Sharkoon Pure Steel Midi ATX Case – White or Black with RGB

Rating: 8.0.

In this review we take a look at 2 cases from Sharkoon which both sit in the Pure steel line up. The first variant sports a minimalist design and white paint job to create a completely blank canvas and retails for around £70 . The other Pure steel case is the RGB version which features an all black chassis with 4 preinstalled 120mm addressable RGB fans for an extra £20. There's a lot of competition at this price point so how well does the Pure steel shape up? 

Gallery: 

Specification: 

• Form Factor: MATX, E-ATX, CEB, EEB
• Expansion Slots: 7
• Side Panel:  Tempered Glass
• Weight: 8.66 kg
• Dimensions (L x W x H): 47.4 x 21.0 x 47.5 cm
• I/O: USB 3.0 (Top), Audio (Top)
• Max. Drive Bays: 3.5″ x 3, 2.5″ x 5
• Fan Configuration
• Side Panel: 2 x 120 mm fan or radiator
• Rear Panel: 1x 120 mm RGB fan (pre-installed in RGB variant)
• Bottom Panel: 3 x 120 mm RGB fan (pre-installed in RGB variant) or radiator
• Max. Length Graphics Cards: 42 cm or 30cm with certain radiators
• Max. Height CPU Cooler: 16 cm
• Max. Length Power Supply: 29.5 cm
• Max. Height Radiator incl. Fan (Front): 14.5 cm
• Package Contents: PURE STEEL RGB, 8-Port Addressable RGB Controller, Accessory Set, Manual

Test build components:

• Intel i5-7400 Processor
• FSP Windale 4 CPU Cooler
• ASUS Strix Z270F Gaming Motherboard
• ASUS Dual series RX 580 graphics card
• Patriot Viper DDR4 16GB 2400MHZ
• Seasonic Focus Platinum 850PX
• Samsung 850 EVO 250GB

Cooling performance:

Our test build components aren't the most demanding parts out there and the Sharkoon pure steel barely had to break a sweat when keeping them cool as shown with the impressive results.

Idle temperatures are just above ambient with 32C for the CPU and 33C for the GPU which are just what we would expect. After spending some time gaming and after stress testing it using AIDA64 for 10 minutes the temperatures maxed out at 51C for the CPU and 71C for the GPU. Overall this the pure steel appears to have no issues keeping components cool.

Acoustic Performance: 

The 4 RGB fans that come supplied with the RGB version of the Pure steel case that we opted build in are good value for money when it comes to aesthetics and build quality. Unfortunately they aren't the quietest fans and do make some audible noise in our system. 41 decibels isn't the worst we have heard but anyone wanting a silent system might be a little disappointed.

However even when our test system was under full load they didn't create much excess noise, only increasing to 45 decibels.  When connecting them via Molex if your motherboard doesn't have enough fan headers the full speed noise is far from ideal. It was irritating enough for us to sacrifice some cable management aesthetics in favor of using the 3 pin connectors.

Pros:

• Attractive aesthetics
• Good build quality
• Plenty of options for cooling
• Good value RGB fans
• Good cooling performance

Cons:

• Tight clearance for the 8 pin
• RGB fans have daisy chained molex connection
• RGB fans might be a little noisy for some people

The Pure Steel RGB Case can be found here

The Pure steel Base case in white can be found here

Kitguru says: The Sharkoon Pure Steel case isn't perfect but we think it is a clean attractive case that is well built and performs to a good level for a reasonable price.  

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