L
ike Bill’s Hanzo sword, Luke’s lightsaber, and Gordon Freeman’s crowbar,
Thermaltake’s newest chassis appears unconvincingly plain—until you
take it out for a spin. The SwordM dices through our typical chassis frus-
trations like a chain saw through a burrito. This is truly a next-generation case.
The SwordM’s side panel is split into two halves: A section covering the
front bays swings freely, while the grated chunk covering the motherboard area
pops open with a pleasant whoosh—because it’s attached to the case with
two hydraulic arms. This is an improved version of what Thermaltake used in
its Tai-Chi case (Holiday 2005), and we’re glad the design isn’t a simple vanity
accessory. The Terminator-style appendage is an elegant solution to flimsy side
panels and their oft-stupid connection mechanisms.
Unlike in a typical case, the SwordM’s motherboard rear connectors
are surrounded by absolutely nothing—goodbye, trusty I/O shield. We love
the free-hanging look created by the motherboard and its various PCI cards,
which are themselves protected and concealed by the rounded back half
of the case. You string your cables through two holes in the case’s rear,
although dual-monitor, USB-filling, surround-sound-rocking, water-cooling
users will find this to be quite a tight fit.
For all the awesome construction, we were a bit miffed to see such
a lame, screw-filled hard-drive bay. And the SwordM comes with room for
only three drives. That’s a bit strange given the case’s pronounced size and
awesome connectors. We’re nitpicking, but we also don’t like slapping hard
drives into 5.25-inch bays.
The SwordM remains vivid and clutter-free, even accounting for all of
its great features—
including superlong
front-panel connec-
tion wires, room for
12 12-centimenter
fans, and a front-
panel storage con-
tainer. Thermaltake
didn’t just toss in the
kitchen sink with the
SwordM. No, it took
out its styling brush
and painted up an
elegant representa-
tion of just how much
this company gets
case design. A few
minor blotches (such
as the finicky cabling situation
in the rear) sully the detail work, but we remain quite impressed
with the big picture.
—DAVID MURPHYThermaltake SwordM
It slices, it dices, it rocks!
reviews TesTed. Reviewed. veRdicTized
9
ThermalTake swordm
$500, http://www.thermaltakeusa.comFront-panel
connection trifecta:
The SwordM
supports USB,
FireWire, and eSATA.