The demise of multi-GPU PCs has had a knock-on effect on the PC case market, big time—or perhaps one should say, making it small time. The need for just a single graphics card enables current gaming-PC builders to downsize their cases, if only so far; the thickness of today’s graphics-card coolers can make some Mini-ITX arrangements simply not viable. Sometimes, MicroATX is just what you need, a motherboard big enough to gain just one graphics card slot, a full-size CPU voltage regulator, four slots for desktop DIMMs, and perhaps some space to shove a couple of M.2 drives under the graphics card’s cooler. (A pity that AMD’s DTX initiative never really broke through.)That’s what makes Thermaltake’s $179.99 The Tower 300 a happy balancing act for a reasonably compact showcase PC case: It uses the sometimes-overlooked MicroATX form factor to great effect. This next iteration of The Tower family shrinks the glass around Thermaltake’s familiar design to reflect the dialed-down component mix but maximized cooling that many gaming system builders demand today. As a show-it-all-off solution for a powerful DIY desktop, it’s a fine choice if vertical style is what you’re after.
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Design: An Explosion of ColorsFirst off: The available colors! The Tower 300 comes in a choice of eight, many of them off the beaten path. We got the comparatively tame white (Snow) version; the other options are black, a Thermaltake-signature Hydrangea Blue (which the company is designating a special color for its 25th anniversary), Racing Green, Matcha Green, Bubble Pink, Bumblebee (yellow), and Turquoise.While its sideways-motherboard tray invites comparison to larger Thermaltake models such as The Tower 500, its upward-pointing MicroATX motherboard arrangement and matching graphics-card placement gives The Tower 300 a profile that’s barely wider (and little more than half as deep) as a typical dual-chamber ATX mid-tower. We like that the reduced depth will help it fit on more desks, even if the extra width crowds out a few knick-knacks.
On a slanted portion of the top panel, the front-panel ports include two USB 3.x Type-A and one Type-C, each connected to the appropriate generation of motherboard header. Headphone and microphone jacks are separate; the reset button is appropriately smaller than the power button; and pinholes illuminate with separate power and hard drive activity LEDs.
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
Thermaltake has even made it easy to service the power supply’s intake dust filter; it slides out from the front of The Tower 300.
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
Around back are the power-supply bay, a metal mesh filter/cover over two 140mm/120mm dual-format fan mounts, and a peripheral-cable passage that also acts as a grab point for removing the top panel. The mesh filter is attached via magnetic strips along its edges.
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
A removable hard drive tray covers a hole in the motherboard tray that allows for rear-side access to the CPU socket, for installing support plates for your CPU cooler. Two drives (2.5-inch or 3.5-inch format) can mount on this tray, but with the case having only around 1.5 inches of clearance to the back cover, if you install 3.5-inch hard drives, you will probably want to skip mounting any fans to the back panel.
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
Thermaltake’s pronouncement of a 220mm maximum power-supply length probably doesn’t factor in cables, since we measure a little more than 250mm between The Tower 300’s power-supply mounting plate and its front-panel brackets. A removable mounting plate at the rear allows you to slide in power supplies from the case’s back; side openings ease cable routing; a removable top cover eases access for cable-management efforts; and two screws on the bottom even allow you to remove the internal cage.
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
The Tower 300’s right side features a fan mount that’s large enough to accept radiators up to 456mm long, according to Thermaltake. (The “official” specs may have gotten a couple of digits mixed up, since we measured 465mm of space, ourselves.) Note, though: The longest supported radiators (beyond 445mm tall) have to pass through a window with a lip, so mounting these is possible only by tilting the radiator into place, adding the mounting plate, and then standing the radiator back up.You can also position the fan mount on the left side, but the edge of a MicroATX motherboard would prevent 140mm fans from being mounted and front-panel cable connectors would block 120mm fan installation.
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
A removable tray for a third 3.5-inch or 2.5-inch drive is mounted to the side of the power supply’s cage. Removing it gives builders up to 2.5 inches of space for a radiator and fans, but leaving it installed reduces that space to around 2.1 inches.
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
Drilled to at least support fans on both 140mm and 120mm formats, the top panel’s fan mount appears to also support…something else. Given that the case actually needs top-panel exhaust and also needs all of the space underneath those fans, we’re not sure what else the bracket might have supported.
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
The reason we won’t be mounting anything to the underside of the top fan bracket is that it sits only 2.75 inches above our I/O ports. We need that space to bend our cables under the fans and through the gap where you see the black cables pass (in the image below), into the gap behind the motherboard, and up through the holes in the top of the chassis. From there, they get bent again to go through the cable passage at the back of the top panel.
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
The Tower 300 features too many filters to show them all in place, but here’s how they look removed: There’s the top panel filter (the one with the sawed-off corners) that clips into place, the slide-in power-supply air inlet filter, side panel filters with magnets embedded into hard plastic frames, and the rear panel cover (the item at left) that isn’t really a filter but still catches dust.
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
Building With The Tower 300The Tower 300 includes a replacement front-panel section designed to hold an accessory LCD screen, plus several cable ties, a warranty sheet, an installation guide, a beep-code speaker, a full screw pack, and a pack of replacement panel snaps.
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
A combined front-panel button/LED header fits every motherboard we’ve tested in the past four or so years and thus eases cable installation. Also present are HD Audio for front-panel jacks, a 19-pin first-generation USB 3.x front-panel cable for the Type-A ports, and a Type-E (Gen 2×2) cable for The Tower 300’s Type-C front-panel port.
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
The motherboard tray is bordered with cutaway areas that support MicroATX boards with rear-facing connectors, along with a few extra cable-passage holes for those that don’t. (Our test board doesn’t have rear-facing connections; see our test build with MSI’s Project Zero for background on such designs.)
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
Even without employing a reverse motherboard, hidden cables, or any special flair, The Tower 300 makes a stylish build of our hardware with relatively minimal effort. Judge for yourself…
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
Testing The Tower 300Here’s a short list of the build hardware we used for testing the case, and for the physical build you see above…
The Tower 300 performed on par with other MicroATX cases, with its CPU temperature solid and its GPU temperatures taking second place despite the lack of intake fans. The effectiveness of its top exhaust fans is evident in voltage-regulator temperatures, since the voltage regulator is cooled entirely by other fans drawing air over it.
The InWin A3, which was a contender in cooling performance, is noticeably quieter than The Tower 300. You can dramatically reduce noise by enabling automatic fan control (in motherboard BIOS), but anyone pushing their system to its full potential will still get to hear the fans at full speed at least now and then.
Given the proximal noise and cooling performance, we probably wouldn’t pick our case based on the differences seen in our charts. We’d instead pick The Tower 300 if we wanted to show off, or the InWin A3 if we wanted to go low-key.One final note: You can also use The Tower as a Not-A-Tower, lying horizontal. Hoping to attract even more buyers, Thermaltake offers a $30 stand kit to prevent The Tower 300 from falling backward in this orientation, lying on a rear corner bevel. Of course, then the case bottom becomes its right side, and you wouldn’t want to see the case’s feet in that orientation, so the kit adds a second end cap that almost matches the top cover, sans port holes or buttons.
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
As we’re currently collecting data to roll out a new PC-case testing configuration, we thought this was a perfect chance to drop a sneak peek at some of the hardware and see how a different loadout looked inside the case. The larger card certainly fills the space nicely.
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
However you build with it—with the case ultimately standing up or lying down—you’ll find The Tower 300 is a well-designed balance between saving space and packing in maximum power, all the while giving your parts maximum exposure.
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