Cooler Master Centurion 5 Chassis

Well built, cool, and quiet for well under $100

Strengths: Solid build quality, toolless drive and adapter card installation, quiet

Weakness: No slide out motherboard tray. Must remove the side CPU exhaust tube if installing a large CPU fan.

The Cooler Master Centurion 5 offers a lot of bang for the buck. It's well built and you won't cut off a finger while working inside it. It's compact yet roomy inside and looks good with the front mesh grill and silver aluminum highlights. The case is quiet with the included 80mm front and 120mm rear case fans considering that the mesh front and vented side means that sound will naturally leak...
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The Cooler Master Centurion 5 offers a lot of bang for the buck. It's well built and you won't cut off a finger while working inside it. It's compact yet roomy inside and looks good with the front mesh grill and silver aluminum highlights. The case is quiet with the included 80mm front and 120mm rear case fans considering that the mesh front and vented side means that sound will naturally leak out.

By flowynn - Jan 10, 2006

A cool pretty case

Strengths: front panel USBx2, IEEE 1394 x 1, audio in/out, two case fans, tool-free installation, pretty

Weakness: none so far

This case is highly recommended. It has all the good features a case should have. The front panel has 2 USB, 1 IEEE 1394, mic/speaker ports. The power/reset buttons are easy to press. The front panel leds are in cool blue color instead of red/green in traditional cases. The installation can be tool-free except setting the motherboard. There are one frontal and one back fan for cooling the system....
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This case is highly recommended. It has all the good features a case should have. The front panel has 2 USB, 1 IEEE 1394, mic/speaker ports. The power/reset buttons are easy to press. The front panel leds are in cool blue color instead of red/green in traditional cases. The installation can be tool-free except setting the motherboard. There are one frontal and one back fan for cooling the system. I cannot find a bad thing about it so far.

By dozen - Dec 4, 2005

Great case!

Strengths: black mesh bezel the 120mm exhaust fan:very quiet solid structure nice button push action tool-less install

Weakness: 80mm intake fan really needs to go

This is a great case. For the price I paid(45$) it was a fantastic deal. The mesh feel makes it look very sophisiticated and slick. There is also a side vent that allows better cpu intake. As for the mesh, it allows more airflow and also contains a filter behind the mesh to prevent dust.

By snorbro - Nov 14, 2005

EXCELLENT! Cool, Quiet, Quality - fits my A7N8X-E perfectly

Strengths: + Dual fans (120mm exhaust, 80mm intake) + Unique "meshed" front panel allows superior airflow + Ample screws, Mobo standoffs, etc. + Front case lights/panel work 100% + Tool-less design

Weakness: - (minor) Limited instructions. Tons of screws included, which is a plus, but no instructions on how to use each (e.g., 2 types of mobo standoffs, plastic square thing, round doughnut thing?)

This case is really awesome. It was my first upgrade from a micro-ATX case and hopefully my last. The case looks great, sleek and clean looking. Major selling point for me was it's airflow capability. The case includes 2 fans and has a unique front panel design - every open 5.25 bay is covered with a sturdy metal "mesh" panel with a dust filter in behind. Behind the bottom 2 bays is the front...
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This case is really awesome. It was my first upgrade from a micro-ATX case and hopefully my last. The case looks great, sleek and clean looking. Major selling point for me was it's airflow capability. The case includes 2 fans and has a unique front panel design - every open 5.25 bay is covered with a sturdy metal "mesh" panel with a dust filter in behind. Behind the bottom 2 bays is the front 80mm intake fan, which blows air to the 120mm exhaust fan.
Front panel works, same with the blue power and HD lights. It actually included more case wires than my A7N8X-E supported.
The weakness I listed was trivial, because it only took a couple minutes to examine the screws to see what was needed (a little overwhelming at first to see all of the included parts...just note that there are 2 different types of standoffs and 2 different screw sizes.)

This is the way cases should be made - quiet and cool. I would buy again and would recommend it to friends and family.

By dcheu - Nov 8, 2005

Incomparable case

Strengths: Very affordable, roomy and well ventilated with the fonrt mesh bezel, simple to use, plenty of connectors, front panel connectors very helpful, stylish.

Weakness: So negligible as to not need noting here

Without doubt this was the smartest computer purchase I have yet made. This case is astonishing for the simple fact of the abundance of features it has for such a ridiculously low price. With any other case you would expect to pay about double what I paid for the Centurion ($55 including shippping after rebate). The layout inside is a treat and unlike some reviwers I wasn't too unahppy with the...
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Without doubt this was the smartest computer purchase I have yet made. This case is astonishing for the simple fact of the abundance of features it has for such a ridiculously low price. With any other case you would expect to pay about double what I paid for the Centurion ($55 including shippping after rebate).
The layout inside is a treat and unlike some reviwers I wasn't too unahppy with the absence of a mob tray. Access from both side panels is more than adequate for all jobs except a complete system upgrade.
You get five externally accessible 5.25" bays, four internal and one external 3.5" bays - all with a neat slide connector that does away with the need to secure your devices with screws. The rear pci slots also have easy operating locks that dispenes with the need for fiddling with screws to hold cards in place.
I was very pleased with the front panel which gives you mic and headphone jacks, 2 USB ports and a firewire port. This was a great selling point for me (no more crawling around the back of my desk to plug and play with USB devices such as my flash drives).
Very pleased with the included 120mm exhaust and 80 mm intake fans - along with the side vent these keep the inside atmosphere cool enough to run a Prescott without any temp issues and are actually quiet enought for me to run audio recording apps using these fans.
There are only three real quibbles I have. The brief instructions that come with the case and don't really help as you wade through all the screws and mobo jacks. However it doesn't take much work to figure out what needs to go where.
Some people will be put off by the absence of a power supply with the case. And indeed the price-point alters dramatically when you have to obtain your own. But if you're building a system you will appreciate the flexibility this allows and therefore it is actually a plus rather than negative for the Centurion.
The other issue I had was the tool-less design. Well it is - if you don't want to access the front drive bays. You need to jimmy the front bezel off to get at these from the front, and this was the only disappointing design aspect. But it really wasn't an inconvenience and considering what you get with this case it just was not a problem.
This case is the basis for a whole new build system I've just put together and I cannot speak highly enough of it. The aesthetic of the case is superior to the low end Lian-Li's, with five esternal 5.25" drive bays knocks the socks off anything by Antec that isn't three times the price, and in functional terms surpasses all competitors with the ease of operation.
The Centurion even wipes the floor with many of CoolerMaster's other cases, including the Wavemaster.
This really is the business as far as affordable and feature-packed cases go. It will take some convincing now to move me away from the Centurion, and I urge anyone with an interest in buying a new case to seriously consider this one as your first port of call.

By leveller - Feb 12, 2006