CoolerMaster launched the Storm brand at CES 2009. While we were there, one of our meetings was with the CoolerMaster marketing team.  The Storm series is built for gamers by gamers. CoolerMaster teamed up with cyber athletes and other eSport prodigies to bring The Storm Sniper to life.

 
This is the first case in the Storm series and the second, The Storm Scout, is soon to follow. CoolerMaster boasts excellent cooling capabilities with minimal noise with the design. The case is large enough to accommodate most hardware set ups including some water cooling with out being too intrusive. With its outward appearance resembling that of most military weapons, the sniper perhaps takes it''s namesake deservingly or is it just a shot in the dark.

CoolerMaster is an industry veteran with plenty of cases under their belt and competition over the last few years has lead to some fairly innovative design changes and integrated features that enthusiast's desire. The quest for quieter operations while maintaining similar cooling performance has prompted most manufactures to use 200+ cm fans. Larger fan blades can move large amounts of air at a lower RPM thus reducing noise. Most manufactures are including access ports for water cooling setups allowing consumers to set up custom cooling solutions easier.

"Cooler Master was founded with the mission of providing the industry's best thermal solutions. Since its establishment a decade ago, the company has remained faithful to this mission, emerging as a world leader in products and services for companies dealing with devices where heat issues must be resolved.

In pursuing this mission, Cooler Master is absolutely committed to delivering solutions that precisely meet customer requirements for features, performance, and quality. Moreover, we strive to be a reliable long-term partner for our customers that they can truly depend on. Cooler Master aims to be the first and foremost name that comes to mind for companies around the world seeking thermal solutions, and seeks to build such a reputation through outstanding technology, sophisticated design, and superior service.

Cooler Master's current business encompasses a comprehensive lineup of thermal solutions for a full range of applications. Our products range from heat sinks and fans to component housing, chassis, and ducting for computers, industrial machinery, telecommunications equipment, and many other devices."

Built in security features, an integrated carrying handle, custom fan and lighting controls a just a small sampling of what this case has to offer.

Now let's get on with it.

Specifications & Features

Packaging

The sniper is shipped in heavy duty box that should protect it and arrive free of damage. The graphics on the front of the case do a good job of illustrating the look of the case while the back and the side of the case go more in depth with features and specifications. It gives a good indication of what you will be getting in the box.

Inside the box, the case is surrounded by a plastic sheet and capped off with Styrofoam at both ends. The Styrofoam should be enough to protect the ends from drops and falls during shipping and the plastic protects the finish of the case. This should ensure that the case arrives at its destination in the same condition that it left the factory.

Exterior Features

The right side panel has a meshed window. This should facilitate decent cooling in and around the GPU & CPU. A fan for this panel is not included with the case but can be ordered separately. The left side panel is fairly standard. No window, vents or fans here, just a small CM Storm logo. Over all the exterior has a very good finish. The upper and lower parts of the case are made of plastic while the remainder is made of steel. CoolerMaster did a great job of fitting the plastic and metal together as there are no large gaps between the two and the finish of the plastic closely matches the matte black paint job. 

The front of the case you can see is also mostly mesh and only the main frame is solid. The bezel is made of plastic and is easily removable. Hiding behind the front bezel is a 200mm fan. The fan is rated for 500-1000 RPM and 17-23 dBA respectively.  The backside of the case is pretty standard. It includes the IO panel cutout, 7 expansion slot brackets . Take notice of the bracket that is rotated 90°, this is part of the  StormGuard® system and we will go into that a little later.

The back side has two grommets installed above the fan for water cooling hoses with an additional two knockouts located towards the bottom on the right side of the power supply cutout. I would have liked to see a rounded fan guard at the back to help reduce noise, but  the punched honeycomb design will suffice. The rear fan can be changed to a 90mm or 80mm fan and the mounting holes are pre-drilled.  

Heading to the top of the case you can see one of the two integrated carrying handles. At only 23lbs. and some change this is a very light case and can be lugged to LAN parties with little effort. Also you can get a peek at the top case fan.

Moving to the bottom of the case, you can see the four feet that rotate out to provide the case with its stability. Keeping with the open design the bottom of the case is also vented, as you can see the vent holes for the bottom mounted power supply.

