Thermaltake Core V1 Snow Edition Cube Chassis Budget Build

In this build series we are using a Thermaltake core v1 cube in the snow-white color for a ITX small form factor case build. The motherboard is an AB350 Mini ITX with a 256gb western digital black PCI express m.2 drive for the system drive to install windows 10 on. The processor is an A10-9700 AMD 3.8ghz quad core. This one is a bit of a budget all-around office gamer build so we went ahead and stayed with the stock cooler configuration which will be more than adequate for our intended use, especially once coupled with our case fan setup. The RAM we are using is a 2x4gb for 8 gigabytes total DDR4 2400, since we only have 2 ram slots and once again keeping with our budget theme.

As far as ITX cases go I would put this one or these style of cube cases towards the top of the list as far as ease of use, upgradability, airflow, and aesthetic. Many types of small form factor cases compromise the functionality in favor of the compactness. This shell however is a nice balance. The points I would nick it on is cable management, i.e., lack of hidden cable areas. Also, you are limited in overall GPU size be it overall length and only up to 2 slot width capable cards will fit. I do not recommend ITX builds for a full high end build anyway so for our intent it fit perfectly with the parts used and the nice open area of the case allows cooling not to be impeded by cables. For case cooling we are keeping the stock 3-pin 200mm fan up front and adding 2 Silverstone 80mm PWM fans for exhausting as needed. The Core V1 has space for an additional 2 2.5” or 3.5” HDD or SSD’s. The PSU placement is also favorable since it can fit even bulky power supplies with ease.

Motherboard installation is straight forward, the standoffs are built into the base so do not overtighten them though. A good practice for any mobo install really. Since this system isn’t super high power, we went with a corsair VS500 non-modular 500-watt power supply unit, which is adequate for our needs as per our power supply calculator. And as always, I do account for efficiency rating & additional peripherals that may be connected in the future, such as additional hard drives and USB devices for a good buffer over our max power needs.

Cable management could be improved with a semi-modular or full-modular power supply to limit the excess unused cables for additional eye candy. But, there is plenty of room to run and connect the cables needed for this build. The motherboard fits in nice and easy, front panel and other board headers connect easily as well. Zip ties or Velcro cable straps are your friend for this build to keep the wires as tidy as possible, you could have wires hitting your fans if you have poor cable management.

We popped in a pair of white housing with blue fan blades Silverstone 80mm fans with 4-pin pulse width modulation with rubber anti-vibration mounts for additional cooling and trouble-free install. A fan splitter or hub is needed to connect all 4 fans (CPU fan, front case fan, 2 rear case fans) as our motherboard only has 3 fan headers. With the fans in now is a good point to manage the additional cables that have been connected.

A bit of a surprise GPU for this build I busted out the XFX RX480 to show you the max physical size of a GPU that you can fit on this case, we are cutting it close but one good thing is there is a cutout in the front panel section that helps aid installation of a larger card. If you are doing an ITX build with more recent components an RTX 3050 or 3060 would be a good pairing for this case with plenty of room to spare. With the graphics card in place, we can clean up the additional cabling with zips.

For extra file storage we added a 1tb terabyte western digital Blue 2.5” HDD. The sata data and power connections are no problem here.

The side panels are well designed, not only can you flip them around so the case orients in any direction you like, but you can also place them in such a way that it aids in ventilation for the components housed within. Not only that but the plexiglass window also allows you to show off what’s inside.

Once the build was completed, I decided on a couple extra things. To really give this build some nice file storage I went ahead and swapped the 1tb 2.5” HDD for a 4tb 3.5” WD Blue variant. Also, since our system nvme drive is not that large and since HDDs are not the best choice to install games on due to frequent updates and the need for quick file access, we also put a 500gb WD Blue 2.5” SSD to max out the extra drive bay slots on this case, bringing our total data drive count to 3 total and close to 5 terabytes of available data space! Then, since our rear case fans have blue fins, I went ahead and decided to swap all the zip ties for blue ones to match that color scheme a bit, so with the red accents on the motherboard we have a red/blue/white theme going on.

That concludes this build and thanks for checking out this series, feel free to subscribe to the YT channel to stay up to date on the latest projects!