Corsair 500R vs Fractal R3 Plack Pearl mini Comparison Review

I've just taken delivery of the Corsair Carbide 500R case, which is going to replace my Fractal Design R3 Black Pearl.

Having moved over to crossfiring my ATi 5850's I was finding the R3 a little bit of a squeeze with all the cables required.

Current system, which is in the new case & was in the old one:

Asus P6T Motherboard
Intel i7 920 CPU @ 3.2GHz
Corsair H50-1 CPU Cooler
12GB DDR3 1600Mhz (6GB OCZ / 6GB G.Skill)
Sapphire ATi 5850's in Crossfire
Corsair HX850w PSU
Blu-Ray/DVD Re-Writer
OCZ Agility 3 120gb SSD (O/S)
1TB Samsung HDD
1TB Western Digital HDD
2TB Hitachi HDD


I'll stick up pics as I go through, but I'll list the pros & cons at the end.




Up first is a frontal comparison on the size/look of the cases:




As you can see the Corsair (on the right) is slightly taller & wider than the R3. Totally different designs, which is blatantly obvious as well as differing options on the case front/top controls.




Here we have a side on view.



Both cases look roughly similar in length, but the Corsair (on the left) is actually 5mm longer than the R3.
The R3 doesn't come with a side panel fan, that's an extra I added in to improve cooling for my crossfire cards.





Next up is the open side on view, with my system still in the R3.



Nothing much to say here apart from being able to see the plethora of holes in the Corsair that allow good cable routing which I was after.
My R3 cabling was shocking to be honest, but a good friend of mine helped me out & re-routed a lot of the cables for me & tidied it up.




Moving on. Now I've moved my system over to the Corsair 500R now & you can see how it fits into the case.



Admittedly I could have possibly done a better job with the cabling & tidying up, but I've never said I was good at it
One thing I do find & it's not a fault of the case manufacturers it's the PSU makers, is they 24-pin cable. Why do they have to make it so chunky?
Flat cable would help immensely. But if there's a reason for the chunkiness I'll appreciate that it has to be that way
Also, you'll notice that there's very little gap between my 5850's. Unfortunately this is down to the cards being dual height & the motherboard PCI-e slots being so close together.
I'll consider a larger gap in between the slots when I upgrade to help the cooling.



Just so you can compare both the builds at once, here's a collage of them both.



Even with the Corsair only being 5mm longer it feels more roomy inside than the R3. It certainly helps being able to move my H50-1 rad into the top of the case, thus allowing more room at the rear, which a single extraction fan in place.




Finally, and I think it shows of the Corsair Carbide 500R off quite nicely, is a front on shot with power.




While I admit the look won't be everyone's cup of tea but I think it's a nice looker.


So, conclusion & comparison time.

I'm trying to avoid fawning over my nice new bits of kit so that I can remain objective and see any faults, of which there are a couple.

Corsair Pro's:

• Good size allowing excellent cable routing
• Nice looker, but beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Some may think it's fugly
• Airflow seems to be good
• Top mesh area (not photo'd sorry ) allowing fitting of radiator/fans
• Fan control on the front of the case. (Low/Medium/High)
• USB3 ports + option to connect to USB2 header if USB3 not available

Corsair Con's:

• Top mesh pop-up cover lug broken/snapped. Able to super-glue together luckily
• HDD quick removal trays, one arrived broken, but usable. They are quite flimsy
• Top mesh cover actually increases noise when fans in top radiator area. Pop up mesh cover quietens fans a lot.
• 200mm side-panel fan may not provide best air-flow, especially when helping cool cross-fire cards.

So how do I feel having moved over to the 500R?

Basically I'm happy as I feel the improvement in cooling & design has benefited my system. I think we all want to take a step forward when spending £85 on a case, rather than a step back.

The build/design issues that I mentioned in the Cons section are a bit niggly, especially when things break or are already broken, but that's a Corsair QC issue.
One good thing is the cable hole rubber surrounds stay in place in the Corsair. The R3 they just fell out & were absolutely useless.

If I could marry some of the good bits from the R3, over to the 500R then it'd be an awesome case as I still like the R3, especially for it's simple design & sound proofing. But my system kind of out grew the case somewhat and having to squash side panels down while trying to slide them on, wasn't good.

I was limited in the size of the case I wanted as either an Fractal XL R3 or a Corsair 600T were just too big for where my PC sits, but I'm sure either of them would have been great cases in their own right.

So all in all I'm very happy with the 500R. I'll look at changing the fans over as you plenty of options in the case to fit 120/140mm fans in various places.

Out of 10, I'd give it an 8.5

Should be getting a white 500R later this week, just curious as to why you have top mounted to H50 rad rather than use the rear mount for it?

Also has there been any great temp reduction overall? Especially with that 200mm fan blowing onto the GPU's? I take it the side 200mm is another 200x20 fan? if so is there clearance to put in a CM Megaflow (200x25mm)?

pgi947 said:

Should be getting a white 500R later this week, just curious as to why you have top mounted to H50 rad rather than use the rear mount for it?

Also has there been any great temp reduction overall? Especially with that 200mm fan blowing onto the GPU's? I take it the side 200mm is another 200x20 fan? if so is there clearance to put in a CM Megaflow (200x25mm)?

Click to expand...

