Assembly

The optical bay installation is fairly simple. First remove the front cover, slide the drive in place, and then lock it in place with the easy turn locks. The top optical bay was however the only one with the steel spacer removed. If multiple drives were installed these would simply be bent until breaking the connection with the sides. The hard drive was installed in the removable bay. Only one hard drive was installed, but it was still nice to remove the bay and install the drive before replacing the bay.


When I installed the power supply I noticed how much real estate I lost. This standard ATX power supply took up quite a bit of room, not including the cables. As well it was pretty hard to manage the power supply cables inside the case.


Installing the mainboard was very simple. With the tray removed from the back panel I was able to mount the motherboard and then insert it in place with the back panel. With the main board in place the Blackstorm starts to fill up, with not alot of room left over. With the processor cooler and graphics card installed the case looks over-cramped and messy. There just isn't enough room for much else. It's unfortunate that larger graphics cards may not fit without removing the hard drive bay.

Finished Looks

Fully installed and powered on the Blackstorm really does look good on the outside. The included fans are very quiet as well. While the front lights are pleasant I'm not sure how well the hard drive activity and power light (red and green) may contrast the white and blue color scheme. From another angle the chassis glows a soft blue haze that is quite soothing. Even the rear of the case has a nice color composition when powered on. Overall I would enjoy having this case sitting beside my desk.