A Closer Look

An inmportant feature of this case is the fact that you can access all the parts, while all cables are still connected. To achieve this, both sides can be flipped down. The right door also holds the mainboard and addon cards installed, just like a mainboard tray. It also has an airvent for the side fan, which blows across the external 3.5 inch bays.


The left butterfly door has a large, 120 mm air duct which can be extended about 2 cm into the case. Judging from the fairly compact interior, you may just want to remove the duct and install a normal 12 cm fan instead. There is a fan bar, which also doubles as a securing device for PCI/graphic cards. It can also hold a 8 cm fan, which is not included.


You may wonder why there was no mention of screws during the "Contents" section of this review. Spire has these neatly packed into a plastic tray at the bottom of the case. You will also find four pairs of rails, which are meant for hard drives in this drawer. A small connection sheet is supposed to aid you when installing the front input connectors. This diagram is not user friendly at all and it would have been better to see this as part of a nice instruction manual or user guide.


The bottom of the front houses the hard drive cage, which can hold up to four hard drives. The middle is reserved for the two external drive bays, while the top can hold up to four 5.25 inch devices. While the topmost cannot be accessed from the outside, only two of the three have screwless plastic locks, so you will end up grabbing a screw driver if you are filling the bottom 5.25 inch bay.


To remove the hard drive cage, you need to unscrew the single and only thumb screw inside this case. Then turn it 90 degrees while pulling it out. Behind the cage the fan, which is mounted on the outside of the case can be seen through the honeycomb grill.


Even though you can install the 5.25 inch drives by sliding them in through the front, the metal cover which you need to break out to free the bay cannot be removed without taking off the entire front. This is simply done by firmly pulling on the bottom of it. You will not be able to install the power supply with the rear cover on. To remove this, you will have to open the right butterfly panel first. It can then be pulled off as well.


The front fan is actually a 140 mm one, which usually means less noise and slower fan, while still pushing a lot of air. The rear fan is just 80 mm, as there is no room for a larger one. There is another thin, 8 cm fan on the side. It blows directly over the external 3.5 inch bays. Unless you use these for hard drives, there is no need for active cooling, so you may want to leave this one unplugged to reduce the overall noise level.