**A Mixed Bag: The Silverstone Farah R1**

When it comes to budget cases, there are few options that stand out from the crowd. One such case is the Silverstone Farah R1, which promises a balance of features and price. But does it deliver? In this article, we'll take a closer look at the Farah R1 and see if it's worth considering.

One of the standout features of the Farah R1 is its build quality. Silverstone has clearly put a lot of thought into designing a case that is both aesthetically pleasing and durable. The build quality is overall improved, with a focus on using high-quality materials and attention to detail. This is evident in the way the case is assembled, with a focus on secure connections and a robust construction.

However, not all is sunshine and rainbows with the Farah R1. One of the major issues we have is with the inclusion of a single fan as part of the standard specification. While this may not be a huge problem for some users, it's a significant drawback for others who want to keep costs low. The fact that the case is supposed to retail at around $60 or $65 also raises eyebrows, given that Silverstone has accounted for the cost of the fan and still manages to trim down the price.

Another issue we have with the Farah R1 is its front panel design. While it looks great in theory, the actual execution falls short. Specifically, the front panel was not attached physically to the I/O plate, which means that some features may not be fully functional. This is a major disappointment given the case's otherwise strong build quality.

**Comparison to Other Cases**

So how does the Farah R1 compare to other cases in its class? One notable competitor is the Cooler Master NR 600, which also promises a balance of features and price. However, it has a number of key advantages over the Farah R1, including two fans instead of one, a tempered glass side panel, and an ultra-fine mesh front.

The NR 600 also trims about $18 off the original MSRP due to tariffs, which puts it at around $70 rather than its usual price. This is a significant difference, and one that may be enough to put some users off. However, for those who want the best of both worlds, the NR 600 may be worth considering.

**A Word on Budget Cases**

Budget cases are all about finding the sweet spot between features and price. For many users, this means spending around $50-$60 on a case that meets their basic needs. Unfortunately, neither the Farah R1 nor the NR 600 fit neatly into this category. The Farah R1 is more of a mid-range case, while the NR 600 pushes into low-mid range territory due to the need for an extra fan.

This raises an interesting question: what constitutes a budget case? Is it purely about price, or are there other factors at play? In our opinion, a good budget case should meet most users' needs without breaking the bank. However, with features like tempered glass and mesh panels coming in at premium prices, it's becoming increasingly difficult to find a case that meets this criteria.

**Conclusion**

In conclusion, the Silverstone Farah R1 is a mixed bag of a case. While it has some standout features like its build quality and paint job, it also falls short in several key areas. The inclusion of a single fan is a major drawback, while the front panel design is subpar. For those who want to consider this case, we recommend thinking carefully about whether you're willing to make do with a fan that may not be sufficient for your needs.

Ultimately, the Farah R1 is a case that shows promise but ultimately falls short of expectations. We expect more from Silverstone, but they've delivered elsewhere in their lineup. For now, we can't wholeheartedly recommend this case to our readers.

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: encases below the $70 mark with breathable mesh front panels have become rarer in the last few years but the trend is starting to pick back up at CES we saw a deluge of 60 to 70 dollar mesh cases like the fantex p300 a which takes the principles of the P 400 a and down cost them and the Silverstone for r1 which is meant to be a successor to our lawn praised silver stone our al zero six the RL 0-6 was a long time budget masterpiece it managed chart-topping performance at around $70 accomplished with four 120mm fans a short chassis length that brought the fans closer to components and a mesh front now we're reviewing the spiritual successor to the Silverstone RL zero six and that's the Farah R one mesh variants that we saw at CES before that this video is brought to you by e BJ's RT x 2060 kayo we previously reviewed the RT x 2060 kayo model for its fuse down RT x 2080 die that uniquely benefitted blender and some professional applications offering better performance than expected in some pro workloads while offering usual strong RT x 2060 performance for gaming the RT x 2060 ko also includes the game deliver us the moon for free with EVGA geforce r-tx cards EVGA is actively restocking its RT x 2060 ko with new ties which you can find a link to the description below the fara r1 is one of several cases in what's supposed to be a line silverstone like many companies is going to keep the cost low on the streets of cases and it's doing so by reusing the tooling as much as possible there's nothing criminal about this in fact it's a good idea if it can be done properly and some companies do cut corners where they shouldn't but for the most part reusing tooling and changing the face of the cases or the arrangements of the fans or other features is a great way to get extra mileage out of it while driving the cost down for a more mass consumer friendly product so that's the goal of the fara we chose the