It should go without saying at this point that Joe Everybuilder isn't going to be interested in spending $349 to cool his single CPU, single GPU, air-cooled build. The Corsair 900D positively dwarfs our full fat testbed and really, it would take serious work to fill up this case anyhow.
My primary concern when reviewing most cases is ultimately how they perform thermally and acoustically, with aesthetics taking a bit of a backseat. If a case is hideous but does its job really well (looking at you, Antec GX700), and the price is right, sacrifices can be made. The 900D is a different beast entirely, though; airflow design and stock performance just aren't part of the equation, and anyone who buys the 900D and then uses it in its stock configuration is someone who has more money than sense. I can tell you that with the pair of closed loop coolers I've installed in my Nanoxia Deep Silence 1 (Swiftech H220 on the CPU and Arctic Accelero Hybrid on the GTX 680), Nanoxia's airflow design and fan control became somewhat less important. Note that this design, coupled with a Noctua fan wherever I could put one, allows my ~$109 case to very effectively cool a 4.6GHz i7-3770K and a GTX 680 overclocked as far as the silicon itself will allow under NVIDIA's voltage spec. I bring all of that up to give you perspective on the 900D and its potential position in your computing life.
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The 900D is exceptionally well built, and outside of the expansion slots, it's easy to assemble. At $349 it prices itself right out of contention for the vast majority of users, and the fact that it's an underwhelming choice for air cooling further shrinks its niche. That makes it a strange sort of halo product and while liquid cooling enthusiasts will probably love it, they were already reasonably well served by the 800D. At $49 more it's not unreasonable to just make the jump to the 900D if you were going to buy the 800D in the first place. I do think for the price Corsair could've sucked it up and included the other two drive cages, but I have a hard time sweating the case still shipping with nine cages.
If I'm a bit ambivalent about the 900D, it's for two reasons: one, I had to actually build and move the thing, which wasn't fun, and two, I'm not really sure anyone really needed it. The 800D was already popular and doing well on its own, so Corsair just made a better one. That's fine, but the majority of their case line is going unaddressed. A little birdie told me I'll be seeing something new and exciting from them soon, but they're at the point now where they need to start actually refreshing and improving existing designs. More than that, air cooling has always been a weak point in Corsair's portfolio, and it's something that desperately needs to be addressed.
This is another one of those cases where you already know if you want it or not. Whether or not it's worth the money is subjective; I feel like if I were a liquid cooling enthusiast, the Corsair Obsidian 900D would be pretty close to the holy grail. I'm not sure I'd fork over the cash for it, but in its weird way I don't think the price is actually even part of the discussion. If you do pony up for it and you know what you're planning to do with it, I think you'll be happy with the 900D.
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Ubercake - Wednesday, April 17, 2013 - link
Looks a little smaller than my Thermaltake Spedo. I do like it though.Even without water, it's really easy to work in a case this large.
Ubercake - Wednesday, April 17, 2013 - link
It's actually bigger front to back, but not as tall.Ubercake - Wednesday, April 17, 2013 - link
Dimensions are actually bigger all the way around on the 900D. It just doesn't look that way. The spedo has 2 rear 120s. I wish more newer cases had these.truprecht - Wednesday, April 17, 2013 - link
That's not a computer case, that's furniture.nleksan - Wednesday, April 17, 2013 - link
I have been water cooling for a long time, and I have owned a lot of "water cooling cases", some of which were good, a few of which are truly great, but the majority of which are frankly terrible for one reason or another. This is a very niche market and it is one that demands perfection at such a price point as the 900D is attempting to compete, but the sad fact is that most people are going to buy this case simply because it has the (frankly worthless) Corsair name attached to it.I have two fully liquid cooled builds right now, the first is in a Switch 810, without doubt the most capable water cooling case anywhere near it's price range, with as much radiator space, if not more, than the nearly 2.5x pricier 800D.
The other build is at the opposite end of the price spectrum, sitting in a custom made fully equipped Case Labs TH10 (XL Pedestal, 120mm Extension up top, etc) with 4x 560 + 1x 420 + 2x 360 radiators all cooling the system. It makes the monolithic 800D look like a SFF case in comparison, and the build quality is simply so far ahead as to be indescribable.
Which brings me to the point... Case Labs now offers the SM5 and SM8 cases at the same or lower prices than the 900D, but with nearly limitless customizability, build quality that is unrivaled, and small touches absent on anything from the company that Corsair has become.
I simply don't see why this case would sell, it's as much a dinosaur as it's circa 2008 brother...
Biggestinsect - Wednesday, April 17, 2013 - link
Confounds me how most tech sites get all revved up about this case but seem to be unaware of any of CaseLabs' offerings. Corsair and especially higher end stuff from Lian Li and Silverstone have nothing near the build quality at any price point.cjs150 - Friday, April 19, 2013 - link
I love my TJ07 but totally agree about the build quality. Holes not perfectly aligned, lack of cable management etc. Case labs looks a lot better (also like mountain mods) on biold qualityhyperdoggy - Thursday, April 18, 2013 - link
Oh wow, the window is flushed with the side panel, that is awesome! normally case windows looks like someone broke the window on the side panel and they ghetto attach some acrylic on till they can afford to fix it, fine for a sub $100 case, big no no on a $200+ case.isorashi - Thursday, April 18, 2013 - link
+1: Fluke referenceZoeAnderson24 - Monday, April 22, 2013 - link
uptil I looked at the draft of $4237, I have faith that...my... father in law woz like they say actualey receiving money in there spare time from their laptop.. there dads buddy haz done this for only about ten months and just repayed the loans on there home and got a new Jaguar XJ. go to, All29.comCHECK IT OUT