As we have seen in most of the cases to house one of our precious counterparts, namely the CPU and the motherboard, cases seen better days a being one of the more expensive, plastic exterior or just lucky an aluminium body; brushed or plain, and all of the nifty fans and onboard controllers to play around with. As in the conclusion that they can be very noisy, very big for a system inside or just too cluttered of limited forms of cable works inside. Cooler Master, Thermal take or any of the rest of the case makers try to fix this problem of generic old cases generally leaves in a cost of being a very low cost alternative from the enthusiast kind.
Well, we see in the most of your reviews, that we try to cut cost down and also not really cutting out the performance, we have seen atrocious hardware, and also some over the edge types, triple slots, oversized fans and also crazy prize margins of these called high end parts. While cooler Master have served us great cases namely the HAF series, with its great looks and superior cooling ability of the three massive 230MM fans located in the side top and the front! Prize was a great concern in this criteria being about $180 and up asking prize makes you look somewhere else. But the new top down version HAF 922.
The new or a bit old Cooler Master HAF 922 series is a smaller version ATX form factor hold case made out of good mix of aluminium and plastic for insulation of the vibration that may or may not be generated from any of the components inside. As it is a top down version of the 923, this has some excess removals, the 230MM fans are all replaced with low rpm fans of the ascending size of 120MM, in the back, 140MM in the bottom and a large one on the top measuring 200MM. As for the rest of the cut outs in the new 922 is the size difference, having no option of a top PSU location so a water-cooling unit will occupy this place and also the removal of the side fan and a replacement of a viewable side mesh makes it easier of the original side oriented cases and great for showing off, but having to be a open flow case, you have the problem of having a dust filled case in a matter of months.
Well, the only flaw in the 922 is the smaller form factor and also the dust cleaning problem, the good insides of the HAF922, are the five external outlets for optical drives the size of 5.3in and also another five for the internal HDD’s or SDD’s in 3.2in form factor. The standard seven pin expansion set are all present with tool-less design and also including the 3.2 and the 5.2in drive bays. The motherboard tray is an open CPU bracket and at the back are cable linings to clean the wandering cables in the case to provide an open view of the mobo and increase cooling efficiency.
Testing is a RAID operative Velicoraptor HHD’s, a MSI X58 board, a Core i7 940 stock speed with a passive mounted cooler, dual 4850’s with also passive cooling and the rest are a 1000W corsair PSJU to power all of the system. Rating say in the idle and load timings , stayed in the good stable temps with idle only hitting 34 degrees in the overall system and in load just above average 68 degrees being as passive configuration you have to expect higher temps but I am satisfied that the 922 keeps it that low.
Overall the case, even if it top down versions of the better big brother, this is a better prize margin in the competition and good rounded performance for money, well few flaws like the problem of dust accumulating and I would like a removable motherboard tray. But it is not hard to bend down and make your hands dirty, so they are only minor problems. Ending this, great all round case, good hit in the pocket is a great buy.