art one for review over something like the v1 because we cared about the mesh front of the case we thought it'd do better in our bench and it's more interesting to our style of building and for most of our audience well ventilated cases have been really rare in the last few years the old course here 200 R got several recommendations from us even in the last couple years it's been around for half of a decade at this point and that's because there weren't many good ones now that's changing the Fraxel match fic obviously has been a fairly budget well we'll put that in big air close quotes there but budget ish case that about seventy dollars unfortunately it's best with extra fans and unfortunately seventy dollars isn't that budget typically we prefer to look for something like 50 bucks or 60 for our low ish end case and they can be good but they're rare and the our l06 was one of the best ones we've worked with this year that's changing there's plenty of those coming out this is one of them and it's at a perfect time really because given our impending economic doom everybody's going to be looking at cases like this for budget bill there's always a bright side here Silverstone does in fact refer to this case as the Farah r1 it moves away from its letter letter number number scheme that it's used for years that everybody has complained about of course if you ask gns a senior camera operator Andrew what the case is called it's Ferrari because look at the side of the box let's it's what do you thought it was maybe that would be what DIY PC would name its zonda successor the front of the case is really close to the core components this is a trend you're going to see a lot more of in the next couple of years that's because case companies are finally figuring out that hey we don't need a bunch of empty space where the optical drives used to be anymore and people aren't really buying hard drives so why is it there so they're getting shorter the Corsair 220 t is another one that did this and bring the front in closer to the case does benefit its thermals because naturally if you have fans up there which this one does not then you can get the air straight into the components and there's very little distance for the air at home wonder off and find some other place to exit the case based on the pressure system that may have developed within the case this one includes only one rear stock fan four out of box and it's a 120mm fan it's not particularly exciting it's supposed to be $60 for the steel version and 65 for tempered-glass the current pricing from what we looked at when writing the script doesn't reflect that it's about 70 but it's supposed to be 60 at $60 it's a significantly better position than 70 but either way some higher-quality features the case build quality is for the price point genuinely superb it's much higher than we'd expect for around this price point although accent all the fans shows where the cost is gone it is into the structure of the case which is better on average than most of its competitors now the NR 600 is the closest competitor that stands out from coolermaster that should be around the same price but it isn't and that's the one we'd point to for something that's the most structurally similar and the most competitive thermally the actually the white paint on this one is extremely well done if you've seen any of our factory tours we've talked in the past about how white paints really difficult to do on cases where you're mixing and matching different metals or or plastic and metal and in this instance the white does actually match really damn well between the panels and one of which again is plastic and that's pretty rare to do so this is a point that if you really want a white case and you want it at this price point it's gonna be hard to do better than this one but there's a lot of downsides and there's some upsides too let's get into the build notes then we'll talk thermals and then we'll go through whether it's worth it or not the side panels are as simple as possible both for the glass and the steel the tempered glass side has four holes drilled into it that slip over posts which are clearly repurposed motherboard standoffs which is a design that we've seen since the very first tempered glass cases came in for review there are downsides to this method there's nothing to catch the glass if it slips when removing the panel and replacing the panel will inevitably leave fingerprints around the edges and potentially on the inside the upsides are that it's cheap it's simple and blocks as little of the window as possible it's fine what we really take issue with is the steel panel which harkens back to the days of needing to people or at least three hands or two hands and your face to close a computer it hooks into the chassis with fragile tabs that get smashed flat if the panel isn't lined up properly and it must be pressed down on three of the four sides to slide into place yes it keeps the cases price low but we'd be perfectly happy if we never saw one of these panels again because we worked with them for at least probably over a decade at this point in a similar price cutting vein only two of the stock PCIe slot covers are removable the rest are the punch-out disposable variety we have enough loose slot covers to fill 50 cases at this point so that's fine by us but it's a potential shortcoming for some users it's an interesting detail as well to cut corners and probably shaved another half dollar off the cost the case there are two sets of cable cut outs at the front edge of the motherboard one of which is covered up by full width ATX ports smaller form factors can take advantage of the