I put the rad at the top just so that it pulled in cooler air, than from the rear of the case, but it doesn't seem to be making too much difference over having it mounted at the rear.

Temps seem ok, maybe a bit less, but not entirely sure. I do notice my graphics card fans kicking in more, but seeing as the Fractal R3 was more sound proofed it could have been an effect of moving to a less sound proofed case.

I think there'll be plenty of room for an extra 5mm for the Megaflow. The side of the cases protrudes outwards so that it's further away from the motherboard.

Nice write up, like this case a lot.

I don't suppose you could do me a big favour(or anyone who owns this case) and check the actual width, including the side bulges.

I'm not sure if the dimensions account for the bulges and I've only got a 9" space to play with.

Thanks

Front of case 20.4cm and with the side panel buldges its 23.5cm. I have one on my desk

Thanks for that. Think it might just fit with a cm to spare

Nice comparison! Shame on the bits that came broken... have you tried to rectify this with Corsair?

Could you let me know what spots have 120 and 140mm fan mounting holes and which will only take 120mm?

If you have any problems with Corsair cases they are very good at sending out replacements FOC. The 2 year warranty is direct with them and they pride themselves on sorting any problems out which is quite refreshing in this day and age ...

Thank you for posting this, Gazanimal. I was pretty much already sold on the 500R, but your comments helped to settle it. I have now ordered a 500R, and should get it tomorrow

I'd love to get one but it's an inch too tall for the available space I have

thanks for the info, was interested in the corsair case.

I'll drop Corsair a line & see if they'll help out with replacing the broken parts. Hopefully they will without too much fuss.

Saundie said:

Thank you for posting this, Gazanimal. I was pretty much already sold on the 500R, but your comments helped to settle it. I have now ordered a 500R, and should get it tomorrow

Click to expand...

Good to hear. It's a nice case & I certainly recommend it for a good medium size chassis.

bedazzled said:

I'd love to get one but it's an inch too tall for the available space I have

Click to expand...

That's a real shame. I know I was comparing sizes over my R3 as I wanted a wider & taller case, which the 500R is.

ray168 said:

thanks for the info, was interested in the corsair case.

Click to expand...

Hope it helped.

While I remember to ask, whats the noise level like on the provided fans? And how effective is the fan controller?

I'm quite surprised corsair are including fan controllers in any of their cases with Link Commander due out soon.

Looking good and better then the famous fractual R2/R3 case.... I gotta admit when a case is more wider at the front and taller you sure get a lot more space and its easier to build in and better cooling. Looks like corsair got the distance thing sussed out well also its not too big or small so airflow will get alround the case, like the large side fan too just in case you got a highend hot graphics card or 2 of them...

pgi947 said:

While I remember to ask, whats the noise level like on the provided fans? And how effective is the fan controller?

I'm quite surprised corsair are including fan controllers in any of their cases with Link Commander due out soon.

Click to expand...

The stock fans (3 x 120mm & 1 x 200mm) seem fine on the noise level, not intrusive as I was worried after going from a sound proofed case that it'd be noisy but far from it.

The fan controller works on 3 speeds. Low, Medium & High via a 3 position switch. On low they are virtually inaudible, medium is very acceptable but you can tell they've increased in speed. On high you can hear them, but it's not a whining sound, more the push of air.

Medium is what I prefer, although with the 5850's in there, I can mostly hear those fans, not the case fans.

Also, forgot to mention the option to turn off the LED's on the case fans via a switch on the case front, but the white light is quite nice so I have them on.

White 500r ordered! Be with me on thursday, price has dropped too, last week they were £94.99, today there £92.99 so added bonus

Glad to know the fans seem up-to scratch, if there too loud I'll just change them out for xigmatek crystal whites. Already have 2 which will take up the top 120mm mounts. Though my main reason for buying this case is performance not noise. Next on my shopping list is some of those white NZXT cable extensions, should really bring out a nice contrast against the black interior.

I think I need to mod my desk to fit this in too, ever so slightly too long, but nothing some wood and rails wont fix

like the carbide case but that fan blowing on legs equals pain

I got my 500r yesterday and moved my PC across to it yesterday. It was relatively painless, except for the fact that there's barely any clearance between the drive bay and the side of the case. It hadn't occurred to me that the hard drives go in "backwards" so that the connectors face towards the motherboard rather than away from it. The SATA power cables on my PSU are huge and very stiff, so I've had to leave the drives hanging out of the bay in order to get the side panel on. A couple of SATA extension cables and some right angle data cables should deal with the issue, though. My old case was a tiny Lian Li PC-A05B with only one 120mm case fan, so moving to the 500R has resulted in a dramatic drop in temperatures for minimal increase in noise. The 500R is quite a lot bigger, but that was part of the plan anyway

I got my case yesterday as well and I have to say... big disappointment!
I will most likely be sending it back and replacing with the Obsidian 650D or Raven 3...
Plastic bits feel terrible, some of the steel is way to thin and although I love the looks of the case I can't get over that the two Zalman Z9+ I used for friends builds had much better quality of plastics and overall quality for over HALF OF THE PRICE!

Im planning on getting this case soon, do you know if there is anyway to power/control more than 3 fans off the controller built in, i was gona get some 3 pin splitters but then i seen somewhere that the 3 pin connector is different and wouldnt work, do u know if this is true or see a way around it?