Moving to the IO Panel of the front of the case, you can see this is what sets the sniper apart from the competition. Starting from left to right, the tiny recessed button is the reset switch. The large power button comes next. Sitting next to the power button is the fan and light controller. Rotate the outer dial to turn up or down the fan speeds. Press the center and that turns off/on or dims the lights. There is a plethora of connections which include 4 USB ports, 1 Firewire and 1 eSATA port and a headset and microphone port. I would rather have the power and reset buttons be the same size instead of a huge power button and a tiny reset button however, I feel the layout is well balanced visually and a larger reset button would throw that off.

That concludes the exterior tour of the case, lets pop off the panels and dig around inside

Interior Features

Here's the first peek at the interior. For a mid-tower case it's surprisingly spacious. The case supports Micro-ATX & ATX motherboards. CoolerMaster has provided an installation sheet for that purpose. Just pick your motherboard size and install the standoffs in the required location. Unfortunately the motherboard tray is not removable but CoolerMaster has eased the pain. The large hole in the motherboard tray facilitates cooler changes without forcing the user to completely remove the motherboard to install or change the back plate for the cooler. The case''s edges are all rolled and I didn't feel any sharp edges.

The Sniper boasts a tool less design. The 5.25" bays use a clink in click out locking mechanism. Press the button once to unlock the mechanism, slide in the device, then press the button once again to lock down the device. You may need to slightly slide the drive back and forth to line up the screw holes in the drive with the tabs that are used to lock down the drive. The 3.5" drives are held in place by a frame that fits around the drive. Press the tab to open the drive bay and slide out the frame. Fit the frame around the hard drive and slide back into the case. Close the front of the frame.

The expansion slots are also tool less. The clips open and hold the end of the card by via a plastic pin that fits through the case where a screw would normally hold the card. This design works pretty well and during testing they held quite well. Just to the left of the expansion slots is the StormGuard®. StormGuard works by weaving the keyboard, mouse, and headphone cables through the bracket and locking the bracket back in place. This would be a handy feature at a some of the bigger LANs. The power supply location should hold most power supplies, however with some of the longer power supplies removal of the additional fan mount may be necessary. 

Cooling is provided by two 200mm fans and one 120mm fan. There's an additional 140mm fan mount on the bottom of the case. The two 200mm fans are clear and include blue LEDs that give off a nice glow. The 200mm fans are adjustable from 500-1000 RPM. The 120mm fan is rated at 1200 RPM and 17 dBA. Additionally another 200 mm fan can be installed on the side panel.

The accessories pack includes a 3.5"  to 5.25" adapter, since to install a 3.5 external device a 5.25" drive bay must be used. Also included are additional grommets for water cooling hoses and rubber inserts that are installed in the case feet to prevent scratches on the floor. All the screws required to get the case up and running are included along with a manual.

Conclusion

Test Setup

To test the case I wanted to load up everything as much as I could. For the CPU, Motherboard and Northbridge I loaded up OCCT and ran it for an hour at the same time I ran HDD Tach to test the hard drives. . For the GPU I looped Crysis Warhead non-stop for an hour. Temperatures were recorded using Lavalys Everest Ultimate. Processor fan speed was manually set at 800 rpm and all case fans were set a their lowest settings.

The Sniper showed great results for a mid-tower case. I would like to see the GPU temperature drop some, but I had the fan speed locked at 40% for silence. This case is dead quiet. The hard drive is  louder than any of the fans and is a pleasure to use. The integrated fan controller works well and easily adjusts the fans as well as the lights in the case. With both 200 mm fans at 1000 RPM the noise from the case was quite noticeable.

Conclusion:

CoolerMaster has brought to market a case that ranks very high. Their approach to aesthetics with the Sniper has paid off. Their goal was to model it after military weapons and it works. The case''s matte black only adds to the very distinctive looks. Performance of the case is good, the open design tends to help in the cooling of most components, while the mesh side panel doesn't add to the cooling of the GPU. Cooling performance at the high setting lead to an average 3 degree drop, so I don't see the need for the high setting with this current hardware set up. As hotter hardware is added one can assume that cooling performance should scale with it. The case does not have a removable motherboard tray, but that shouldn't distract anyone from this case as the interior is very spacious and I did not run into any clearance issues and the motherboard install was a snap. Cable management for the most part was a breeze. The cables for the case come tied together for the user already. The inclusion of the cutout in the motherboard try allows the user to easily swap CPU coolers without removing the motherboard from the case and I hope this a feature with all CoolerMaster cases. The integrated fan controller is a welcome addition to the case and works very well. I have used this case for just over a month and while for the most part the dust filters work pretty well, where I live is a considerable amount of fine dust inside the case and over the hardware.