newer cutouts for less clutter while ATX boards may still have plenty of cabling routing room without the extra set cutouts on the motherboard tray may be generous but they're more scarce along the surface of the power slash route we use a standard ATX power supply for case testing and since the top of the power supply is almost flush with the shroud it blocks the rear most cutouts that would otherwise be handy for routing front IO cables longer power supplies will block even more room for bundling cables is limited and storing any cables behind the motherboard tray makes the side panel much harder to get back on and the motherboard tray is flexible enough that smashing the cables against it isn't a very good idea you could end up with a direct short the hard drive cage is removable but builds that use one or more three and a half inch drives will prove very difficult to cable manage so make sure you couple this with if possible in the budget a modular power supply otherwise you're gonna be jamming a lot of cables into places the hard drive cage holds a single sled with mounting holes for one additional three and a half drive on the roof of the cage there are three two and a half inch drive trays included and four mounting locations for them two behind the motherboard tray and two on top of the power supply shroud this case isn't ideal for builds that use any three and a half inch drives at all since the drive cage takes up such valuable space and that may not be ideal for targeting the budget market front i/o is two USB 3.0 ports one USB 2.0 and a combined mic headphone jack the manual shows a USB type-c port in one image but this is not present in the final product we like the vertical i/o arrangement and the minimal labeling we don't like the fact that the i/o is wired to the front panel itself and pulls off with it this is another aspect the build that is pretty old if you're familiar with cases or have had any amount of time working with computers even without the cables attaching to the front i/o the front panel would still be hard to detach the clips holding it on are exceptionally stiff even after several cycles of replacing and removing it we use the screwdriver to help pry it off at one point which did help a lot but that obviously risks damage it doesn't have to be this way removing the front panel isn't necessary for installing fans or radiators at the front of the case and for cleaning out the front dust filter which by the way isn't removable from the front panel it's a woven layer glued onto the frame behind the externally visible metal mesh the filter itself seems relatively breathable and unproblematic for the most part but not being able to remove it and clean it will create headaches down the road for anyone who doesn't decide to just rip it out again removing the front panel is a necessary part of using and maintaining this case and that panel is attached to the case by the cables so although you could work with it and detach everything it takes some extra time so if you wanted to bring the panel over the sink to clean it out it's not as simple as it would be with something else even if there isn't much room to use them we really like the tie points that Silverstone has come up with rather than pressing out a loop large enough for a velcro strap they simply drill out four holes in a flower pattern and then press them out together into a lump through which a zip tie or twist I can be easily passed horizontally or vertically the price bracket this case falls into doesn't exactly merit spending extra money on reusable velcro ties that will be hidden away anyway so zip ties are perfectly adequate for this the end result is a neat small feature that's probably less expensive to produce than normal cable tie points and actually works really well we've talked at length about EA TX and the fact that it's not a real specification Silverstone was one of our sources for that piece and they informed us in no uncertain terms that Silverstone only uses quote EA TX to refer to full 12 by 13 inch motherboards even to the point of butting heads with other manufacturers about it accordingly the farah family of cases is not referred to as EA TX or SSI EE B or SSI C EB which are all terms that Silverstone uses accurately for other cases the faro r1 is referred to as a standard a ix case 12 inches by nine point six inches which is about as specific as it's possible to be however there are some standoff holes in the motherboard that are marked with E which appeared to line up with EB spacing silverstone has made absolutely no claims about supporting e-atx just to be clear which is good given how cramped it would be but they also haven't constructed the case in a way that would prevent people from trying it and we like that it's possible to try if you really wanted to but that it's not marketed this way so they've kind of left it up to you to decide if you want to try and fit one of the smaller ei TX boards in the case without making a claim that just simply isn't true like most the other manufacturers would do silverstone has taken a similarly modest approach to their radiator support claims the front of the case can fit three 120mm fans but silverstone doesn't try to claim that 360 mil radiators will fit it might be possible almost with the fans mounted on the outer face of the chassis inside the front panel but it wouldn't be pretty the distance from the front fan mounts to the front edge of the standard ATX motherboard mounting is 10 centimeters from the front fan mounted the back of the fan cutout on the front edge of the power supply shroud it's 3 centimeters and from the top of the case to the top edge of