Silverstone Raven RV03: User review, lessons learned, and build log

Balthazor

Gawd
Joined
May 18, 2006
Messages
688
I know there are a few users interested in this case, or users of the RV02 who might be curious, so I'm duplicating my post regarding my experience with the RV03 to date.

Sorry for the poor quality images. My wife has the 'good' camera.

Planned build:

RV03
Antec HCP-1200 -> You have to untwist a particlar twist tie to make this work, see details below
Gigabyte G1 Sniper motherboard
990-X
3 x 4 GB G-Skill DIMMs
2 x SATA3 510 Intel SSDs (500 GB total)
3 x SATA2 X-25M Intel SSDs (480 GB total)
3 x Nvidia EVGA 580 GTX (reference/stock)

Cooling:
RV03 2 x 180mm bottom intake fans
Replaced default top exhaust w/ Noiseblocker M-12PS 120mm
1 x 120mm M-12P on Tuniq Tower 120 Extreme CPU heatsink

Wide / Top pics of case:



Wide shot, showing the entirety of the case. The top cover and side panels are removed.



Top of the case, with cover removed, showing the recessed area where your MB I/O cables will come out. They will lead out through the 'handle' pictured, which is toward the rear of the case. The manual notes that some VGA adapters are not ideal to use here; since the cables have to bend and go towards the back of the case some adapters might not fit very well.



Showing the top/front panel I/O, with lid open to show the ports. These are USB 3.0, with 'external' cables leading out the back. I tucked these in through the rubber grommets on top, and am connecting them to my motherboard using Gigabyte's internal USB 3.0 header. I'll route this all behind the tray.



Showing the USB 3.0 cables going into the case. I'll connect these to the Gigabyte MB using a Gigabyte USB 3.0 dongle that then connects to the motherboard's internal USB 3.0 header; the dongle is routed behind the MB. Also pictured are the 180mm fan controls, one per fan; you can leave them set to 'high' and then control the fans using a fan controller or MB fan header. The fans use 3-pin type fan connectors.



Straight-on shot of the top of the case.

PSU Selection

One of the first issues I encountered with this board was with my choice of PSU - the Antec HCP-1200. This PSU has received outstanding reviews, and I had to get some assistance from Silverstone to get it to work with the RV03.

The RV03 has an unusual PSU installation. You mount it in sideways, and the case only provides mounting holes for one orientation. Included with the case is an angled power connector that connects to your PSU, and this angled power extension connects to a receptacle beneath the front of the case. You then plug in your normal PSU power cable into this receptacle.

The manual is clear that the PSU max depth is 180mm, but what is NOT mentioned is that if power input socket on the PSU is facing flat side up then you have to release a twist-tie hidden inside the case to have enough slack to reach these certain PSUs.

The Antec HCP-1200 I tried to install is one of these, and I eventually got it to work. This sort of information should be included in the manual, though!



The cable length is too short! I had to release a hidden twist-tie to get some more length here.



Side panel, showing the PSU compartment.



The 'proper' orientation of the PSU cable, with the flat side of the connector 'down.'



This shows the empty PSU compartment. The top of the compartment is formed by the lowest 5.25" bay adapter and the bottoms of the two lower fan brackets. If you had a PSU that needed air from above, you could remove the lowest 5.25" bay adapter entirely.



Shown: the receptacle underneath the case. You can see here the twist-tie that must be removed to get some extra length on certain PSUs.



The Antec HCP-1200 installed.

PSU Considerations:

  • This case only allows your PSU to be installed in one orientation, so keep that in mind in choosing a PSU.
  • This case is designed for PSUs with intake fans sucking air in from below. There is a filter below the PSU compartment to minimize foreign matter in the intake. A PSU with a 'side-sucking' fan would also work, but it's intake wouldn't be filtered.
  • If your PSU must be installed in such a way that its intake fan is trying to take air from above then you must remove the lowest 5.25" bay adapter.
  • Max depth is 180mm, although at least one user reported success mounting a 200mm Corsair AX1200 by removing the cable sleeving on his cables, which allowed for a tighter bend as the cables exit the PSU.




