Corsair Carbide Series Air 540 Cube Case Review

Rating: 9.0.

‘Unique' is a word that is reserved for only a few companies in the case market today. With a split-chamber design and cube shape, does Corsair's Carbide Series Air 540 create a spark that could relight the flame of innovation for the chassis market?

Designed to isolate heat-producing components from their less power-hungry counterparts, the Carbide Series Air 540's unique split-chamber design is one of the first of its kind to create a such a buzz across the market.

Watercooling options include simultaneous 360mm and 240/280mm radiator support, as well as a 140mm unit. Eight expansion slots make quad-card configurations a possibility.

Touting an impressive set of features and a unique style, does Corsair's Carbide Series Air 540 have what it takes to win the stamp of approval?

Specifications:

• Motherboard support: E-ATX, ATX, Micro-ATX, Mini-ITX.
• Expansion slots: 8.
• Included fans: 2x 140mm front intake, 1x 140mm rear exhaust.
• Fan mounts: 2x 140mm (or 3x 120mm) front, 2x 120/140mm roof, 1x 140mm rear.
• 5.25″ drive bays: 2.
• Internal drive bays: 2x 3.5/2.5″, 4x 2.5″.
• Dimensions: 415mm x 332mm x 458mm.

Corsair ships the Air 540 in the company's typical brown box. Features and a blown-up image are found on one side of the packaging.

Mounting hardware and zip ties form the supplied bundle. As with the Obsidian 350D that we recently reviewed, Corsair doesn't supply the Air 540 with PSU screws.

For the sake of a few pennies, the power supply screws should be supplied.

A user manual provides surprisingly-helpful assistance when trying to navigate some of the Air 540's trickier installation procedures.

Unique is most certainly a word that can be associated with Corsair's Air 540. While cube cases aren't particularly new, one that looks fantastic and seems to offer simple general usage features is certainly worth some attention.

A large side panel window provides viewing access to the 540's entire primary chamber, allowing users to view graphics cards, CPU coolers, a pair of drives, and any watercooling kit.

The right side side panel is formed from steel and features a uniform style, with the exception of air holes for the power supply's fan.

One thing that is clearly noticeable about the Carbide Series' Air 540 chassis is its weight, or lack of. The 540 is very easy to manoeuvre, even with a single hand.

A unique ‘grilled' style panel that features airflow-permitting mesh spans an almost seamless distance from the Air 540's lower front to the upper-rear edge of its roof.

Two 5.25″ bay covers provide a consistent appearance for the plastic front panel.

IO ports are the standard affair; power and reset buttons, 3.5mm jacks, and a pair of USB 3.0 ports.

The rear of the primary chamber features eight recessed PCI slots and motherboard IO panel, as well as a grilled 140mm fan mount.

A slot for the power supply and a large area of airflow holes form the secondary chamber.

Four rubber-tipped feet act to damp vibrations and lift the Air 540 off the ground by around 10mm. It is disappointing to see that Corsair omits a dust filter beneath the case, even though no fan mounts are present. Dust can easily enter through the case's bottom area due to the large, non-filtered holes.

The spacious primary chamber is deceivingly large due to the fact that it isn't equipped with sizeable drive bays or a power supply area.

Maximum expansion card clearance is 320mm, or around 355mm if one decides to remove the front fans.

A pair of 2.5″ or 3.5″ storage drives can be mounted on the Air 540's bottom edge without the need for tools. The drives are powered and connected via a single-device SATA hub.

The drive mounts' location keeps them beneath the eighth expansion slot, hence minimising interference issues.

Corsair equips the Air 540 with a pair of its Air Series AF140L fans in the front mounting location. A large, magnetic filter stops dust and dirt entering through the case's front side.

Removing these fans will give watercoolers the freedom to mount a 240/280mm or 360mm radiator in the front section. And the 110mm of clearance to the motherboard's nearest edge should also make push-pull configurations a possibility.

Clearance above the uppermost 120mm fan mount is 20mm which means that things could get tight when front- and roof-mounted radiators are used simultaneously and their tubing meets in the top-front corner.

Another of Corsair's Air Series AF140L fans is used in the 540's rear mount. With 60mm of clearance between the rear fan mount and roof, a heavily-oversized 140mm radiator could be fitted with ease.

Eight expansion slots each feature a vented cover and tool-less operation by means of thumbscrews.

A pair of 120/140mm fans can be mounted beneath a high-quality dust filter in the Air 540's roof.

Clearance between the roof mount and motherboard upper-edge is 71mm – a sufficient value for a thick radiator and single set of fans, but somewhat limited for push-pull configurations.

Corsair uses the secondary chamber to isolate less heat-sensitive components from the power-hungry CPU and graphics cards. The motherboard tray acts as a barrier between each chamber, limiting the transfer of heat from one side to another.

