Corsair Carbide 500R review - Introduction

We recently reviewed the Corsair Carbide 400R, a mid-tower chassis that came out surprisingly well, offering good features for a fair price. With the Carbide series Corsair entered a more mainstream market, and as we all know that means a cheaper product often resulting in stripped away features, style and functionality. But the 400R most certainly did not disappoint.

Being a somewhat mainstream chassis you could say a thing or two about airflow IF you plan all kinds of hefty hardware components in the chassis though.

With that in mind Corsair went back tot he drawing board and improved that 400R model towards an updated SKU, the 500R. They added more meshed vents, a new 200 fan was added, a three step fan controller and tweaked the overall design a little as well with removable and relocatable hard drive cages allowing you to even insert a 452mm in length graphics card.

Carbide Series

• Side panel with mesh fan mount locations
• Four 5.25” drive bays
• Six 3.5” hard drive bays with 2.5” compatibility
• Eight expansion slots
• Supports most 240mm dual radiators (15mm spacing)
• Two-year warranty
• Front I/O panel contains:
  • Two USB 3.0 connectors
  • One Firewire connector
  • 3.5” headphone and microphone connector
  • Power and reset switches
  • Lighting toggle switch (lighting kit not included)
• Dimensions: 20.5” x 8.1” x 20”
• Supports graphics cards up to 316mm in length
• Six 120mm/140mm fan mounts
• Four 120mm fan mounts
• Includes two front-mounted 120mm fans and one rear 120mm fan
• Multi-channel fan controller
• Includes a 200mm side panel fan, two front-mounted 120mm fans, and one rear 120mm fan

Compatibility

• Intel LGA 775, 1155, 1156, 1366, and 2011
• AMD sockets AM2 and AM3
• Hydro Series H80 requires a case with a rear or top 120mm fan mount
• Hydro Series H100 requires a case with dual 120mm fan mounts with 15mm spacing for a 240mm radiator

So all in all, they took the base 400R and added/improved on features. Also funky is that Corsair now offers a somewhat unusual colored model, the White edition.

That particular model we'll review today, and though it is a total bitch to photograph, we do hope you get a good overview what this 105 EUR chassis is all about.