CPU Backplate / Heatsink installation

Plenty of room to work in the back, on the underside of the motherboard, once the board is installed. Installing the heatsink was a snap.





Cooling / Front Drive Bays

This case has 7 x 5.25" drive bays in front. Shown here are the six drive bay filters; there are simple solid plastic attachments that can be applied to cover the filters if you don't need air circulating through here. The lower six are in two groups of three, and each group of three has two 120mm fan brackets, allowing up to four 120mm fans to be mounted in front. I mounted an optical drive in the top and had originally mounted two 120mm fans towards the front of the case.



One thing to note: the 5.25" drive trays must remain in place if you want to use the front fan brackets, which are attached to the 5.25" drive brackets. You can optionally remove the drive trays if you only want to use the rear fan brackets. The lower fan brackets form part of the PSU compartment, though, and appear to isolate heat from the PSU, so you may want to leave at least the lower fan brackets in place.



During my time with this case I changed around my fan configuration a bit, and moved my two front intake fans closer to the motherboard using the rear fan brackets. The RV03 manual suggest this may help muffle the noise, and it also may reduce the volume of air inside the motherboard air and help channel the 180mm fan air through the case a bit better.

However, after using the case for a bit and running some very primitive temperature testing with these front fans on and off, I found they contributed next to nothing in terms of cooling. Your experience may be different depending on your CPU cooler, motherboard, and cooling requirements, but for my particular build I didn't see much benefit to the front intake fans.



I ended up taking out all of the front fan brackets, fans, and 5.25" drive bay adapters and put in six large acoustic foam blocks. This should help reduce noise a little further (I really like quiet systems) and prevent air from the bottom-mounted 180mm intake fans from circulating into the empty 5.25" bays.



I also originally installed a rear intake fan, and used a magnetic fan filter on the exterior. Installing a fan here prevents use of the eighth expansion slot on the case, so this won't be an option (at all, even with thin fans) if you want to make use of the eighth slot.



However, I also found this intake fan contributed very little to GPU cooling. My reference 580 GTX in the last slot is designed to intake air from lower down. I think some non-reference coolers may benefit from using a rear intake fan, but not the ones I have. I ended up putting acoustic foam on the rear of the case, covering the now unnecessary grille; warm air will still escape through the top of the case, or be exhausted by the GPU coolers.



Right-side panel HDD Tray

The right-side panel has a spot for a 120mm fan for intake into the HDD tray located on the underside of the motherboard. This tray has 4 x 3.5" HDD brackets, and one 2.5" dual-drive bracket, located in the center (see above.) Two of the 3.5" HDD brackets are mounted 'upside down', shown lower left and upper right, as pictured above.



The right side brackets have enough room to route cables beneath them. Not so on the left side.



One of the four 3.5" drive brackets, removed from the right side HDD tray. Rubber grommets minimize vibration and noise. HDDs are mounted by screwing them onto the bracket through these grommets.



The 2.5" dual-drive bracket can be mounted in one of the 3.5" HDD brackets. Additional brackets can be ordered from Silverstone (part # SDP08.)



One oddity about the included bracket and screws that come with the case: if you use the included case screws for the 2.5" dual-drive bracket you won't be able to use them on the 'lower' drive. You can see pictured here how the heads of the screws are too large to screw in correctly. The optional SDP08 does come with correct-sized screws. Silverstone should have caught this in testing.



2.5" dual-drive bracket with two SSDs installed. The case directions recommend alternating the two drives, so that they face opposite directions; I fail to see how this is helpful in anyway. The directions that come with the SDP08 show both drives mounted facing the same direction, and that seemed to make a lot more sense.



Showing the 2.5" drives installed using screws from the SDP08, which have smaller heads on the screws allowing for a correct installation.



Showing the conventional drive and two SSDs mounted.

You can completely remove any brackets you don't use. I decided to remove the 2.5" dual-drive bracket and install it into one of the 3.5" HDD brackets, and then install two more 2.5" dual-drive brackets into two other 3.5" HDD brackets, leaving me one 3.5" bracket open for the one conventional HDD I am installing. This ended up giving me space for 1 x 3.5" HDD and six 2.5" HDDs.