the motherboard it's about 2.6 centimeters those reference points should be enough to help anyone trying to squeeze in a larger radiator but additional clearance information for air coolers is also available in the manual PDF we also noticed that there are two 120mm fan mounts on the surface of the power supply shroud silverstone mentions that nothing of these probably because they're obstructed by the power supply and they're unusable if the internal two and a half inch drive trays are mounted on top of them if only one drive tray is needed and if the power supply isn't too long the mount towards the front of the case might actually be usable as an additional intake fan for the GPU obviously that's not officially recommended but we again appreciate the same approach of having the option and not having the manufacturer try to claim that it will definitely work and completely improve your life with the bill given that silverstone intends to use this tool in for multiple cases perhaps another related chassis will officially support EE B motherboards or fans on top of the PSE you in the future let's get into the Thermal testing the first chart will show only the Farah r1 and the RL o6 we'll save the comparative tests for next the only stock fan in the whole case is positioned directly behind the CPU so if anything at all is getting cooled it's that during the torture test we logged an average CPU temperature of 65 degrees Celsius telson see over ambiens almost at the point of throttling but we never dropped clocks even with no fans mounted directly behind the front panel removing the panel proves beneficial with a drop down to 57 degrees over ambient as the rear exhaust fan could more effectively pull air from the front of the case and create the pressure system needed to rush cool air in a drop is expected from panel removal in every instance but the larger the drop the more obstructive the panel is in this instance an eighth degree drop wouldn't typically be as significant but the lack of front fans makes it more important for tastic usually removing the front panel results in better thermals than any of our other tests but using the RL o6s fans in the farah r1 with its front panel resulted in a significantly lower CPU temperature of 50 degrees even with the obstructions of the front panel and the filter is still there stopping more fans in a case really does work especially with a mesh front panel the original RL o six measured at about 48 degrees for the same test marking the r1 a poor successor to the original it's got potential but it really needs the fans to realize it and then you might as well just buy a more expensive case in many instances like the P 400 a because you'd be spending about the same with the fans plus the AR one compared to the other cases we've tested 65 degrees Celsius is terrible an easy retort is that silverstone intends the users to add more fans but the similarly priced cooler master and our 600 includes two fans and scored massively better in the stock test vs. stock at 56 degrees celsius over ambient adding one front fans the NR 600 brought it down to forty seven point one degrees Celsius over ambience replacing the r1 single fan with the four from the RL o six still didn't bring it that low the RL o six itself averaged about one degree better than the r1 using the exact same set of fans it's allowed to remind you but we'll talk about that more in the noise normalised section are still some margin for error here as well coolermaster skipped a filter altogether relying on the fine mesh of the NR 600 phone panel itself to keep the dust out it's hard to fault Silverstone for spending the money on a feature that the NR 600 doesn't have but the filter in the r1 is permanent and non removable unlike the older RL zero six is it feels like a regression from the previous design GPU temperature was 61 degrees over ambient with the standard torture workload that we use for our torture testing it also improves by several degrees with the front panel removed down to 54 degrees there's no intake fan pointed at the GPU and the only exhaust fan in the case is above the level of the backplate so any improvement in temperature here is just due to unsealing the case and keeping the hot air from building up inside a single exhaust fan isn't adequate buy more fans in order to use this case giving the GPU direct airflow with the RL 0 6 fans lowered temperatures further down to 51 degrees Celsius over ambient since we only control fan speed on the test systems GPU it's free to adjust clocks up or down based on thermal Headroom so thermal differences usually aren't as dramatic as the CPUs the original rlo vi at about forty seven point one degrees in this test when stock comparative GPU thermals are next 61 degrees Celsius on the GPU is again right at the top end of some of the hottest cases we've tested the NR 600 average 54 degrees delta T over ambient with its stock fans which in the context of the original review for that case wasn't overly impressive but it's a definite improvement over the r1 the original RL oh six average forty seven point one degrees GPU temperature one of the best stock results we've ever seen but the r1 misses that mark by a few degrees still 51 degrees delta theory' ambient would have put it on the cooler side of the chart along side cases like the cooler master aged 500 blanc mesh specifically the blank and the corsair 570 ex this case would have the potential to be high performance if the right fans were purchased for it the fire strike extreme stress test confirmed what the torture test showed with an identical GPU temperature of 61 degrees over ambient that's just as high