Thermaltake's Core V1 Case is Small but Capable

News
By Niels Broekhuijsen
published

Thermaltake's new Core V1 case can house a nice Mini-ITX gaming system.

Thermaltake is showcasing its Core V1 Mini-ITX PC, a case that is quite small yet could house a very decent gaming system.

The case measures 267 x 260 x 316 mm. Inside the case you can fit a horizontally-mounted Mini-ITX motherboard, a graphics card up to 255 mm long (or 285 mm in some cases), along with two 3.5" drives and another two 2.5" drives. All of this can be powered by a standard ATX power supply.

For cooling, Thermaltake has given the case support for up to a 200 mm fan up front for air intake and two 80 mm rear exhaust fans. The front of the chassis also supports both 120 mm and 140 mm radiators, and Thermaltake includes a 200 mm fan standard, which spins at up to 800 RPM.

Then there are the side panels. These are symmetrical, and thus can be swapped interchangeably to suit your needs. The top of the case has an acrylic top window. Front I/O connectivity is provided by two USB 3.0 ports and the standard set of HD audio jacks.

There is no exact word on pricing or availability just yet.

Follow Niels Broekhuijsen @NBroekhuijsen. Follow us @tomshardware, on Facebook and on Google+.

Niels Broekhuijsen
Niels Broekhuijsen

Niels Broekhuijsen is a Contributing Writer for Tom's Hardware US. He reviews cases, water cooling and pc builds.

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16 Comments Comment from the forums
  • PennyLife
    Good idea and like the overall design, but cable management looks like a nightmare and noise might be a problem if you go for performance parts.
    Reply
  • jbheller
    I am concerned that the design uses 80mm fans. I thought we had moved on from that. Either they will not blow enough air, or be too noisy when driven at high RPM.I suppose if you use a couple of Noctua NF-R8 PWM 80mm Case Fans you could get some effective, quiet cooling, but these are $20 each. Is there any front air filters?
    Reply
  • Novuake
    The miniITXs are becoming more and more attractive.

    I just wish that GPUs manufacturers would make more blower designs for their cards, I really do no want that hot air in such a small chassis coupled with 80mm fans.

    Maybe 140mm radiator in from that somehow exhausts air could work.
    Reply
  • RazberyBandit
    A square box with a lot of holes in it? No thanks, Tt. Here's hoping the V2 offers more.
    Reply
  • Haravikk
    It seems like quite a nice case, but I'd rather they had gone for an SFX power supply, as
    they could have then moved the motherboard down, made the case a couple centimetres taller, and allow for a bigger exhaust fan. There's not much point having a nice slow, quiet 200mm front fan if you've got 80mm fans struggling to then get rid of the hot air.
    Reply
  • ubercake
    I like the minimalist design. Seems like it's all you would need in an ITX case even supporting full-sized power supplies.

    Like jbheller, I have reservations about 80mm fan noise. If they could figure in a mount for a single 120 or 140 off the back of the top-back, this would be good.

    Also, if someone could come up with a way to incorporate a TV tuner on an ITX motherboard and the complimentary coax connection off the back, it would make for the ultimate compact gaming/HTPC combo. Tablo or Simple.TV (or other varios devices) could cover this for the whole home network if they never did incorporate it, though.

    All in all this case seems pretty good, but I'd be curious to see how the drive mounts fit into the design.
    Reply
  • lp231
    This case only has 2x 3.5" bays that also has mounting holes for 2.5" drives. If you install a HDD on both of them, there is no room to install a SSD.
    Also this case seems to lack any cable management. All your PSU wires are bunched up and stuffed in the front.
    Reply
  • DarkSable
    This case only has 2x 3.5" bays that also has mounting holes for 2.5" drives. If you install a HDD on both of them, there is no room to install a SSD.
    Also this case seems to lack any cable management. All your PSU wires are bunched up and stuffed in the front.

    ...seriously dude? So stick a SSD on the wall. Or on top of the hard drives. Or upside down underneath the motherboard. They don't have moving parts, so there is no reason for them to have to go in regular hard drive slots.

    Also, regarding cable management, that's one of the sacrifices you have to make to get very small form factors, unfortunately. I'll admit that this doesn't have much room, and that the photo did not do a good job of cable management, but with a decent PSU with the OEM's shorter cables, it wouldn't be too much of a worry.
    Reply
  • ubercake
    13846509 said:
    ...So stick a SSD on the wall. Or on top of the hard drives. Or upside down underneath the motherboard. They don't have moving parts, so there is no reason for them to have to go in regular hard drive slots.
    ...
    Where no mounts are available, Velcro always works well when it comes to mounting SSDs.

    It's good to know there won't be any included mounts once two HDDs take up the space in this case though.

    From a cable management standpoint, I'm thinking a good 550W or 650W modular would be good in this case with velcro zip ties. It's all about the velcro.
    Reply
  • lp231
    13846509 said:
    This case only has 2x 3.5" bays that also has mounting holes for 2.5" drives. If you install a HDD on both of them, there is no room to install a SSD.
    Also this case seems to lack any cable management. All your PSU wires are bunched up and stuffed in the front.

    ...seriously dude? So stick a SSD on the wall. Or on top of the hard drives. Or upside down underneath the motherboard. They don't have moving parts, so there is no reason for them to have to go in regular hard drive slots.

    Also, regarding cable management, that's one of the sacrifices you have to make to get very small form factors, unfortunately. I'll admit that this doesn't have much room, and that the photo did not do a good job of cable management, but with a decent PSU with the OEM's shorter cables, it wouldn't be too much of a worry.
    The article sounds like you can install all 4 drives (2 HDDs and 2 SSDs) all at the same time, but that is not the case, so I made that post to clear things up.
    I know you can install the SSD almost anywhere, like velcro tape on to the wings of a Boeing 747. Don't forget to buy extremely long SATA and power cables. But these don't exist, so a call to the factory is required. Just ask them to make one with the length of 25,000 miles or 41,000 kilometers.
    Most setup will just have 1 SSD + 1 HDD, so there is no point of even using velcro.


    Reply