But separating components isn't the secondary chamber's biggest task – cable management and storage is. With 115 millimetres of space between to motherboard tray and right side panel, copious amounts of cables can be stored without the requirement for precise cable management.

A moveable support bracket is useful for power supplies up to 200mm in length. Users with power supplies greater than 200mm in length can simply remove the moveable bracket and rely on supporting force from the remaining two columns and four mounting screws.

Sat behind the high-quality, magnetic dust filter are Corsair's AF140L fans. Removing the front panel requires the roof panel to first be removed. This is an irritating design choice which adds needless time to simplistic upgrades.

Thankfully, both panels are very easy to remove. The roof is held in place by a pair of thumbscrews, while the front panel slides upwards out of its position. Don't expect to mount a pair of fan between the roof and top panel filter – there isn't enough clearance.

A 4-slot bay allows up to four 2.5″ drives to be installed without the use of tools. The drives are held in place by the bay's constricting dimensions and a plastic lever.

The 540's tool-less hard drive installation method is very good – it's simple and secure. 3.5″ drives clip in via four metal pins surrounded by silicone vibration absorbers, while 2.5″ devices require four screws which are fastened from beneath.

Our Seasonic Platinum-1000 power supply required the 540's movable support to be placed one position away from the penultimate mounting location. The support does not interfere with either of the storage drives' SATA hubs.

26mm of clearance between the PSU and right side panel gives plenty of room for air to reach the power supply's fan.

During installation, we noticed that Corsair's design choices could cause major problems for a large user base. Corsair shortens the 540's front panel cables by a considerable margin. While this is a fundamentally wise decision for a case which has its front panel situated just a few centimetres from the motherboard, certain board layouts are totally incompatible with the Air 540 case.

Our ASRock 990FX Extreme9 motherboard has its front panel headers positioned further to the left side than many other ATX boards that I have worked with. Corsair's 29cm front panel cables simply cannot reach the 990FX Extreme9's header. We were forced to resort to shorting the power switch with a screwdriver for the purpose of this review.

Corsair should have spotted such an issue and eliminated it by increasing the cables' length, or providing extensions in the bundle. A similar issue exists with the USB 3 header, but this is less of a problem with most modern motherboards making use of the near-24 location for such headers. Nevertheless, supplying an extension would have eliminated potential issues and allowed users to maintain effective cable management if the increased length is not required.

Corsair's cable management system implemented on the Air 540 makes for one of the easiest building processes that could be wished for. Grommet positioning is almost flawless, with only the omission of a specific route for the lower-left positioned HD audio cable causing some slight untidiness.

Thanks to the interference-free design of the Air 540's primary chamber, working inside the chassis is a pleasant experience, even for builders with large hands.

CPU cooler clearance is a sizeable 195mm, allowing the market's premier giants such as the Noctua D14 and Phanteks PH-TC14PE to fit inside the Air 540 without any problems.

With both front fans installed, expansion card clearance is 320mm. That value extends to around 355mm with the fans removed.

Storage drives slip into place below the motherboard without blocking any components' access.

The connection via a SATA power and data hub allows drives to be rapidly removed, although this does require the side panel to be detached, hence it is not quite a hot-swap system.

A large CPU cooler cut-out provides access to wide variety of motherboards. The tool-less 2.5″ drive will have to be removed for the most complete access to be obtained.

When there is 115mm of clearance provided, cable management is a simple and fast procedure. Our build's cables were connected to the desired component and then housed in any available space.

A small amount of room between the 5.25″ bays and motherboard tray gives access to the upper two cable management grommets. Fitting a fat 24-pin cable through gap can be tricky, but it is possible.

We were not impressed by the 5.25″ devices' fastening mechanism; our drive wasn't particularly secure.

A black 5.25″ optical drive's bezel fits in seamlessly with the design of the Air 540's plastic front panel.

Recessed IO ports and PCI slots reduce the possibility of interference occuring with long cables.

Given that the cables and the power supply are located in the secondary chamber, Corsair was wise to use a full-sized side panel window that shows off the entirety of the primary chamber.

To put this case through its cooling paces we will be using a test system consisting of an AMD FX-8350, Radeon HD 7850 and multiple storage drives. This system allows us to produce a substantial amount of heat and effectively test the Corsair Carbide Air 540‘s cooling capabilities.

For stress testing we use a mixture of Prime95 and FurMark to create the maximum heat output. Prime95′s ‘Small FFTs’ setting allows us to stress our CPU. FurMark’s ‘GPU Burn-in’ mode creates the maximum amount of load our GPU is ever likely to see.