relative to the rest of the chart as the torture result was but the cpu results is also warm with 35 degrees in this test placing it above most the other results on the chart even without a load on the CPU hot air builds up at the top of the case and can't be effectively exhausted by a single fan blender is a serious workload by CV benchmarking standards but compared to the torture workloads we used for case torture testing it's relatively light the cpu render averaged 40 degrees over ambient only a couple degrees warmer than the NR 638 degrees but much further toward the hot end of the chart smaller differences mean more here due to the nature of the test the original RL o6 did 34 degrees out doing that successor markedly the GPU accelerated render a verdict Rees on the GPU while the NR 600 averaged 27 degrees neither of these temperatures compared to cases with GPU focused cooling like the SL 600 M which averaged 22 degrees over ambient in this test if we haven't set it enough by now this case needs an extra fan at the very least preferably an intake directed towards the GPU our standardized fan test is one that we added by community requests it's useful but it can also be misleading so we'd encourage you to watch our testing methodology content about this test to understand why before you paste the results all over the internet without understanding them the standardized fantast is an extremely appropriate one for this case specifically but only if the intention truly is for customers to buy their own fans see me a temperature here is 48 degrees lower than any other test utilizing a torture workload that we did in this case that ties it with the coarser 220 T airflow just slightly warmer than the ever popular fractal match of icees temperature of 47 degrees Celsius as well these are all within error of each other the r1 finally beat the NR six hundreds of average here with cooler Master's case a couple degrees warmer at 51 degrees C via thermals in the r1 don't have to be bad with fans equalized the r1 outperforms many more expensive cases that stock line really illustrates how far it is from the rest when left alone though GPU temperatures with the standard knock to a fans averaged 55 degrees that's more toward the middle of the case as we've tested so far and definitely above the NR 600 at 50 degrees we try to stick to a normal layout for the standardized fan test with two 140 ml front intake fans above the level of power supply shroud and one back 120ml fan so the NR 600 gained the advantage here by forcing ours to mount one of the 140 ml intakes partially below the level of ESU shroud where it could more strongly benefit the GPU create a fan placement could narrow the gap between the two cases in this test but this is one of the instances where standardized fantasti isn't always as standard as people like to think it is and a surprise to nobody putting a single fan in the very rear of the case makes it quiet we measured the noise level of the r-1 with case fans at max case case fan at max speed and the CPU and GPU fan controlled as usually at our usual 20-inch distance at a reading of 36 DBA that's exactly the threshold for our noise normalized testing we can treat the standard torture results as noise normalized results but even for this test it seems that the r1 could have benefited from more fans running at a lower rpm the 65 degree average CPU temperature is higher than any case we've run through the noise normalize testing so far other than the DIY PC Zonda o the GPU temperature of 61 degrees is higher than any except the BitFenix and so the Zonda o may be old and ridiculously cheap but it comes with three fans one of which is aimed at the GPU it's also the flimsiest case we've ever worked with so you win some when you lose some we want to like the r1 and to some extent we do this is a very function focused product it's something that Silverstone is well known for their adherence to strict SSI ee b nomenclature is one of the things that illustrates what silverstone cares about which is being pedantic in a good way and trying to get a functional product that people understand without overselling its features they've done all those things and silverstone deserves tremendous praise for that because as we stated in the script in the build section there's a lot of small stuff on here where they could kind of get away with advertising support for a 360 ml or kind of get away with advertising fan mounts on the top of the power supply shroud that would mostly do nothing on this particular case but they didn't do that because silverstone understands that those things are questionable at best and so it's best to just let the user try it if they want to but not actually push it as a major point because then the user wants to try it that's on that but Silverstone's not going to market something that's only halfway or accidentally a feature that won't be wide support across I look at ei TX for example you can kind of fit at some of you ATX boards in there but it'd be awfully tight and it wouldn't be particularly fun to work with and some won't fit so silverstone has accounted for that so we give them a bit a lot of praise for that build quality is overall improved but there are lo6 still beats it in some ways like the front panel on the o6 wasn't attached physically to the front i/o so it had things that benefitted it beyond thermals and this is just seen worth where silverstone has come from and where the farah r1 lands disappointing really is the best word for it now it's got upsides we've described them mostly build quality paint quality stuff like that and you can account for a lot of this with buying