Cooler MasterElite 301 Lite Micro-ATX High Airflow Minimalist PC Case, 365mm GPU Max, Compatible RTX 5080|RX 7090 XT, 280mm AIO Max, Type C, Tempered Glass, 120mm PWM Fan, Intakes Grill

I love the ability to start my assembly by installing the motherboard on the mb tray. This leaves plenty of room to start plugging in cables. Especially with a tall tower style air cooler it is difficult with most mb's to plug in the cpu power and cpu fan cables if the top is already on.For most people that is the most frustrating part of a pc assembly.The case came together in less than an hour. I watched a couple videos and cooler master has done a great job showing how to put the case together. Links on the box via QR code. Also the pieces come out of the box in order.The instruction pamphlet is confusing as the numbering of the steps is not very clear and is not intuitive. It goes 1,2,3,1,1,2,1,2, etc. WHY.. EVERYTHING ELSE IS FANTASTICBut CM has videos as well as other users and reviewers. The front panel connections (power, power led, hdd led and reset) are combined into one 5x2 plastic block that goes into the left half of the front panel header on the mb. I never saw this done before and figuring out that simple change was the longest part of this build.I ran 3d mark and the temperature of my cpu went DOWN. The concern others have about the dust filters blocking air flow did not apply in my case, but I have an AMD cpu not Intel as one concerned reviewer did. I did not overclock.I would not be concerned about temperatures.Noise is not an issue either. I barely hear it and if anything else is on the noise from the fans is completely masked by the noise in my apartment.I do not think a 360 mm radiator is a good choice for this case, CM doesn't say it would even fit, due to the placement of the power supply. A 280 or 240 supposedly fits, but I put in an air cooler: the ThermalRight Assassination Warrior Ninja Killer had plenty of room despite the need for the front fan to rise 3-5 mm above the cooling tower due to tall rgb memory.You can exchange the side panels to allow room for fans in the side bracket.Cooling and noise is not an issue in my build which contains a 9900x and a 7900xt with 650 watt Silversmith G style ps all running at stock.Size is fantastic, it is about as compact as one could reasonable ask with these components and air cooling.I take great satisfaction in knowing that I can still assemble my own computer from parts researched by myself.It's nice to be environmentally correct and support companies trying to green up their businesses.QUBE 500 has a great compact size without the difficulty such small builds usually entail. The handle makes moving the case safe and secure.The problems: if you have larger than ATX power supply and a long graphics card you will have difficulties.I put my power supply at the highest spot and routed the fixed cpu, gpu and mb cables around and behind my 335 mm graphics card. Cable management is a B or B+ with my ATX power supply. An SFX ps would give cable management an A with plenty of room in the rear for more.It looks ok, but the cables are bent to their maximum safe bending angle. Depending on the exact size and location of your ps cables getting around a long gpu could be an issue.I did not install sata style hard drives as I bought my first NVME stick and I love it. There is room in back to place more drives, and also in the front if you don't want to put fans in the bottom.I am wait and see on adding fans, the one it comes with and the 2 from my ThermalRight tower plus the 3 in my CPU and the 1 in the power supply seem to be enough right now. I may add 2 x 140mm in the bottom and/or a 240/280 mm CPU radiator in the top.If you don't have a power supply yet consider a fully modular and perhaps an SFX form factor AND PERHAPS fanless just to reduce possible noise.Cleaning dust filters seems straight forward, the front and top panels do snap off and on so no screwdrivers are required to clean them. The bottom filter is magnetic and easy to place on and off.

Size is amazing for someone who moves a lot and prefers the understated look. Air flow is great - don't mind any old reviews - however, the newer hexagonal dust filters may be allowing a little more particulate in than I might like. My case fans don't ever need to go above 1300rpm and I don't hear em. Won the lottery on an undervolted asus 5070ti sff so don't hear that. Whenever I start tinkering with the cpu I may have to go AIO but doubt I'll hear those 140mms up top either.Cable routing is solid. Build is simple. Maybe took me an extra 10minutes compared to a pre-assembled case? The fans on the bottom are going to be a little annoying to swap out whenever I want to really dial in my fish tank look and put reverse-blades down there while giving Ahsoka a proper platform.aaand can't beat the price for the quality it's super sturdy.

I wanted a case that supported a horizontally mounted motherboard so the GPU is slotted vertically without the need for fancy extenders.Pros:I like the way the case looks and feels.I'm happy with the modularity and versatility the case provides.It has a very nice build quality apart from the plastic feet.There's plenty of space.Every panel has a mesh dust filter.Cons:You have to assemble EVERYTHING.When the case is built to lay on its "side" so that the motherboard is horizontal, what used to be the "bottom" of the case which is now a "side" does not have a metal panel with built-in dust filter. It simply has the magnetic dust filter. And while the macaron edition provides additional colored panels that could fill the space and provide aesthetic, the plain black or white editions do not provide any additional panels for this particular "side" configuration. One side doesn't look great.Additionally, there wasn't an option to buy the case without a tempered glass panel. And when the case is on its "side", the tempered glass exists above all other components. I've had tempered glass on an oven door spontaneously shatter in the past. And while I wouldn't ever put anything atop the case with it being tempered glass, I was concerned with a potential explosion with glass shattering in my case.Apart from contacting support and perhaps requesting and paying for additional parts, there is no way to buy additional panels from their store.There is a small section on the back of the case that is simply open. There is no way to seal that section up to prevent dust from entering. I believe it is open to allow for different case configurations that affect PCI-E card orientation. I'm not sure why the case wasn't designed with a small metal panel to insert there to close it off.Result:I didn't want to contact support to try requesting and paying for additional parts. So, I bought a 2nd case purely for an extra top/front panel for my case' "side", and a second metal side panel for my case' "top" to take the place of the tempered glass I was hesitant to use. I guess the added bonus of buying a 2nd case is that I have spare parts if I ever need them. Still, it's too bad the consumer has to resort to such extremes to acquire parts that should either be an option when purchasing the case, or easily available after purchase.