Soldato
Evening all,
I bought the Fractal Arc Midi R2 from elsewhere because I'm looking to cool my rig without the hassle of a full tower, and want to use 2X240 rads, which, in a nice midi case, don't seem to be a common feature.
However, this Arc Midi R2 seems to do it all, and excellently.
My build consists of:
• ASUS PZ68 pro motherboard
• 1XSSD @ 120GB (OS)
• 1XSSD @ 240GB (Steam and other games)
• 1XHDD @500GB (Music and movies)
• 4X8GB Corsair XMS3 (2GB eac) 8GB
• BeQuiet Pure Power 530W '80 Plus'
• EVGA GTX 480
• DVD RW drive
• Akasa card reader
I've been looking to water cool this because, of late, it hasn't been gaming cooly, and I managed to get 2XGTX 480s with water blocks for £150.
So, I'm moving from a Bitfenix Shinobi. Out with the old, in with the new. Here we go!
What's in here??
Fractal Arc Midi R2, and it's enormous. I had no idea that it would be so wide! Really nicely made, and it looks brilliant from the outside.
Either side. Nice big window here
So now we reach the internals. This is the setup you find as you get it out of the box, left hand side.
And right hand side. There's a lot of room in here for hiding cables, and good tubing slots (whatever they're called!).
Nice little box here.
Look what's in it (upside down!!).
Here's the poor old Shinobi, ready to go. Bitfenix Shinobi, it's been good, but here we part.
Left hand side of the Shinobi.
Shinobi interals. It's cramped in there!!
Empty Shinobi, ready to sell on the MM
So I stripped the R2, and these are the bits, as well as some of my components. These include two dust filters from the top and bottom of the case, which are fantastic. I think this is a superb idea, which Bitfenix could really do with catching on to! That Shinobi ate up a lot of dust.
More bits from the Shinobi, and general components.
This is the stripped down R2 in all its glory! Front is still on though as I hadn't worked out how to get it off at this point!
With HDD cages stripped out. The plan is to have a 280 rad (probably) in the front, so the small cage will be moved into the middle position, and the large cage just removed.
The front, with a Bitfenix Spectre fan in, as well as the R2 fan, which is brilliant I think.
HDD caged moved...
Finally got to the bits in that little box.
HDDs and SDDs installed.
DVD RW drive, and card reader installed, with awful white cable!!
Front with DVD RW drive and card reader.
The front in all its glory. That dust filter/mesh on the front is really nice, and pops out with a couple of hard pushes at the top.
Motherboard standoffs installed, time for building!
Motherboard installed with Corsair H50 attached. You can see the lovely 80mm fans at the top there too.
H50 hooked up to its 80mm fan and rad.
PSU installed; it takes up a lot of room and those cables are awful!!!
The right hand side, with a few cables
Everything in! Lots of space here, you can see how easy it would be to put a very thick 280mm radiator in here for the GPUs
With the window on, nice view, just need to light it up!
I'm really happy with this case. It's so spacious, very easy to work with, and Fractal has put in some excellent features to help with the build.
Over the next month or so I'll be installed watercooling with 2x240mm or 1x240mm and 1x280mm radiators, as well as reservoirs and everything you need for watercooling. Also, I’ve got some more fans coming and some ideas of how to make it all fit a bit more nicely in there.
Ask me anything!
Thanks for reading,
dirtychinchilla
I bought the Fractal Arc Midi R2 from elsewhere because I'm looking to cool my rig without the hassle of a full tower, and want to use 2X240 rads, which, in a nice midi case, don't seem to be a common feature.
However, this Arc Midi R2 seems to do it all, and excellently.
My build consists of:
• ASUS PZ68 pro motherboard
• 1XSSD @ 120GB (OS)
• 1XSSD @ 240GB (Steam and other games)
• 1XHDD @500GB (Music and movies)
• 4X8GB Corsair XMS3 (2GB eac) 8GB
• BeQuiet Pure Power 530W '80 Plus'
• EVGA GTX 480
• DVD RW drive
• Akasa card reader
I've been looking to water cool this because, of late, it hasn't been gaming cooly, and I managed to get 2XGTX 480s with water blocks for £150.
So, I'm moving from a Bitfenix Shinobi. Out with the old, in with the new. Here we go!
What's in here??
Fractal Arc Midi R2, and it's enormous. I had no idea that it would be so wide! Really nicely made, and it looks brilliant from the outside.
Either side. Nice big window here
So now we reach the internals. This is the setup you find as you get it out of the box, left hand side.
And right hand side. There's a lot of room in here for hiding cables, and good tubing slots (whatever they're called!).
Nice little box here.
Look what's in it (upside down!!).
Here's the poor old Shinobi, ready to go. Bitfenix Shinobi, it's been good, but here we part.
Left hand side of the Shinobi.
Shinobi interals. It's cramped in there!!
Empty Shinobi, ready to sell on the MM
So I stripped the R2, and these are the bits, as well as some of my components. These include two dust filters from the top and bottom of the case, which are fantastic. I think this is a superb idea, which Bitfenix could really do with catching on to! That Shinobi ate up a lot of dust.
More bits from the Shinobi, and general components.
This is the stripped down R2 in all its glory! Front is still on though as I hadn't worked out how to get it off at this point!
With HDD cages stripped out. The plan is to have a 280 rad (probably) in the front, so the small cage will be moved into the middle position, and the large cage just removed.
The front, with a Bitfenix Spectre fan in, as well as the R2 fan, which is brilliant I think.
HDD caged moved...
Finally got to the bits in that little box.
HDDs and SDDs installed.
DVD RW drive, and card reader installed, with awful white cable!!
Front with DVD RW drive and card reader.
The front in all its glory. That dust filter/mesh on the front is really nice, and pops out with a couple of hard pushes at the top.
Motherboard standoffs installed, time for building!
Motherboard installed with Corsair H50 attached. You can see the lovely 80mm fans at the top there too.
H50 hooked up to its 80mm fan and rad.
PSU installed; it takes up a lot of room and those cables are awful!!!
The right hand side, with a few cables
Everything in! Lots of space here, you can see how easy it would be to put a very thick 280mm radiator in here for the GPUs
With the window on, nice view, just need to light it up!
I'm really happy with this case. It's so spacious, very easy to work with, and Fractal has put in some excellent features to help with the build.
Over the next month or so I'll be installed watercooling with 2x240mm or 1x240mm and 1x280mm radiators, as well as reservoirs and everything you need for watercooling. Also, I’ve got some more fans coming and some ideas of how to make it all fit a bit more nicely in there.
Ask me anything!
Thanks for reading,
dirtychinchilla