extra fans but it's just not really what we want to see you stock in terms of the case overall it's supposed to be $60 or 65 with tempered glass everything about this case implies that's very low margin or that they've done their best to trim the fat where they can we'd love to have a for fan our l06 back at its original MSRP of 75 dollars but it doesn't seem like that's going to happen that was also in the days of the lower tariffs and and even with the old acrylic panel that'd be fine but it's a sad reality of making and selling cases that they're not going to stick around forever even when there's some of the best ones we believe the fara are ones main competition is the cooler master and our 600 which reviewed fairly well in our review it's got relatively similar appearance except not available in white that's potentially a key difference for some people it has a tempered glass side panel it has a mesh front it's got the ultra fine mesh so there's no dust filter that's a bit of a trend to this year as well the NR 600 includes two fans that the managed to outmatch the r1 is a single exhaust fan unsurprisingly and it also trims another few dollars off the PC shopping less because if you buy this you do need to buy at least one fan and that adds to the cost the case it's not 60 anymore now it's maybe 67 or 70 it's not 65 a tempered glass is like 70 something so should be about the same price between the NR 600 and this is the key phrase here because as writing it's difficult to find if not impossible the NR 600 near its MSRP of $70 Coolermaster increased its cased pricing by about 18% as a result of the tariffs and that really kind of knocks them out of the range that we're looking at so the are one that might be the only advantage it needs here it's good to see some tight competition for the budget space it's unfortunate that the competition requires an extra fan so it kind of exits what we consider to be a proper budget solution which would be 50 to 60 bucks and becomes more of like a low low mid-range $70 case and there's a lot of really good cases once you start getting up into the 75 range so where that leaves this case is that in an objective sense in a vacuum it is a good case meaning as it's designed it's good but it needs an extra fan in a relative sense where other cases exist it is thermally inferior in a massive way and that might be the difference of you buying something else instead so that's what it boils down to the way we cut it is this if you like the case you like how it looks you like the features of it and you can stomach a fan purchase because maybe it's not that big of a difference to your budget then they're not a ton of reasons we would advise against it other than some related to drives things like that that we've mentioned you shouldn't have a ton of reservations if you like everything you see cases are of course also very subjective so that matters but in an objective sense it is not what we would call good out of the back of the box in fact it's quite bad out of the box so yeah that's a massive downside and we expect better Silverstone but they've delivered elsewhere so it's a bit mixed on this one and that will cap it for now so thank you for watching subscribe for more as always go to store documents nexus net or patreon.com slash gamers nexus helps out directly subscribe for more we'll see you all next timecases below the $70 mark with breathable mesh front panels have become rarer in the last few years but the trend is starting to pick back up at CES we saw a deluge of 60 to 70 dollar mesh cases like the fantex p300 a which takes the principles of the P 400 a and down cost them and the Silverstone for r1 which is meant to be a successor to our lawn praised silver stone our al zero six the RL 0-6 was a long time budget masterpiece it managed chart-topping performance at around $70 accomplished with four 120mm fans a short chassis length that brought the fans closer to components and a mesh front now we're reviewing the spiritual successor to the Silverstone RL zero six and that's the Farah R one mesh variants that we saw at CES before that this video is brought to you by e BJ's RT x 2060 kayo we previously reviewed the RT x 2060 kayo model for its fuse down RT x 2080 die that uniquely benefitted blender and some professional applications offering better performance than expected in some pro workloads while offering usual strong RT x 2060 performance for gaming the RT x 2060 ko also includes the game deliver us the moon for free with EVGA geforce r-tx cards EVGA is actively restocking its RT x 2060 ko with new ties which you can find a link to the description below the fara r1 is one of several cases in what's supposed to be a line silverstone like many companies is going to keep the cost low on the streets of cases and it's doing so by reusing the tooling as much as possible there's nothing criminal about this in fact it's a good idea if it can be done properly and some companies do cut corners where they shouldn't but for the most part reusing tooling and changing the face of the cases or the arrangements of the fans or other features is a great way to get extra mileage out of it while driving the cost down for a more mass consumer friendly product so that's the goal of the fara we chose the art one for review over something like the v1 because we cared about the mesh front of the case we thought it'd do better in our bench and it's more interesting to our style of building and for most of our audience well ventilated cases have been really rare in the last few years the old course here 200 R got several recommendations from us even in the last couple years it's been around