Room for routing cables behind these drive brackets. The large cable connector thingy is the Gigabyte USB 3.0 internal header connector, connected to the case's two USB 3.0 cables, routed behind the MB tray.



Here you can see the same area wired with SATA and power cables. The SATA power connectors just reach between drive brackets, and using two SSDs facing the same direction appears to be fine in terms of cable routing and connectors.



With the center 2.5" dual-drive bracket removed the 180mm intake fan can more readily blow air into this HDD tray. The foward 180mm fan is offset slightly just for this purpose. I rerouted the 180mm fan cabling, which came with its cabling blocking much of the air into the HDD tray, and now it should have a clear route to cool the HDD tray and underside of the motherboard.

Since I'm using mostly SSDs and I was able to get a decent channel for airflow from the 180mm fan I decided to not mount a 120mm fan on the right panel. I don't really like panel-mounted fans, anyway, it makes taking the panel off a mild annoyance.



Cable Routing

There is plenty of space to route PCIE power, MB power, and SATA cables behind the tray here once everything is setup. Pictured is the motherboard with HDD SATA and fan cables routed; will neaten it up once the PSU is installed.

You'll need at least a 24" SATA cable to reach an optical drive mounted in the top 5.25" bay, by the way. The rest of the drives mounted on the right panel can be reached with shorter cables.



PSU Cabling Issues:

Now that I've managed to get the Antec PSU installed, I'm finding that I have limited space to put excess cable without blocking airflow to either this entire tray (blocking the edge of the 180mm fan that is supposed to cool this area) or blocking the side intake for the PSU itself. What I am considering doing is moving the conventional drive to one of the front bays, behind the front intake fans, move the lower left set of SSDs up, and then I'll have room above the PSU to bundle excess cabling. I'll do this and take some pictures of the result.



OK: PSU cabling done. Removing the conventional drive and moving one of the SSD brackets up enabled me to use the leftover space immediately above the PSU for excess / unused PSU cables. This definitely resulted in a neater appearance and should help with airflow on this rear tray area. I now only have SSDs in this right tray, so that should also remove any concerns about overheating conventional hard drives in this space. I ended up just removing the conventional drive altogether, as I don't really need it.



Area behind the PSU where the PSU will intake air, cleared of cables.



PSU exhaust area.



GPUs and 90 degree cases
3 x 580 GTX GPUs installed. I used reference 580s because their cooling works well with the RV03's cooling methodology; heat flows from the 'bottom' of the card, as installed, out the top. Most (well, all that I found, actually) non-reference cards blow their hot air all over the place with no clear channeled exhaust. This doesn't mean you can't use these cards with the RV03 or other 90 degree cases, just that they won't benefit as much from the unique cooling potential of the RV03. AMD cards are similar; their reference design will work well, but you may want to examine non-reference designs as a consideration before buying. If you are going to be liquid cooling your GPUs then this is not going to be a concern for you.



All cables routed, just need CPU and RAM to finish up.



With side cover on.



Whole-case shot, with all covers on.



Magnetic filters on the bottom; on the right you can see where you'll plug your PSU into the wall.



The bottom-facing power receptacle.



These side grilles on both right and left side panels of the RV03 prevent you from laying it flat with the side panel on. Something to keep in mind.



Interior of the finished system, as it currently is; I rerouted GPU power cabling to allow for better airflow into the GPU intakes from the 180mm fans. Thanks to juano, from the overclock.net forum, for that suggestion.



Dear Gigabyte

Please don't put huge inflexible thick-gauge connectors on internal headers like this. The third dual-slot GPU, shown here, presses up against any large connectors in this location on a motherboard, and it puts unnecessary stress on components. Pictured is the Gigabyte USB 3.0 internal header/connector.

