SilverStone RL 05 Gaming PC Case Review
Closer Look at the SilverStone RL 05 Gaming PC Case
The dominant color of the case is black however there is some color in the front of the case. Around the front of the case there are four red stripes that give sophisticated look to the case. Overall construction of the case is based on steel with a ABS plastic front bezel. One thing that jumps out is a very large window on the left side of the case that goes from edge to edge and top to bottom. The plastic window is protected by a plastic wrap that keeps dirt and scratches a way while the case is being transported.
Both of the doors could be removed when maintenance needs to be performed on the internal components. All you need to do is remove the screws from the back edge of the panels, grab the handle and pull towards the back of the case. The trend right now for manufacturers is to try and isolate the power supply from the rest of the components and SilverStone is doing the same here in RL 05. The bottom portion of the case is dedicated towards 3.5″ hard drives and the power supply.
The front bezel of RL 05 is all made from ABS plastic. The middle of the bezel is supported by steel honeycomb mesh. There is one spacer for the 5.25″ devices such as your DVD drive or any other 5.25″ accessory. Trying to not take away from the look of the RL 05 a single SilverStone logo is laser engraved and could be found on the bottom of the front bezel of the case. The RL 05 offers two front facing USB 3.0 Type-A connectors, one Type-C connector, Audio and Microphone connectors. The Power and Reset buttons are placed directly across from the front ports on the left side of the bezel.
To keep dust and debris out of the case the front bezel has a plastic filter that could be easily removed when cleaning needs to be performed. The filter also has honeycomb pattern. RL 05 comes with two 140mm LED (red) fans. These fans can be removed and replaced by a 240/280 mm radiator.
The skeleton of this case is held together with butted rivets and is very stable without any components in it. The Back of the case offers your standard power supply on the bottom layout with PCI slots and motherboard IO plate on the top. There is pre-installed cooling fan on the back however you can install a your own fans or it can accommodate a 120/140mm radiator for water cooling.
To keep the PCI components in place the SilverStone RL 05 Gaming PC Case has a latching mechanism that keeps all of the components nice and secured in addition to screws. Plastic feet are used for the RL 05 and they do provide stability of the case however, they will leave scratches on the polished surfaces. Cooling for the power supply is being offered through the bottom of the case along with a removable mess filter.
The SilverStone RL 05 Gaming PC Case also offers a non-removable motherboard tray with a large window so you don’t have to remove the entire motherboard just perform maintenance on the CPU. To keep cables in place the RL 05 offers cable management tabs to use with the provided zip ties. The power supply slot is located at the bottom of the case and supports standard PS2(ATX) power supplies.
Storage mounting in the RL 05 is some-what limited. Enthusiasts have ability to install two 2.5″ hard drives/SSD on the back of the case and two 3.5″ drives on the bottom of the case. In order to mount 3.5″ drives you need to use plastic caddy tray that are included with the case. If you are planning to use the 3.5″ bay to host drives, I strongly advise on getting a 80 mm fan that can fit between the 3.5″ cage and front bezel to keep the drives cool.
All the fans that come with the case are made by SilverStone. These two fans are 140mm with built in red LEDs.(Model Number APA1425M12). These fans are rated for 12 V DC 0.30 Amp. It is also worth to mention that speed of these fans cannot be controlled by PWM controller from the motherboard as they only have a three pin connection.