for half of a decade at this point and that's because there weren't many good ones now that's changing the Fraxel match fic obviously has been a fairly budget well we'll put that in big air close quotes there but budget ish case that about seventy dollars unfortunately it's best with extra fans and unfortunately seventy dollars isn't that budget typically we prefer to look for something like 50 bucks or 60 for our low ish end case and they can be good but they're rare and the our l06 was one of the best ones we've worked with this year that's changing there's plenty of those coming out this is one of them and it's at a perfect time really because given our impending economic doom everybody's going to be looking at cases like this for budget bill there's always a bright side here Silverstone does in fact refer to this case as the Farah r1 it moves away from its letter letter number number scheme that it's used for years that everybody has complained about of course if you ask gns a senior camera operator Andrew what the case is called it's Ferrari because look at the side of the box let's it's what do you thought it was maybe that would be what DIY PC would name its zonda successor the front of the case is really close to the core components this is a trend you're going to see a lot more of in the next couple of years that's because case companies are finally figuring out that hey we don't need a bunch of empty space where the optical drives used to be anymore and people aren't really buying hard drives so why is it there so they're getting shorter the Corsair 220 t is another one that did this and bring the front in closer to the case does benefit its thermals because naturally if you have fans up there which this one does not then you can get the air straight into the components and there's very little distance for the air at home wonder off and find some other place to exit the case based on the pressure system that may have developed within the case this one includes only one rear stock fan four out of box and it's a 120mm fan it's not particularly exciting it's supposed to be $60 for the steel version and 65 for tempered-glass the current pricing from what we looked at when writing the script doesn't reflect that it's about 70 but it's supposed to be 60 at $60 it's a significantly better position than 70 but either way some higher-quality features the case build quality is for the price point genuinely superb it's much higher than we'd expect for around this price point although accent all the fans shows where the cost is gone it is into the structure of the case which is better on average than most of its competitors now the NR 600 is the closest competitor that stands out from coolermaster that should be around the same price but it isn't and that's the one we'd point to for something that's the most structurally similar and the most competitive thermally the actually the white paint on this one is extremely well done if you've seen any of our factory tours we've talked in the past about how white paints really difficult to do on cases where you're mixing and matching different metals or or plastic and metal and in this instance the white does actually match really damn well between the panels and one of which again is plastic and that's pretty rare to do so this is a point that if you really want a white case and you want it at this price point it's gonna be hard to do better than this one but there's a lot of downsides and there's some upsides too let's get into the build notes then we'll talk thermals and then we'll go through whether it's worth it or not the side panels are as simple as possible both for the glass and the steel the tempered glass side has four holes drilled into it that slip over posts which are clearly repurposed motherboard standoffs which is a design that we've seen since the very first tempered glass cases came in for review there are downsides to this method there's nothing to catch the glass if it slips when removing the panel and replacing the panel will inevitably leave fingerprints around the edges and potentially on the inside the upsides are that it's cheap it's simple and blocks as little of the window as possible it's fine what we really take issue with is the steel panel which harkens back to the days of needing to people or at least three hands or two hands and your face to close a computer it hooks into the chassis with fragile tabs that get smashed flat if the panel isn't lined up properly and it must be pressed down on three of the four sides to slide into place yes it keeps the cases price low but we'd be perfectly happy if we never saw one of these panels again because we worked with them for at least probably over a decade at this point in a similar price cutting vein only two of the stock PCIe slot covers are removable the rest are the punch-out disposable variety we have enough loose slot covers to fill 50 cases at this point so that's fine by us but it's a potential shortcoming for some users it's an interesting detail as well to cut corners and probably shaved another half dollar off the cost the case there are two sets of cable cut outs at the front edge of the motherboard one of which is covered up by full width ATX ports smaller form factors can take advantage of the newer cutouts for less clutter while ATX boards may still have plenty of cabling routing room without the extra set cutouts on the motherboard tray may be generous but they're more scarce along the surface of the power slash route we use a standard ATX power supply for case testing and since the top of the power supply is almost flush with the shroud it blocks the rear most cutouts that