Some thoughts after using the case for a while
  • I really like how my cards don't 'bend' due to their weight anymore. I don't see why more manufacturers don't try this motherboard orientation.
  • I expected a tri-sli system to be much louder than it is. I suspect that part of the quietness is due to the effectiveness of the cooling design and motherboard orientation.
  • The power-on light at the top front of the system is extremely bright; please tone this down in future products, Silverstone. My wife complains about it at night.
  • The front panel audio jacks require quite a bit of pressure for the jacks to be detected. A LOT of pressure.
  • The gold stripes CAN be removed, but they are relatively subtle in any event.
  • There are two bottom-mounted fan filters, but they do not line up exactly with the fans; one covers 1.5 fans, and the other covers the rest of the foward fan and the PSU compartment. This leads to dust getting in, in between the two filters. I think if the filters were lined up with the two fans they would filter dust more effectively.
 
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Hi Balthazor, good looking build you have going so far! Have you tried removing the cable tie located in the lower front side of RV03? This may give you just enough power cord length to install your current PSU:

rv03_powercord.jpg
 
Nice to see some more hands on info about this case. Just waiting for it to show up on Newegg, then it's mine.
 
Sorry for the poor quality images. My wife has the 'good' camera.
Photos are fine, but any chance you can replace the image links with the (automatically generated) imageshack thumbnails for forums - it will make viewing the thread easier (even more when the inevitable image quoting starts)

Good job anyway, looking forward to seeing the rest of your comments :)

Is there any possibility this case might appear in the Fortress flavour at some point? For those of us who prefer the alternative styling.
 
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Photos are fine, but any chance you can replace the image links with the (automatically generated) imageshack thumbnails for forums - it will make viewing the thread easier (even more when the inevitable image quoting starts)

Good job anyway, looking forward to seeing the rest of your comments :)


Is there any possibility this case might appear in the Fortress flavour at some point? For those of us who prefer the alternative styling.

Yeah, I'll modify the thread later today or tonight when I have time. In-laws are visiting, so my computer forum time is a little restricted.

I believe the FT03 is out, and they changed it to a mATX format with a very unique styling. The TJ11 is also out, which is a much larger (and more expensive) version of the basic principles in the RV03.
 
Hi Balthazor, good looking build you have going so far! Have you tried removing the cable tie located in the lower front side of RV03? This may give you just enough power cord length to install your current PSU:

This worked! Thanks man. Will update original thread in a bit.

Silverstone should have put that in the manual.
 
haha man that sucks when little things like that can delay your build. Glad you got it resolved
 
For the power supply issue, couldnt you have just opened up the PSU and flipped the power socket receptacle?
 
Thanks for the write up. I love the new hard drive brackets and it's very nice that they go behind the motherboard. One of the only things I don't like on my RV02 is the hard drive cage and its location. This is definitely the case for my next computer build.
 
Thanks for the write up. I love the new hard drive brackets and it's very nice that they go behind the motherboard. One of the only things I don't like on my RV02 is the hard drive cage and its location. This is definitely the case for my next computer build.

QFT, loving those mounts; so clean. Can't wait to see it finished
 
Thanks for the post!

Having picked up an FT03 instead of the RV03 due to space contraints, seeing the case in action makes me want a small FF RV03; love the case but I don't need 5-7 drive bays...
 
Photos are fine, but any chance you can replace the image links with the (automatically generated) imageshack thumbnails for forums - it will make viewing the thread easier (even more when the inevitable image quoting starts)

Good job anyway, looking forward to seeing the rest of your comments :)


Is there any possibility this case might appear in the Fortress flavour at some point? For those of us who prefer the alternative styling.

What about the Fortress 2?
There are some trade-offs between the two, since the RV03 has USB 3 ports and 8 card slot spaces.
The FT02 has the main design component of this case (90 degree rotation of motherboard) and has what I think is a better approach for PSU mounting.
 
Thanks for the write up. I love the new hard drive brackets and it's very nice that they go behind the motherboard. One of the only things I don't like on my RV02 is the hard drive cage and its location. This is definitely the case for my next computer build.

While mounting the SSD's behind the motherboard is a great idea, I'm not so sure it's a good idea for a standard drive.
It's true that you're mounting the drive away from a lot of the heat sources, but your also mounting it away from any significant airflow.
I'm not sure that's a good thing. After all, there's a reason why most "enthusiast" cases have a fan in front of the drive cages.
 
