Corsair Carbide Air 540 Builds

SimonMaltby · 15 Jul 2013 at 17:39

With this case now starting to become available I though I would share my build feedback and invite others to do the same as and when.

My case arrived today.

I am going to be trying to build it as a fully water cooled rig running the following components...

Water cooling:
EK 360 Rad at front
EK 240 Rad at top
Corsair SP120 High Pressure fans.
D5 Pump with EK res
Heatkiller 3.0 CPU block
HeatKiller 680 Blocks and back plates
Clear 10mm / 16mm tube
Blood Red Coolant
Chrome Fittings

Components:
Asus Z87 MAXIMUS VI EXTREME Motherboard
Intel i7 4770K CPU
8GB G.Skill TridentX 2666MHz Ram - Or 16GB Patriot 2400MHz
Corsair AX1200 PSU
2 x EVGA Superclocked GTX 680's in SLI
2 x Samsung 840 500GB SSD's in Raid 0

Other:
Red LED's

SimonMaltby · 15 Jul 2013 at 18:12

Ok well the 360 rad fits ok although looking at the space at the top I don't think I can do push pull on the 360 and still fit the 240 in the top. So fitted with singe fans for now. May be able to do push pull on the 240, will see later.

My main problem is where to fit the pump and Res combo.
http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showthread.php?t=18527339

SimonMaltby · 15 Jul 2013 at 20:48

Ok Pump is in...

Warranty is void already as I drilled a 20mm hole for a fill port

As its attached to the Res with a solid fitting I may have issues with vibration, will have to see. The fill port is fixed to the metal of the case under the top plastic cover... I may extend it up and cut the plastic in due course, but for now its hidden and requires removing two screws to get to it.

Think that's enough for tonight.

SimonMaltby · 16 Jul 2013 at 05:57

dunny87 said:
i think i saw some one else have there push fans outside of the case, under the plastic outer shell, if you remove the front dust filter that is supplied.

maybe worth a try

Ah brilliant, that works perfectly. Routing the cables will be tricky as there is no gap with the 360 rad, but there is a hole just big enough for the fan cables to slot though i think.

SimonMaltby · 16 Jul 2013 at 10:38

Relentless81 said:
If someone could measure the distance apart for the feet from the furthest left to the furthest right I would much appreciate it, I need to know if the feet will sit on a 285mm width shelf

Hi mate, I posted in the other thread for you yesterday as follows...

The feet are 310mm from outside edge to outside edge, if you sit it on a 285mm shelf, it will use about 1/3 of each foot, you would have about 5mm of each foot in contact with the shelf. The feet are rubber and rectangular so its still a fair amount on the shelf, but far from ideal.

SimonMaltby · 16 Jul 2013 at 14:33

Ok now I'm running into trouble

I'm trying to use an EK 240 rad top and an EK 360 rad front.
The 360 fits ok, but the 240 will then not fit unless I remove the top fan from the 360, which rather defeats the point of having a 360. Also to use the 360 and the 240 I have to site the 360 feed at the bottom and the Hard drive cage gets in the way

This is starting to prove much more complex, I expected an easy build with these two rads and its not at all.

Need to rethink...

What do you guy think, a thinner, stealth 360 instead of the EK or maybe just a second 240, or continue and try harder to make both fit?

UPDATE To above...

Ok sorted something out.
I moved all the fans for the 360 to the front of the case. Does not look quite as special and I can't do push pull on the top fan, but it should still be ok.

Just leak testing now.

SimonMaltby · 16 Jul 2013 at 23:32

Here we go, Build basically complete

As I said earlier, I run into some serious issues using both a 360 and 240 Radiators, but solved it by having the inlets of the 360 at the bottom and putting the fans at the front, replacing the dust filter. The only downside of this is that I can't use the right side hot swap drive bay for a full sized drive, although a lap top drive will fit fine.

Anyway here we go with some pictures:

Really happy with the build. There are a few things to do:

Change the top rad screws from chrome to black
Tidy the wiring in the back (there is a reason I did not include a photo
Get some nice red fan guards or rad guard to make the inside of the rads look better
Get a better rear fan

I decided to install my Ivy bridge setup first of all so I and compare temps to my previous case (Fractal Arc Midi). It will not take much work to swap for my 4770K later.

temps are well down on before, even with the fans on silent. The graphics cards idle in the mid 20's and under benchmarking seem to be about 42c, they were in the 70's on air.

So in summary...
This case is not quite as easy as I thought it would be, but after some hard thought and graft, I'm really pleased with the result. My temps are much lower and the case is quieter.

I'm not looking forward to using the Blu-Ray drive in its sideways position.

SimonMaltby · 16 Jul 2013 at 23:55

~>Dg<~ said:
nice job simon ! the dvd drive sideways on is kinda mystifying aswell only thing putting me off at moment. would it really of mattered if they did it in a normal orientation size wise ?

Well, the case is wide as it is and would have to be quite a bit wider still if they allowed enough space for it to sit horizontal and maintain the clean main chamber. I was looking to see if I could locate a slot load Blu-ray drive as this would solve the issue, but cant find anything other than laptop style.

Personally its not a big issue for me. It will work, you just need to be careful when opening the trey with a disk inside. I may switch to a USB external for the few times I actually use a DVD drive nowadays.

