Cooler Master Storm Sniper Review

Interior

This is what you will see when you first open the case. A box of accessories and all the wires from the control center.

The insides of the case are not painted.

Introduced with the HAF, the Sniper also features a cut-out in the motherboard tray behind the CPU socket area. This should allow you to remove and install coolers without taking out the motherboard.  A nice innovation.  The motherboard tray features another cut-out near the power supply area which should allow the power supply wires to be routed behind the motherboard tray.  In addition to lending a clean feel to the case, this will also stop the wires from causing any obstruction to the airflow inside the case which should provide you with the lowest temperature possible for the components inside.

Cooler Master also sticks a paper  to the motherboard tray to help the users identify the motherboard standoff locations for ATX and mATX boards. But no markings are made on the motherboard tray, which is a concern as once this paper is lost it will hard for beginners to identify the correct standoff locations for the motherboard.

On the right we see five hard drive trays.  These trays are made of flexible plastic.  It is very easy to remove these trays and install hard drives in these trays.  The  hard drives do not plug into any hot swap adapter on the other side.  Cabling needs to be connected on other side. This is another plus point for this case as the SATA cables that are routed behind the motherboard tray are connected on this side.

Above this are the five 5.25 inch optical drive bays. Sniper uses a push-button optical drive mounting.  This is great little feature which makes installing the drives a breeze.  Just take out the drive cover by pushing a button from the inside and pulling on it.  Then move the drive into place and push the button to hold it in place.

The bottom rear of the case features the power supply bay. The power supply is placed on two foam rubber strips which should take care of any noise due to vibration.  The power supply is mounted so that it draws air through the open vent in the floor of the case. This area does not have a dust filter, which means that the power supply will accumulate dust over time.

Just to a little right of the power supply bay is an optional 140mm fan mounting location. The mounting bracket included can secure a 140mm fan in place without using any screws, but mounting holes are included for a 120mm fan. This fan has a dust filter, which should keep the dust out.

Above this are the expansion slots which feature a tool-less design which uses a plastic locking mechanism.  Unfortunately, cards which are covered with plastic shrouds like Nvidia reference designed GT200 series and the Palit 9800GT in the picture will not be able to use this feature although you can still use the traditional screw method to lock the card in place.

To the left of the expansions slots is a security feature called “Storm Guard”.  Basically you can wrap your USB peripherals through the openings of this slot which should stop people at LAN parties from just unplugging your peripherals and walking away with your belongings.

Above this is the 120mm exhaust fan.

Things like power consumption and noise are some of the things that enthusiasts can neglect if they can get bleeding-edge performance.  But manufacturers have been trying to offer both lately.  It goes with this case too.  Gone are the days of 92mm fans.  They are not even heard of in any enthusiast cases these days.  These days manufacturers choose to use big fans that spin at low RPMs thus keeping the noise levels down while moving a lot of air at the same time.  The Sniper employs two 200mm fans.  One is an intake fan at the front and the other is an exhaust fan mounted at the roof.  Another 200mm fan can be installed on the inside of the mesh panel side but it may interfere with large CPU coolers.