Yeah, I'll modify the thread later today or tonight when I have time
Thanks :)

I believe the FT03 is out, and they changed it to a mATX format with a very unique styling.
What about the Fortress 2?
The relationship between the naming of the different styles could get confusing.

FT02 and RV02 are more or less the same case with different styling, a large ATX case. RV03 is smaller than both - specifically it's less deep, it's still a full size ATX. FT03 is small footprint µATX design, so obviously a Fortress version of the RV03 would be a different number in the name.
 
The case directions recommend alternating the two drives, so that they face opposite directions; I fail to see how this is helpful in anyway. The directions that come with the SDP08 show both drives mounted facing the same direction, and that seemed to make a lot more sense.

Depending on the type of SATA power connections you have on the power supply, stacking 2.5" drives that close can either make it impossible, or dangerous (connectors and wires pushing against each other with enough force to eventually break the drive), to have the connections so close together.
 
Thanks a bunch for the user review! I have been waiting for this case to come out.

I don't see any outside dimensions, might you be able to provide that? (mm or inches ... heck or both :D )

Really looks like a great case. It seems to be pretty efficient with it's placing of drives, I can't look at the pictures at work, so when I get home I am going to take a look, my uncle has been waiting on this case. Frankly, if the price is right..... I might have to get one myself.... lol. I am hoping it's a little cheaper then the RV02.
 
While mounting the SSD's behind the motherboard is a great idea, I'm not so sure it's a good idea for a standard drive.
It's true that you're mounting the drive away from a lot of the heat sources, but your also mounting it away from any significant airflow.
I'm not sure that's a good thing. After all, there's a reason why most "enthusiast" cases have a fan in front of the drive cages.

I think the back panel fan is supposed to cool the motherboard and the hard drives. Then again, even if a hard drive dies, they are so cheap that I wouldn't care too much (keep all of my important stuff on a NAS).


Thanks a bunch for the user review! I have been waiting for this case to come out.

I don't see any outside dimensions, might you be able to provide that? (mm or inches ... heck or both :D )

Linky for dimensions: http://www.silverstonetek.com/raven/products/r-spec.php?model=RV03&area=usa
 
Interesting case, I had an RV02 about 6 months ago and while I liked it there were a few issues, especially when I started to mod it to accept a triple rad at the bottom and a single rad at the top.

From this I moved to the HAF-X and currently I have a Level 10 GT which is an excellent case. Unfortunately my wife thinks it's butt ugly!!! So I am going to sell this and was looking for something smaller, the Raven RV03 or the new white Corsair 600T.

Nice thread, not much information on the net about this case, so thanks...

BTW advice to the Silverstone rep who was lurking here earlier, either sheath your internal wires with black braid or use black cables like Corsair, multicolored fan cables are plain ugly...
 
That's an unusual orientation of the motherboard...the heatsink at the lower left reminds me of an AK47 magazine

Otherwise a pretty cool build! :D
 
I like the improvements over the RV02. I have the RV02 and it is working out well for me with a custom water loop in it. Looks like the RV03 would even work out better for water cooling.

Thanks for the photos and review.
 
For the power supply issue, couldnt you have just opened up the PSU and flipped the power socket receptacle?

That would have been a little too adventurous for me. But yes, I'm sure that is possible (although, as it turns out, unnecessary.)
 
Depending on the type of SATA power connections you have on the power supply, stacking 2.5" drives that close can either make it impossible, or dangerous (connectors and wires pushing against each other with enough force to eventually break the drive), to have the connections so close together.

They are just far enough apart to work, although I suppose if your connectors were very wide it might be a problem.

Now that the PSU is in I'll take some pictures once the hard drives are wired up.
 
Thanks a bunch for the user review! I have been waiting for this case to come out.

I don't see any outside dimensions, might you be able to provide that? (mm or inches ... heck or both :D )

Really looks like a great case. It seems to be pretty efficient with it's placing of drives, I can't look at the pictures at work, so when I get home I am going to take a look, my uncle has been waiting on this case. Frankly, if the price is right..... I might have to get one myself.... lol. I am hoping it's a little cheaper then the RV02.

