The Cadre P5's Façade

Out of the box the Core P5 looks similar something you might throw in a rack server. The trunk of the case measures merely 50mm wide, though it is the bulk of the instance. From here you can attach iv chrome standoffs for the acrylic window and an optional pair of feet at the bottom for vertical desktop mounting.

The kickoff thing you'll want to exercise is attach the expansion slots to the Core P5 in training for the motherboard installation. There are two means of going near this depending on your preference and hardware selected for the build.

Disappointingly, the user manual leaves a lot to be desired, and while the installation procedure isn't overly circuitous, it is unorthodox, which would make clearer documentation appreciated.

After some messing almost it became clear that the Cadre P5 supports the more than traditional expansion card position as well every bit a less conventional method using riser cables.

The riser cable method is squeamish because it makes installing and removing the graphics card(s) much easier when the Core P5 is mounted vertically. That said, the real reason for this is to allow gamers to meliorate show off their graphics card. Regardless of how you mount the graphics cards they will be limited to a length of 280mm with a reservoir installed or 320mm without. That said, technically, without a reservoir installed there is no length limitation.

Other notable features that can be fastened to the surface of the Core P5 include a PSU mounting bracket and back up, and an optical 3.v" drive cage. The Core P5 will support power supplies of any length really, though Thermaltake specifies a maximum length of 200mm.

This limitation likely comes near past assuming a liquid-cooling reservoir will be installed. Without a reservoir there is zero limiting the length of the PSU. That said, nosotros should point out that fifty-fifty at 200mm long it will be extremely difficult to route the cables through the cable direction hole located directly behind the back of the PSU, assuming it's no more than 180mm long. Covering this pigsty will make it extremely hard to create a keen build with the Core P5 assuming you are non handy plenty to dremel out your own.

The motherboard location supports the Mini-ITX, Micro ATX and Standard ATX form factors and as expected at that place is a huge cutout backside the motherboard tray for rear access. That said, there is a mounting plate on the rear side that blocks a practiced portion of this rear access and removing it to install CPU coolers is a real pain.

There are plenty of cable management holes and while some of them are well placed, many aren't. Quite a few of them dorsum onto the aforementioned mounting plate that blocked part of the motherboard tray pigsty and this makes routing cables more difficult than it should exist.

A unmarried 3.5" or 2.5" storage device can be shown off on the front side of the Core P5 and for testing we tried a WD Cerise Pro 4TB difficult drive as well as an OCZ Vector 180 480GB SSD.

The unabridged right side of the Core P5 is dominated by a long ventilated panel featuring numerous 120mm and 140mm mounting points. This department of the example is designed to suit radiator(s) ranging from just 120mm in size all the way up to 480mm and for this review we will be installing a 420mm radiator with three 140mm fans.

That said, if you don't wish to install a radiator here it is possible to mountain a number of 2.v" or 3.5" drives along the ventilated section.

In each of the Core P5'southward corners are mounting holes for the supplied four chrome stand up-offs that support the acrylic window. The window is offset past 190mm, which is a massive amount of headroom, simply Thermaltake needed this room to adjust the hoses in their liquid-cooling kits. Those not opting for liquid-cooling will take a CPU cooler height limitation of 180mm, which is more than than plenty to install any tower cooler on the market.

The window is 5mm thick which is probably the thickest acrylic window we have seen on a figurer case, though with at least 530mm separating the mounting points the window needed to be thick in guild to avoid flexing. The acrylic window is hard to proceed clean and you accept to be wary of what you use to avoid scratching the surface, which is incredibly like shooting fish in a barrel to exercise with acrylic.

This is one of the central advantages to using glass, and while nosotros understand the costs involved we would dear to run across a glass version of the Core P5 every bit nosotros would happily pay more for the more durable and higher quality material.