I have seen pics of someone that uses the case on its side, so the window is on top and then the drive bays are horizontal. Not for me as I would see the bottom of the case, but maybe an option.

SimonMaltby · 18 Jul 2013 at 08:56

benji182 said:
Very nice build.

Have you used an LED strip for the lighting ?

Yes, I used a couple of the cheaper LED strips
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CM-034-AK

They seem to work really well and stick nicely.
There is plenty of room around the inside case edge and the way the window side attaches to the case means you can go close to the edge with the LED's so they can't be seen directly... you just get the effect.

The camera photo looks nothing like as good as it does in real life. The components are clear and well defined in the light.

SimonMaltby · 21 Jul 2013 at 07:55

Flanno said:
How study are the sidepanels on this ? Hardwarecanucks said they were flimsy.

Yes they are quite thin. It's fair to say that the steel throughout the case is thinner than most recent cases I have owned, but it is well engineered and because everything fits smoothly together it feels strong and sturdy. I compare it to the Antec Lanboy cases for the thickness of the sides.

The big advantage of the thinner steel is weight, the case is quite light bearing in mind its overall size.

SimonMaltby · 24 Jul 2013 at 10:04

Finished doing the cables last night

SimonMaltby · 26 Jul 2013 at 23:52

Ok I think I'm all finished...

Got some proper black screws for the radiators and fans.
Put an AF140 in the rear.
Managed to get another SP120 on the inside of the 360 Rad
Put some nice fan guards over the rest of the rad.

Was playing some games earlier and the case is so quiet. The watercooled graphics probably helps most there. I did an hour of Crysis 3 and the CPU temps did not top 55c with the GPU's at 40c max.

I have it setup so that the fans at the front pull air through the 360 rad and into the case, then the rear fan and the 2 fans at the top pull air out. I could feel the top fans getting warm, but really was very good. I'm really happy.

SimonMaltby · 27 Jul 2013 at 10:14

Andybtsn said:
Simon, any chance you could measure round the case just so I know how long I'd need LED lighting length to be? Be appreciated

The internals are about 37cm x 40cm.
I used 2 of these Akasa "Vegas" Red LED strip light - 60cm chained, starting top left (above the rear fan), going along the top down the front and along the bottom. I did not put any at the back, because thats the part of the inside I see most clearly when sat at the desk and did not want to look directly at the LED's - just want the glow effect.

SimonMaltby · 27 Jul 2013 at 10:46

The case side is a good clean fit, it does not grip to the sides of the case much which means you can get the LED strip close to the edge of the case and when the side is on it prevents seeing the actual LED's unless you actually look very hard. This means the effect is very good even without the ability to dim.

The photo does not do the lighting justice. I'm using a handheld camera with no flash so its not well focused and a bit shaky. In real life the inside components are crystal clear and well defined with a lovely red glow.... So if you think it looks good in the photo, prepare to be very impressed in real life

I may get the daughter's SLR and tripod out later and see if I can do the lighting justice.

SimonMaltby · 27 Jul 2013 at 15:10

Nickolp1974 said:
Whats the thickness of your 360????

Its one of these... http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=WC-085-XS

so 35.5 deep. I did add a Rad gasket between the rad and case so add another few mm to that too.
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=WC-194-XS&groupid=962&catid=1523&subcat=1545

SimonMaltby · 27 Jul 2013 at 17:06

Nickolp1974 said:
Thx bud, one last thing, whats the distance between your cards and rad??

Loads of room. Will measure later, but I can get my hand between to get to the cables easily.

GoogalyMoogaly said:
Don't have the case yet, but trying to plan my build. The big problem I see is where to mount the pump and res. I'm not so keen on modding the case like you did, although that is a nice solution.

The only mod, was for a fill port... other than that I just put some thumb screws through the mesh at the back, did not need to cut or alter anything... The worst that it's done is scratch a tiny bit of the black.

I will say I was rather surprised by the lack of places for the pump, but then the D5 is quite big and so is my PSU as its the 1200W Corsair, so it does come into the case more than most. There are no really obvious mounting points for a res / pump though, it would have been good to have something set for common res / pump configs where the bolt holes were pre drilled etc. This is also a more major issue as bay mounted res / pump combos will not work mounted sideways. Some people I have seen mount the res/pump in the main compartment... the best looking of these, that I saw, put it in front of the PCI-E slots.

SimonMaltby · 27 Jul 2013 at 18:18

My advice is to wait till you get the case and try it in various places. I spent a good couple of hours moving it about and deciding where I liked it best.

SimonMaltby · 27 Jul 2013 at 21:29

Here is the best photo I can manage of the lighting.

SimonMaltby · 28 Jul 2013 at 15:52

RetrogamerX said:
I think the NZXT hue is worth the money. If you get sick of the same colour you can always change it.

The only downside is you have to fit the controller somewhere. The basic LED's just wire to a molex and away you go.

SimonMaltby · 30 Jul 2013 at 22:03

bicpug said:
Is there any options for a sound proofed non window version of this case?

Not heard of anything like that. The case can be made very quiet anyway and it's primary aim is to be the best air cooled case - so sound proofing is a compromise against the design I suppose.