Assembly

Installing the motherboard within the KL07E is done by traditional means, with the use of spacers and screws. As the locking mechanism and screws for all expansion cards are on the outside of the chassis, you will have to remove all the screws holding your expansion cards in place, and two more screws that keep the protective cover from swinging open. This means that all your expansion cards and covers will come loose every time you change your system's configuration. The case can hold long GPUs well, with just enough room for the PNY GeForce RTX 4080 XLR8 Triple Fan to not obstruct any potent push/pull radiator setup you may want to go for in the front of the chassis.


Adding an SSD is quite simple. Just raise the plastic tray away from the motherboard, slide the drive into the unit, and push it down until both sides of the tray snap back into place.


Installing a hard drive is completely tool-less due to the plastic trays. These come with plastic pins which are sturdy enough to hold the drive tightly. Once filled, simply slide the tray back into the bay of your choice until it snaps into place.


Installing a power supply is done by using the usual set of screws to hold it in place. Things are pretty tight for the Dark Power 13 - especially as the HDD cage is now no longer movable either. The documentation mentions 224 mm, but that will include the cable connectors and bend radius of the cabling. On top of that, you will need a bit of that room to maneuver the PSU into place initially.


Installing an AIO is straight forward, as you simply screw it down. As expected, a 240 mm will officially fit and SilverStone clearly stays away from mentioning 280 mm variants for obvious reasons. However, even with a 240 mm unit, you will lose access to the connectors at the top of the motherboard. Also noteworthy is the fact that our Lexar memory tapers off at the ends, so tall sticks may still get in the way of your AIO.


With everything installed, the interior of the Silverstone KL07E is nice and clean, due to the limited in number but well-placed grommet-equipped openings in the motherboard tray. That entire cable mess is manageable behind the tray even though the chassis doesn't have as many zip-tie hooks as most other enclosures out there. You could absolutely split the leads up and spread them a bit more, but we opted to use the Velcro strips as much as possible.

Finished Looks

With the side panels in place and the system turned on, you would not know the system was active if not for the faint operating noise and blue LED at the front.


Looking at the rear, everything is where you would expect it to be. Thanks to the solid side panels, everything is hidden away, and the result is an understated system that will blend into its surroundings.