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Review: Fractal Design Core 2500

by Parm Mann on 19 February 2015, 16:00

Tags: Fractal Design

Quick Link: HEXUS.net/qaco7s

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Specification and Test Methodology

Fractal Design Core 2500 Specification

Motherboard Compatibility Mini-ITX, Micro-ATX, ATX
Drive Bays External 5.25in x2
Internal 2.5/3.5in x4
Internal 2.5in x1
Expansion Slots 7
Cooling System Front: 2x 120/140mm (1x 120mm 1,200RPM fan included)
Rear: 1x 120mm (1x 120mm 1,200RPM fan included)
Top: 2x 120/140mm
Bottom: 1x 120/140mm
Side: 1x 140mm
Integrated three-way fan controller
Radiator Support Front: 240mm or 280mm
Top: 240mm
Rear: 120mm
Clearance Graphics Cards: 380mm
CPU Cooler: 162mm
Power Supply: 155mm when using bottom fan location
Cable Management: 13.5mm - 18.5mm
I/O Ports 1x Audio
1x Mic
2x USB 3.0
Dimensions (W x H x D) 195mm x 431mm x 450mm
Weight 5.7kg

Test System Configuration

Motherboard Asus Sabertooth Z77
CPU Intel Core i5-3570K @ 4.4GHz
CPU Cooler Arctic Cooling Freezer 13
Memory G.Skill Ripjaws-X 8GB (F3-12800CL7D-8GBXH)
Memory Speed and Timings 1,600MHz, 7-8-7-24-2N
Graphics Cards 2x Sapphire Radeon HD 7950 OC in CrossFireX
Storage 120GB SanDisk Extreme SSD
Power Supply Corsair HX1050W
Monitor Philips Brilliance 272P (2,560x1,440)

Our Z77 test platform consists of an ASUS Sabertooth motherboard, an Intel Core i5-3570K processor overclocked to a modest 4.4GHz, an Arctic Cooling Freezer 13 cooler, 8GB of high-performance G.Skill Ripjaws-X memory and two factory-overclocked Sapphire Radeon HD 7950 OC graphics cards in a CrossFireX configuration.

To find out how well the chassis can cool this particular setup, we record the CPU temperature during a 15-minute stint of the Prime95 small-FFT stress test. In order to provide a stabilised reading we then calculate an average temperature across all cores from the last five minutes of testing.

To get an idea of GPU cooling performance, we then record the highest GPU temperature after 15 minutes of running Aliens vs. Predator. Last but not least, we also measure chassis noise by using a PCE-318 noise meter to take readings when idle and while running Aliens vs. Predator.

All chassis are tested only with the standard manufacturer-supplied fans (any/all of which are set to 'silent' in the Asus BIOS or low-speed using a fan controller if present), and to take into account the fluctuating ambient temperature, our graphs depict both actual and delta temperature - the latter is the actual CPU/GPU temperature minus the ambient. For the record, room temperature while testing today's chassis was recorded as 19.4ºC.