Cooler Master MasterCase H500M Review: Expensive, but Excellent

mlee 2500

Honorable
Oct 20, 2014
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This grabbed my attention because it's good to see LARGE fans supplanting the trend of many smaller fans. Large fans can move more air at a lower rotational speed, which means they are MUCH quieter, and the sound they *do* make tends to be lower frequency and therefore less audible or annoying.

One of the quietest workstations chassis I ever used was an old Sun Microsystems U20 case with a single 192mm exhaust fan in back. That 192mm fan drew it's air from a front panel which was so air permeable that it didn't even NEED or have front intake fans at all.

I've wondered ever since why this wasn't more common or standard.

 

thrakazog

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Aug 16, 2011
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18,690
Naming every case they make "H500xxx" should make it really easy to choose the right case............ .................. ...............
 

pawinda

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Mar 27, 2017
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In your pictures, you show a Corsair liquid cooler but your test config doesn't list it. Did you obtain the temperature readings with only the normal case air flow at stock configuration? I've avoided the 7900x because of your excellent paper on its thermal problems because of TIM vs STIM. But the readings in this review for thermal performance of the case with the 7900x are causing me to reconsider this CPU which would greatly help to resolve my PCIe lane requirements. Any further info on test config greatly appreciated.
 

stevenlynch

Contributing Writer
Editor
Oct 4, 2017
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@PAWINDA / BTMEDIC04 Testing for fitment issues / hardware compatibility, we test each chassis with a number of different motherboards, coolers, PSUs, GPUs. If a company includes a feature like a GPU bracket, we use a card long enough to test it. When companies claims E-ATX support we check that as well etc. etc. and so on.

When it comes to Thermal / Acoustic performance, we use the exact same set of hardware on every case to make sure our results are as consistant as possible.

Thanks for the questions, I hope that helps!
 

pawinda

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Mar 27, 2017
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I would really like to know if a liquid cooler was used during the thermal testing or are the pictures of it simply to illustrate installation options. Thanks.
 

pawinda

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Mar 27, 2017
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Steven, on your review of the comparison case NZXT H700i you specifically cite a Cooler Master Hyper T4 air cooler as part of the test configuration. For the H500M there is no reference to any air or liquid cooler under the "Test Configuration" though there is reference to Arctic MX-4 TIM. Was a liquid or air cooler mounted to the X7900 during thermal testing? Thanks.
 

stevenlynch

Contributing Writer
Editor
Oct 4, 2017
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@PAWINDA, Hmmm, it seems as though the website is not displaying the list of system components correctly. We use a Cooler Master MasterLiquid ML240R RGB for all of our testing on our new X7900 test platform. Thanks for the extra set of eyes, we will get that fixed ASAP!
 

pawinda

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Mar 27, 2017
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Steven, one more clarification. Your reply says ML240R but the corrected test config says ml360r. Which is correct? Thanks.
 

pawinda

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Mar 27, 2017
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Steven, just as a follow up, the Enermax Saberay RGB Case review from August 31, 2018, on Tom's Hardware lists the same Cooler Master Masterliquid ML360R in the 'Test Configuration' section.
 

pawinda

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Mar 27, 2017
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Steven, thanks for the clarification. Makes my build decisions easier. And thanks to Tom's Hardware for your concise and thorough analysis of the Core X's use of TIM and the thermal concerns it raises.
 
Oct 4, 2018
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thank you for sharing this review..my computer cooler just broke and i couldn't decided on which to buy but you made my choise easier..and i can start working on my projects with do your project here services