Test System:

• Processor: AMD FX-8350.
• Motherboard: ASRock 990FX Extreme9.
• CPU cooler: Thermaltake Frio (100% fan speed).
• Memory: 8GB Patriot Viper 2133MHz.
• Graphics card: Sapphire Radeon HD 7850 1GB Dual-X (‘auto' fan setting).
• Power supply: Seasonic Platinum-1000.
• Storage drives: 128GB OCZ Vertex 4 (OS), 320GB Seagate 7200.12.
• OS: Windows 7 Professional 64-bit.

Thermal Performance Test Procedures:

• The case’s default fan configuration is used to give an accurate interpretation of the out-of-the-box performance.
• The Corsair Carbide Air 540‘s default fan configuration is: 2x 140mm front intake, 1x 140mm rear exhaust fans.
• The fans are operating at full speed.
• We allow the system to idle for 15 minutes and record the stable temperatures.
• We allow the system to operate under extreme stress for 15 minutes and record the stable temperatures.

Room temperature was maintained at 24°C.

Idle cooling performance of the Air 540 is nothing special. The HDD temperature is higher than competing models due to the fact that Corsair's positioning puts 3.5″ drives away from the front panel.

Load cooling performance on the other hand is very good. The front intake fans' clear path which lacks obstructions allows them to provide cool air directly to the CPU cooler. Graphics cards will also receive cool air which helps them to operate at reduced temperatures.

Acoustic Performance Test Procedures:

• We placed our Digital Sound Level Meter one metre away from the case.
• The case fans are set to maximum speed.
• The CPU cooler’s fans are deactivated.
• The Corsair Carbide Air 540‘s default fan configuration is: 2x 140mm front intake, 1x 140mm rear exhaust fans.

Please refer to our KitGuru noise guide for a comparison between the noise levels of this case and everyday scenarios.

KitGuru noise guide
10dBA – Normal Breathing/Rustling Leaves
20-25dBA – Whisper
30dBA – High Quality Computer fan
40dBA – A Bubbling Brook, or a Refrigerator
50dBA – Normal Conversation
60dBA – Laughter
70dBA – Vacuum Cleaner or Hairdryer
80dBA – City Traffic or a Garbage Disposal
90dBA – Motorcycle or Lawnmower
100dBA – MP3 player at maximum output
110dBA – Orchestra
120dBA – Front row rock concert/Jet Engine
130dBA – Threshold of Pain
140dBA – Military Jet take-off/Gunshot (close range)
160dBA – Instant Perforation of eardrum

The trio of Corsair's Air Series AF140L fans doesn't make for the quietest combination, but they aren't unbearable either. A simple fan controller would help users define their balance between cooling performance and noise output, but Corsair does not supply one.

The Corsair Carbide Series Air 540 is a superlative chassis which executes the unique features very well. Cable management is about as easy as it gets and the spacious primary and hidden secondary chamber, combined with excellent grommet positioning, make for a simple to use and very effective system.

Cooling is a strong point for the Air 540. The two powerful AF140L fans force cool air towards the hot graphics card and CPU area and a single 140mm rear exhaust fan is used for removing hot air from the system.

Watercooling support is welcomed and a double- and triple-sized radiator can fit inside the Air 540. There is a good amount of clearance for thick radiators and large tubing – 110mm at the front and 70mm in the roof.

Expansion options are generally good. Eight PCI slots make 4-card configurations a reality and two 5.25″ bays is likely to be sufficient for most users. It's the standard hard drive support that is slightly limited, a pair of 3.5″ drive mounts may be insufficient for quite a large proportion of users. Three would be more useful.

A high-quality, well-engineered style makes the Air 540's unique appearance an attractive one. Corsair deserve credit for their ability to give a case with such awkward dimensions such an alluring appearance.

The lack of fan controller is disappointing and has a negative effect on the case's acoustic performance. No filter below the HDD slots is a needless corner that has been cut. Our biggest complaint stems from the short – 29cm – front panel cables.

Corsair's decision to shorten them to an appropriate size was a good one, but unfortunately, further research for complete motherboard compatibility was clearly required. Hopefully Corsair will implement a fix to this issue (such as supplying extension cables) before the case starts shipping to users, otherwise major problems could be encountered. Nobody is going to be happy manually shorting out their power button header on a regular basis.

Available to preorder for £116.99 from OverclockersUK, the Corsair Carbide Series Air 540 offers excellent value for money. You get a unique, high-quality, feature-heavy chassis for what is a very competitive price.

If Corsair can quickly solve the short front panel cables issue, the Carbide Series Air 540 Cube case is an innovative chassis that is well worth its competitive asking price.

Pros:

• Excellent cooling performance.
• Unique design.
• Solid build quality
• Plenty of clearance for large hardware.
• Large window.
• Excellent cable management.
• Good watercooling support.

Cons:

• Short front panel cables.
• No fan controller.

KitGuru says: A well-implemented breath of fresh air for the chassis market.

Become a Patron!