SilverStone Raven RV05 Rotated Computer Chase Review @ [H]

FrgMstr

Just Plain Mean
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SilverStone Raven RV05 Rotated Computer Chase Review - The SilverStone Raven series of cases long ago broke the mold when it comes to "normal" computer chassis. Its design execution has always been good and the Ravens' airflow characteristics are excellent. Today SilverStone pushes the new Raven RV05 out there a little bit further in terms of design and function.
 
For a case with 180mm fans maximum size of coolers at 162mm and lack of cable space on the back is seriously disapointing.

Same problems my Raven 2 has
 
A suggestion perhaps based on the comments is how was the heat in the case when using water cooling.solution? Maybe a chart with air only setup and water cooled setu?
 
For a case with 180mm fans maximum size of coolers at 162mm and lack of cable space on the back is seriously disapointing.

Same problems my Raven 2 has

RV/FT-02 have enough space in the back to run 3/4 watercooling hose behind the motherboard. How much more room do you really need for cables?
 
A suggestion perhaps based on the comments is how was the heat in the case when using water cooling solution? Maybe a chart with air only setup and water cooled setup?

We test the hardware in its default configuration as it ships to the consumer. If a case ships with X amount of fans, that's how we test it.

In the case of the Raven RV05, you have to completely remove the two Air Penetrator fans to install a radiator and fans. That alone changes the cooling profile of the chassis as it was intended by the manufacturer. Add in the unlimited number of fans - radiator combos, brands, sizes, style, CFM, direction of the fans and you'd be testing for months, which just isn't practical.
 
A suggestion perhaps based on the comments is how was the heat in the case when using water cooling.solution? Maybe a chart with air only setup and water cooled setu?


I have a single fan rad in mine and it has performed awesome. The key is leaving a good amount of open airflow at the top.
 
Something I would have liked to have seen you test was performance with a passive cooler like the Nofan CR-95, both with and without the case fans. I hope you'll do this with the upcoming FT05.

I couldn't quite spot it, but can the HDD cage be removed to support 180mm radiators? If it can, where would you mount a HDD or SSD?
 
RV/FT-02 have enough space in the back to run 3/4 watercooling hose behind the motherboard. How much more room do you really need for cables?

5-6mm more would be enough

Problem isn't cables itself but sata/molex connectors on them - with how far cables need to go to hdd cage you will have 1 or 2 connectors on wrong side.
 
Something I would have liked to have seen you test was performance with a passive cooler like the Nofan CR-95, both with and without the case fans. I hope you'll do this with the upcoming FT05.

I couldn't quite spot it, but can the HDD cage be removed to support 180mm radiators? If it can, where would you mount a HDD or SSD?

HDD cage can be removed no problem but you would be left with only the two SSD Mounting locations behind the motherboard tray.
 
HDD cage can be removed no problem but you would be left with only the two SSD Mounting locations behind the motherboard tray.

You know, I think that would be fine for most people. You can get 1 TB+ 2.5" HDDs.
 
Silverstone made 1 step forward 1.5 step back. The quality control of x05 cases still sound suspect but is a whole lot better than x04 (which are just silly upsized TJ08)

Why Tony you not make case bigger, the x05 cases clearly are too cramped, like x04. Imagine the clean cable routing and ease of upgrading if they were bigger. I hope you can keep 1x 5.25" bay and use the rest of space for H2O mounting, be creative! I want 140mm exhaust fan. Now RV05 stands between mATX and something else. Give us a real ATX/EATX case, be creative with space!

I continue to wait for FT06 to be true successor of FT02. At now my hopes are they make a smaller TJ11 for $250-300 with good quality and bigger space. A good case last long, like my FT02! Money well spent!

Sadly i think Corsair Carbide Air is the true successor of FT02...:mad:

BTW will Silverstone ever release a 180mm Tundra AIO? I think 1x180mmx32mm TD08 will be perfect for CPU cooling.
 
Ok when i said Carbide Air is true successor of FT02, i dont mean like a 1-1 copy, but Corsair tried to think different and dare to make a difference. It performs great, has good mounting options and easy to upgrade PC parts!

With every Raven/FT case after FT02 (should FT03 consider a FT series?), SS seems to take the series to mass market. It felt like they spent 30% of development time to further improve the new revisions but a whooping 70% time to make them more mass market friendly.

What we want is Tony team to take more TLC to improve the little things that will wow us, wow that SS thought this and that! Such and so it indefinitely more convenient than FT02! etc

But i see since FT02 onwards, the tweaks dont overcome the backsteps. :(

TJ11 is just too damn big for me with too many 5.25" bays (lol, it is really too big). Do something about it, and i may change out my FT02 for some full aluminium enclosure love that still maintain the inverted large fans design!
 
One thing I would like to see in the FT05 is more room behind the motherboard for cable routing.
 
So, can I really run my cpu cooler without a fan or is the article saying I shouldn't add the top 120mm fan? If you have a closed water solution like corsair, do you lose cooling performance attaching the radiator at the top with a fan?
 
I wouldn't run a CPU without a cooler unless you were trying some silent passive stuffs. I use a radiator and fans on my rv02 on the top opening and it works great. I mean this chassis is the best I have ever used. I bought similar units for wife and son as well. Well passed three years and very hardly any dust in the chassis at all, (very small amount in the bottom right back of the case). I will continue to purchase these cases for the dust, cooling and noise suppression.
 
So, can I really run my cpu cooler without a fan or is the article saying I shouldn't add the top 120mm fan? If you have a closed water solution like corsair, do you lose cooling performance attaching the radiator at the top with a fan?
It may not be worded clearly in the article.

What they are saying is the massive fans at the front push the same amount of air into the video card area as they do the cpu area and are more than capable of pushing that air in a linear direction from bottom straight out the top of the case.

Adding another exhaust fan won't necessarily degrade performance. If it is a powerful enough exhaust fan and the speed of the intake fans were low enough, it could disrupt the direction of flow by sucking some of the air from the GPU area. In that case, it is no different from any normal ATX case in terms of airflow pattern.

Worst case scenario: you run the massive intake fans on low, put some screaming 120mm exhaust fan in back sucking 100+ cfm attached to an AIO watercooler, and you use multiple graphics fans that don't exhaust air out the back. In that case some of the hot air generated by the graphics cards wouldn't be forced straight out the top, some of it would get sucked into the 120mm fan blowing over the AIO radiator and raise temps by a couple degrees at most. In that scenario it only slightly negates the 90 degree rotation design because that scenario as I described can occur in regular ATX cases.

In other words, don't worry about it. Worst case scenario puts the case on par with others while a proper setup will make it perform significantly better. There are ways to fix it by making sure the intakes spit out more air than the exhaust, or just attaching the radiators to the intakes.
 
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