The Lian Li Strimer Plus series has one aim: to allow you to light up the two sets of cables you will never be able to hide completely. While the original Strimer offered this for the 24-pin ATX cable, it opted to light up clear, flexible tubes at both ends, much like a fiber optics line. This allowed for colors and basic animations, which looks great in and of itself. The Strimer Plus series goes a step further and puts LEDs along every pair of strands, which results in animations going from one plug to the other end of the whole cable. Another obvious benefit is a much brighter, uniformly lit cable.

With a total of 228 LEDs, there is a lot more creative leeway when it comes to animations, as well as speed and brightness. For this purpose, Lian Li has moved from an expansion-slot based controller to a more elaborate, separate one. This is both good and bad as it allows users of ITX systems to use it without having to sacrifice a precious slot, but also means that you won't have easy access to it unless you pop off a side panel.

For the price, the Strimer Plus cables are actually a pretty good deal as the 24-pin unit comes with a controller that is universally expandable, so you could attach LED strips and fans to it for unison control of your lighting effects inside the chassis, while the 8-pin has a noticeably lower MSRP as it doesn't come with such a device.