Review: Corsair Carbide Series® Air 740 High Airflow ATX Cube Case
When I built my Ryzen 7 system, I went with the NZXT H440 case as I wanted a quiet build, but I regretted it when I attempted to overclock, so I replaced that case with the Corsair Air 740 a few days ago and, overclocking is still a no-go despite an H110i AIO. Don’t get me wrong, the temperatures have dropped by 9°C due to the cleaner air flow, but at 4Ghz and 3.9Ghz, the system eventually crashes to BIOS.
I suspect there may be an issue with the Crosshair IV Hero BIOS, when it crashed, the last temperature I saw was 68°C, which is 7°C lower than TJmax (Tdie). So I am thoroughly confused why the PC is crashing, I gave it as many volts as I dare, 1.4v, which is the general consensus on the maximum safe voltage.
Anyway, back to the case, the Corsair Air 740 is a dream to build in, plenty of space to work in. I would say that building in the Air 740 was the easiest build I have done, and I have built many computers over the years. Moving the storage drives, and power supply to behind the motherboard gives much more room to maneuver. I had none of the usual issues connecting the fiddly fan, front panel, and audio connectors.
The first thing I did was take the panels off to remove the included 140mm fans, not that there’s anything wrong with these fans, I wanted to install my white LED maglev fans, also from Corsair. Then came the task of transplanting all the components from the H440 to the Air 740, which went exceptionally well, I had more issues getting the components out of the H440 than I did getting them in the Air 740.
The Air 740 has nine grommeted passthroughs to the rear compartment, where you will find a PSU mount, four 2.5 inch and three 3.5 inch drive mounts and an astronomical amount of cable routing space. The front has mounts for 3 x 120mm or 2 x 140mm fans, the top has mounts for 2 x 120mm or 140mm fans, the rear accepts a 120mm or 140mm fan, plus two more 120mm or 140mm fans at the bottom.
In theory, for the water cooling enthusiasts, you could fit a 280mm radiator in the bottom, a 360mm radiator in the front and another 280mm radiator at the top. As I am not into open loop water cooling, I used the top 280mm mount for my H110i which mounted with ease, no clearance issues, plenty of room for cabling and access to all those motherboard headers along the top of the motherboard.
On the front fascia, there is a power button, two USB3.0 ports, headphone/mic inputs, a reset button and a button to control Corsair’s line of RGB HD case fans, an option that I did not need, I want an understated white and red build, I don’t need a rainbow explosion in the case. I love the windowed side panel door, which swings open for easy access and can be fully removed by lifting up off the hinges.
On the subject of the front panel, the USB3.0, headphone and microphone jacks are at an angle which makes it kinda difficult to plug in headphones and USB peripherals. In addition, the reset button is right next to the USB ports, which means, in theory, not that this has happened to me, you could accidentally hit the reset switch while attempting to plug in a USB peripheral, which is obviously not desirable.
The Corsair Air 740 is the case I should have bought in the first place, it was the one I initially looked at and liked, but ended up going with the H440 instead. I’m not saying that the H440 is a bad case, it is not, I do like it, but there are some space issues with 280mm radiators and the airflow is not the best given its solid front and top panels. Ironically, due to the fans running at lower RPM’s in the Air 740, the silence optimized H440 case was no quieter than the Corsair Air 740 cube case, at least not to my ear.
The downsides, this thing is freaking huge, it measures 13.4″ x 20″ x 16.8″ (W x H x D), it will take up a lot of space, but this is the price you pay for clean airflow from front to back. That’s about all I can think of when it comes to negatives, this is an exceptionally well made case, very solidly built and well designed and I just love the aggressive looks from every angle. I give the Corsair Air 740 a definite two thumbs up!
Update [Nov, 16 2017, 14:10]: I have discovered an annoyance after writing this review. When my Corsair ML120/140 PRO fans reach the 1150 to 1350rpm range, there is a highly annoying resonance through the case, which was not present when the ML PRO fans were installed in the NZXT H440.