Review
- Introduction
- Packaging and Specifications
- External Impressions
- Internal Impressions Part 1
- Internal Impressions Part 2
- Comparison: Corsair 400R and Coolermaster 690II Plus
- Installation Experience and Conclusion
If you are familiar with CM 690s design, there’s really nothing really new to see- except 2x 120mm section on the base (I haven’t seen a CM 690 for some time now). To sum it all up, the front and top panel are meshed with a plastic chromed trimmings on both ends of the panels and dust filters all the way, with Coolermaster’s logo on the front.
Starting from the top panel, there’s your Power/HDD activity LED light just above the Fan LED On/Off button from the left, when you have the 2X USB 3.0 ports, followed by the audio ports, 2x USB 2.0 ports, Power and Reset button above it. There’s a small recessed area which usually has the X-Dock connector (Note: If you want the X-Dock connector, Advanced version is what you need to be looking at). After that its nothing but meshed vents all the way to the end.
Towards the rear, there are 2x grommets to route the water tubes through, with a 120mm fan pre-installed (no- you can’t mount a 140mm fans- and there are no washers on the fan mounts) and below it there are 7 pci slot covers (not vented) with +1 pci bracket vertically towards the right of the pci slots. As you can see both the panels are secured by thumbscrews. The PSU is bottom mounted and those are pretty thick rear case feet.
This is the part which I like about CM 690 compared to 400R: I/O is of solid built and there’s significantly lesser flexing compared to 400R- even after removing all the PCI slots.
On the left side panel panel, you can install 2x 80/92/120/140mm fans. If you do want to use push more air in, you will need dust filters and unfortunately you don’t with this case. The right side panel allows you to install 80mm fan- provided its 15mm in thickness. I haven’t seen anyone using it on the rear- yet. If you have a well ventilated case then you’re going to ignore this one.
The case feets are pretty neat. Does the job to keep the case in place. You can remove the fan filters in the area below the HDD bay, where you can install a 120mm fan on the base and install a 240mm rad provided you remove a part of HDD bay from the inside. The filters slips in from all corners and also there’s a hook at the centre of the 120mm fan vents to keep it in place.
Unfortunately, its not the same with the meshed area below the power supply. It could have been done on the same way but Coolermaster preferred to keep the filter sandwiched between the base and the power supply. The base of the case also is pretty strong compared to 400R’s base, even with 2x 120mm fan mesh and the meshed section for the power supply’s fan.
