A Closer Look - Inside

Both panels of the Corsair iCUE 5000T RGB are placed on hinges with a single screw each holding them in place. The glass is officially 4 mm thick excluding manufacturing variances. Corsair included push pins on each side, which is great if you need to quickly and repeatedly access the interior. As you can see, the steel side panel comes with a thin, magnetic dust filter to keep grime out, which you may easily remove for cleaning.


You may pull the panels off the hinges to keep them from getting in the way during the assembly process. On the interior, things look quite traditional for a modern chassis, with a metal shroud on the bottom that does come with a plastic extension in the front you may replace with the included accessory, which is handy if you want to use a thick full-size radiator setup, for example. You may install two of your 2.5" HDD plates on the shroud to show off your SSDs, but those are installed behind the motherboard tray by default. I am not sure if Corsair sells these separately for those who want to add more storage. There are also two fairly large cable-routing openings in the shroud, which could have been cut much smaller to keep things as clean as possible.


On the backside, things look nearly identical to what we have seen with the 5000D. However, Corsair did away with the inner door and instead focused on the addition of smarts in the form of the Commander Core XT module, which is installed on the SSD tray.


Towards the front of the chassis is the mounting position for the side fans/radiator consisting of three 120 mm spots, so a 360 mm radiator will fit as well. Corsair has also included two separate cable channels that may be used with their Velcro strips, three of which are pre-installed along the longer main channel out of the box. There are also three separate trays for SSDs underneath the opening for the motherboard tray.


A plate over the opening for the CPU cooler can either hold an additional storage unit or controller. In the case of the iCUE 5000T RGB, there is the Commander Core XT controller, which retails for $59.99. Next to that is a small PCB that seems to interface the six ARGB elements of the chassis to the control module. This means you should see the case as its own element to be controlled via the iCUE software, just like you would see a Corsair mouse or keyboard, for example.


Just like the D-series, there is a metal shroud with the same subtle branding—it allows for very clean cable management. Without active cooling here, the one in the iCUE 5000T RGB also acts as a cover for the side intake mount. As we will be installing a radiator here, we will keep this cover off and use the rubber grommet-equipped cable-routing holes.


In the front, underneath the shroud, is an HDD cage that holds two plastic trays for two 3.5" or 2.5" drives. By default, it is installed as far towards the back as possible for unobstructed access even with fans or a radiator on this side of the iCUE 5000T RGB. Above that, the whole area is intended for cooling purposes. Corsair placed three LL120 RGB PWM intake fans here, which also have a retail value of around $75 in a triple pack on their own (Editor's note: an individual fan sells for $39.99, while the triple pack with the control module sells for $129.99. Deducting the $54.99 MSRP of the module itself, the resulting value is $75).


Underneath the shroud, the PSU bay is standard-fare with its foam bits for the PSU to rest upon. Above that are the expansion slots, each with its individual thumb screw holding the reusable cover in place. In the very top, the 120 mm exhaust fan may be adjusted in height for proper alignment with your air cooler, with that additional space above it for liquid-cooling support.


In the ceiling, you will find the mounting for fans or a radiator. There is plenty of space, so going for any AIO with ample space towards your motherboard is possible. Large openings allow for easy cable management even with something like that in place. That said, this may also add a little bit of clutter to your final build because of the way they are shaped.


All the cables within the Corsair iCUE 5000T RGB are black and mostly what you would expect. The two USB 3.0 cables are flat, which makes routing so much easier. There is no HDD activity LED, though, which is unfortunate for those using solid-state drives since it is usually a good indicator of whether your system is frozen or just working really hard; that said, I can see users utilizing the power button LED as an HDD activity LED instead.