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Benchmarks & Conclusion
After letting the Steelwing bake for several hours, we came back to find that it was unable to keep two of the CPU cores from throttling. The lower-than-expected temperature of the graphics card reflects the disproportionate airflow received from the low mounting position of the case’s front intake fan.
The large opening at the front of the case seems to offset any noise-reducing benefit gained by the Steelwing’s stiff aluminum and tempered glass construction.
Thanks to the poor results from its thermal and noise benchmarks, the Steelwing finds itself in last place in our temperature-to-noise comparison.
Fractal Design’s Define Nano S remains the case to beat, with the Steelwing’s $150 price tag barely pulling it ahead of the more efficient, but significantly more expensive, Antec Cube.
The Enermax Steelwing is a good-looking case with a price tag that isn’t all that high once you consider the quality of the materials and craftsmanship involved. However, it seems Enermax somehow lost its way in its endeavor to make the Steelwing as compact as possible. Ultimately, it seems said endeavor got out of hand and turned what could have been one of the better compact cases we’ve tested into a loud, hot mess that teases you with the potential power of the Micro-ATX platform but never actually lets you use it.
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