From Silverstone's website:

Dimension
235mm (W) x 522mm (H) x 570mm (D)

I think the case was around US$ 160. I got mine from Sundialmicro.com, the first day they sold it. My move back from being overseas has slowed down my build, and my visiting in-laws have slowed me down further.
 
While mounting the SSD's behind the motherboard is a great idea, I'm not so sure it's a good idea for a standard drive.
It's true that you're mounting the drive away from a lot of the heat sources, but your also mounting it away from any significant airflow.
I'm not sure that's a good thing. After all, there's a reason why most "enthusiast" cases have a fan in front of the drive cages.

Well, as it turns out I may need the added space for adequate cable management of excess PSU cabling. The PSU is so efficiently located to most of the components that I have a lot of excess cable length, and I need somewhere to put it.

If you had a PSU with a bottom intake fan you could put the excess the cable 'behind' the PSU, but this Antec requires that area for intake, since its fan is mounted to suck air from behind the unit, through, and out.

However, I have so much SSD space (950 GB total) in this build I may just forego the conventional drive altogether, and just use an external (eSATA) for local backups or whatever. If I do decide to install the conventional I'll likely put it in the front bays, where it will get cooling front the front intake fans I installed.

Still, as long as you can keep the portion of the 180mm clear where air flows up and under the motherboard and througout this tray area, your hard drives should be ok. The challenge is keeping that channel clear when you have a lot of excess PSU cabling that is fixed to the PSU and not modular.
 
That's an unusual orientation of the motherboard...the heatsink at the lower left reminds me of an AK47 magazine

Otherwise a pretty cool build! :D

Honestly I really dislike the Gigabyte's styling of this series, but I I do like the features. The colors are fine, but the ammo magazine is a bit immature.

And this RV03 has a window that will force me to look at it every day, so that's just great.
 
Updated original post; Antec 1200 now can fit after a minor case 'mod'; thumbnails added. More updates to come once I get the PSU wiring in place and some hard drives moved around.
 
Nice! This is an interesting read - thanks for sharing. I really like the idea behind Silverstone's Raven/Fortress cases and this one turned out pretty well (I don't know if you guys saw the prototype of the RV03 but it was pretty hideous compared to the good looking final version). My current computer is inside a Sugo 07, but I have already decided that a Raven case will the home of my next build.
 
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Thanks a Tom for posting this review. Hopefully Silverstone will quickly revise the case and installation instructions. Glad I read this prior to buying, think I'll hold off for now.
 
Nice to see Silverstone expanding the Raven line. Can't say I care for the PSU placement, though :eek:
 
Nice! This is an interesting read - thanks for sharing. I really like the idea behind Silverstone's Raven/Fortress cases and this one turned out pretty well (I don't know if you guys saw the prototype of the RV03 but it was pretty hideous compared to the good looking final version). My current computer is inside a Sugo 07, but I have already decided that a Raven case will the home of my next build.

The revised top is much better looking, and they moved one of the 180mm fans to cool the underside of the motherboard and right-panel HDD tray area.
 
From Silverstone's website:

Dimension
235mm (W) x 522mm (H) x 570mm (D)

I think the case was around US$ 160. I got mine from Sundialmicro.com, the first day they sold it. My move back from being overseas has slowed down my build, and my visiting in-laws have slowed me down further.

Awesome thanks again!!

That's not a bad price, I was hoping it was a little cheaper then the RV02 and it looks like it is. That's good news. Man what I can't wait for is to see that thing loaded down with 3 GTX 580's :eek: I wonder what the temps coming off the top will be like.

Well hey, I'd put your in-laws to work helping to unbox and assemble :p!

Actually.... that might not be the best idea I ever had.....
 
Yeah, thanks again for the detailed review and info. Bummed that my AX1200 won't fit, but that's what mods are for!!
 
I'd be curious how the two 180mm fans vs. the three fans in the RV02 and RV02E impacts cooling performance.

Any input on this? Do you have RV02 or RV02E experience?
 
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