Review System

Assembly

With the tray removed, you are easily able to place the required stand-offs in the right locations before screwing down the motherboard. There is plenty of space underneath the tray for routing cables if you really want to, but there are no cutouts for CPU cooler backplates, which could have been useful. The RM42-502 offers full compatibility with SSI-EEB, SSI-CEB, and extended ATX boards, so there is that extra room on the tray as well.


Before putting the motherboard back into the case, one may install a radiator of up to 240 mm. Alternatively, you could go dual 120 and liquid cool two CPUs independently. SilverStone advertises a maximum thickness of 53 mm for you radiator and fan setup, which is right in line with what modern AIOs provide. This allows you to use the support bracket for extra-long expansion slots as well. Naturally, you may opt for a push/pull sandwich configuration if you do not need that structural part. Lastly, you may also go for air coolers of up to 148 mm in height if you forgo the GPU support bracket. Air cooler height is reduced to a maximum of 130 mm with the bar in place.


Once the board is in place, it will quickly become apparent that cable management is not a focus. This does not meant you could not make it really clean, but that it simply requires a bit more thought and creativity.


Installing drives is done all in one go regardless of type, and you may do so outside of the RM42-502. In our setup, we installed one of each drive type, all of which are held in place by traditional screws. Once filled, simply put the cage back into the case and screw down the four black screws from outside to pin the cage down.


Lastly, adding the power supply is done by utilizing screws. SilverStone does allow you to detach the mounting frame of the PSU bay to rotate it to fit your power supply fan setup best, but by default, any modern unit with a 120 or 140 mm fan will fit right in. Some of the cable management was done by folding together the PSU cables, but quite frankly, you should easily be able to do a better job than in our setup.


With everything installed, you may put the support bar back onto the chassis as well. We had to move one of the support brackets over one and lowered it to keep the GPU in place nicely as well. This works well for expansion cards which are a specific slot size—those not a specific slot size thick will no be able to take advantage of the anti-sag feature.

Finished Looks

With everything turned on, you will immediately be greeted by fan noise if using the default cooling units, which is not surprising since the chassis is geared towards cooling and reliability as opposed to operating quietly. The power button LED can clearly be seen as soon as the system is turned on.


It shines through the front panel ever so slightly, which also holds true for the HDD activity LED, but we only managed to snap a picture of it on with the cover flipped down. In the rear, everything is where you would expect it to be.


As initially mentioned, the RM42-502 ships with all the parts to utilize the chassis in a tower configuration. To do so, remove the left handle bracket and replace it with a connecting plate. Then, add the four large feet, which may either be set to point outward for added stability or rotated 90 degrees. Lastly, the two handles are then installed on top of the case with different plates.


The result is a server tower with carrying handles and a door that flips open to the right. Looking at the rear brings back some serious nostalgia as the exposed steel and PSU placement in the top throw us back to the early 2000s of the retail hardware space.