Cooler Master Cosmos II Ultra Tower Review

Final Thoughts
When you have a great product and you are ready to come out with the next version it is really hard to please everyone and live up to the previous product.  The original Cosmos and the Cosmos S were really great cases so when I heard about the Cosmos II I was expecting the case to be a great case and after using it for a few weeks now I am confident Cooler Master has another great product on their hands.

First let’s start off with the design.  Cooler Master has kept the same look at the original Cosmos cases, but has made it sleeker and more visually appealing.  Cooler Master says the case is inspired by luxurious supercars and looking at it, it has that feel to it.  The case itself is made of aluminum, steel and mesh and goes together very well.  I am glad cooler master kept the large handles on the case because they not only distinguish the case as a Cosmos case they come in handy when carrying the case around.  Remember the case without any hardware installed in 48.5lbs!  My favorite part of the case is probably the doors.  They are so simple to operate and slide right open.  Because of their large size I am glad Cooler Master went with this design.  No one wants to be trying to get doors that big on and off a case.  The front door and how it simply slides down elegantly is just awesome, something you do over and over again just to watch it in action.

You can sure fit a lot hardware inside of this case as well.  On the motherboard side you can fit boards up to XL-ATX and as you may know there are not that many cases that do support XL-ATX motherboards.  We installed a normal ATX motherboard inside the case and there was a hell of a lot of room left, which makes working on the system much easier.  We also installed the Zalman CNPS 12X CPU Cooler, which is one of the largest CPU coolers available and it fit inside the Cosmos II very easily.  Do you have a lot of hard drives?  Well this case has room for them!  There are 11 hard drive trays that support both 3.5-inch and 2.5-inch hard drives, but don’t forget about the 2 hot swap bays on the front of the case.  So in total you can put 13 hard drives in this case!  Did I mention this case also supports 4-way SLI and CrossFire?

Well all if this hardware inside of your case how are you going to cool it all.  Cooler Master does include a 200mm intake fan, two 200mm side panel fans, a top 120mm fan and a rear 140mm fan.  For those with a modest system this should be good enough cooling.  If you want more cooling the top of the case can support a single 200mm fan, three 120mm fans or two 140mm fans.  You also can add 2 more 120mm fans to the side panel.  To control all of these fans Cooler Master has included a very cool fan controller that is simple and easy to use.  If you are more about water-cooling then you have quite a lot of room inside this case for radiators and pumps.

Our installation went flawlessly without any issues.  I like that you are able to easily remove the side panels if you are working inside the case.  The large space that you have to work with makes installing your hardware effortless.  Cooler Master did not try to go all tool-less on this case, it is a nice mix of tool-less and screw systems.  One thing I found interesting was the power supply installation, not only was it easy I am surprised that we have not seen more cases designed like this.  Cable management in this case is a breeze.  There are 11 cable management holes that allow you to route cables behind the case.  You have about a half inch of space on the opposite side of the case, so you can sure fit a lot of cables back there.  With this case the inside of your case will look immaculate.

Honestly when it comes down to it there really is nothing bad that I can say about this case.  The only thing that may hold many people back from purchasing this case is the price.  Right now it is available at my favorite online retailer for $349.99, making it one of the most expensive cases out there.  With this case though I believe you get what you are paying for.  Overall ThinkComputers gives the Cooler Master Cosmos II Ultra Tower a 10 out of 10 score and our Editor’s Choice Award!

rating10 10 small TC award editorschoice small

Pros:
– Supports motherboards up to XL-ATX
– Side panel design
– Room for 13 hard drives and 10 fans!
– Included fan controller
– Large case handles
– Lots of room inside to work and route cables

Cons:
– Price puts it out of range for many people

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