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Cooler Master Storm Sniper |
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Written by Vladimir Dimitrijevic
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Friday, 13 March 2009 |
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Page 2 of 4
Cooler Master also implemented feature that we haven’t seen so far: you can disable lighting (LED) on fans without switching off them completely. Button on big knob has that function. Brilliant! Blue lights are nice but there are some of us that actually like our chassis to be dark so it is nice to see that Cooler Master paid attention even to small details like this one. Of course for this option to function, every fan must have separate wire for fan LEDs but those are available from most other manufacturers and of course from Cooler Master itself. Cooler Master in its product portfolio has 200mm and 120mm fans with separate LED power wire so you can have all 5 fans controlled by control unit used in Storm Sniper chassis.
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Besides fan controller on same place, top side, are located: eSATA, 4 USB 2.0 connectors, FireWire and audio connectors (head phones and microphone). Power and reset buttons are also located at top side. Power button is really big and Reset button cannot be pressed by accident. Of course there was enough space for two LEDs: power and HDD.
Top and bottom side can be dismounted because they are actually made of plastics. Actual process of dismounting top and bottom sides is very simple. When top side is dismounted you can see mounting place for double water cooling radiator with holes for hoses at the back side. Top side of this chassis has also another function. When you are carrying your chassis to the LAN party, the easiest way to carry it around is to hold it for its top side so tunnel on top side can be used just for that. Dismounted bottom side allows access to bottom air filter that protects 140mm fan located at bottom side. Chassis stands are surprisingly big and can be rotated to provide additional stability for this chassis. In case you don’t like these stands, Cooler Master provided additional rubber stands that can be found in the package.
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Mounting of 5.25 inch devices is simple and dismounting of masks is easy. Process involves inserting device into bay and pressing locking button on the side. To gain access to interior of this chassis, it’s enough to unscrew large head screws at the back. There are five 5.25 inch bays but one of them can be transformed into 3.5 inch slot thanks to provided metal bracket. Main power supply mounting position is at the bottom of this chassis. Power supply that sucks air and takes it into interior of the chassis, should be used because of air flow in this chassis. Mounting place for motherboards has holes for mounting of CPU coolers and water blocks that have custom back plate. All cables can be nicely hidden to provide best air flow inside the chassis. PCI cards can be also mounted without any tools thanks to plastic clips.
Often during LAN parties you need to leave your rig unguarded and sometimes some of your components can be stolen. Cooler Master covered that scenario by providing simple solution to that problem. Plate made of plastics, that can be found at the back side, should be used for USB and PC/2 peripherals when connecting them to appropriate connectors on the motherboard. This way if someone tries to steal your mouse or keyboard (webcam, headphones etc) he will pull whole chassis with him. Of course this will save your peripherals from being stolen but they can get damaged in the process. This mechanism isn’t perfect but it is nice to see that someone is thinking about this details.
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