would otherwise be handy for routing front IO cables longer power supplies will block even more room for bundling cables is limited and storing any cables behind the motherboard tray makes the side panel much harder to get back on and the motherboard tray is flexible enough that smashing the cables against it isn't a very good idea you could end up with a direct short the hard drive cage is removable but builds that use one or more three and a half inch drives will prove very difficult to cable manage so make sure you couple this with if possible in the budget a modular power supply otherwise you're gonna be jamming a lot of cables into places the hard drive cage holds a single sled with mounting holes for one additional three and a half drive on the roof of the cage there are three two and a half inch drive trays included and four mounting locations for them two behind the motherboard tray and two on top of the power supply shroud this case isn't ideal for builds that use any three and a half inch drives at all since the drive cage takes up such valuable space and that may not be ideal for targeting the budget market front i/o is two USB 3.0 ports one USB 2.0 and a combined mic headphone jack the manual shows a USB type-c port in one image but this is not present in the final product we like the vertical i/o arrangement and the minimal labeling we don't like the fact that the i/o is wired to the front panel itself and pulls off with it this is another aspect the build that is pretty old if you're familiar with cases or have had any amount of time working with computers even without the cables attaching to the front i/o the front panel would still be hard to detach the clips holding it on are exceptionally stiff even after several cycles of replacing and removing it we use the screwdriver to help pry it off at one point which did help a lot but that obviously risks damage it doesn't have to be this way removing the front panel isn't necessary for installing fans or radiators at the front of the case and for cleaning out the front dust filter which by the way isn't removable from the front panel it's a woven layer glued onto the frame behind the externally visible metal mesh the filter itself seems relatively breathable and unproblematic for the most part but not being able to remove it and clean it will create headaches down the road for anyone who doesn't decide to just rip it out again removing the front panel is a necessary part of using and maintaining this case and that panel is attached to the case by the cables so although you could work with it and detach everything it takes some extra time so if you wanted to bring the panel over the sink to clean it out it's not as simple as it would be with something else even if there isn't much room to use them we really like the tie points that Silverstone has come up with rather than pressing out a loop large enough for a velcro strap they simply drill out four holes in a flower pattern and then press them out together into a lump through which a zip tie or twist I can be easily passed horizontally or vertically the price bracket this case falls into doesn't exactly merit spending extra money on reusable velcro ties that will be hidden away anyway so zip ties are perfectly adequate for this the end result is a neat small feature that's probably less expensive to produce than normal cable tie points and actually works really well we've talked at length about EA TX and the fact that it's not a real specification Silverstone was one of our sources for that piece and they informed us in no uncertain terms that Silverstone only uses quote EA TX to refer to full 12 by 13 inch motherboards even to the point of butting heads with other manufacturers about it accordingly the farah family of cases is not referred to as EA TX or SSI EE B or SSI C EB which are all terms that Silverstone uses accurately for other cases the faro r1 is referred to as a standard a ix case 12 inches by nine point six inches which is about as specific as it's possible to be however there are some standoff holes in the motherboard that are marked with E which appeared to line up with EB spacing silverstone has made absolutely no claims about supporting e-atx just to be clear which is good given how cramped it would be but they also haven't constructed the case in a way that would prevent people from trying it and we like that it's possible to try if you really wanted to but that it's not marketed this way so they've kind of left it up to you to decide if you want to try and fit one of the smaller ei TX boards in the case without making a claim that just simply isn't true like most the other manufacturers would do silverstone has taken a similarly modest approach to their radiator support claims the front of the case can fit three 120mm fans but silverstone doesn't try to claim that 360 mil radiators will fit it might be possible almost with the fans mounted on the outer face of the chassis inside the front panel but it wouldn't be pretty the distance from the front fan mounts to the front edge of the standard ATX motherboard mounting is 10 centimeters from the front fan mounted the back of the fan cutout on the front edge of the power supply shroud it's 3 centimeters and from the top of the case to the top edge of the motherboard it's about 2.6 centimeters those reference points should be enough to help anyone trying to squeeze in a larger radiator but additional clearance information for air coolers is also available in the manual PDF we also noticed that there are two 120mm fan mounts on the surface of the power supply shroud silverstone mentions that nothing of these probably because they're obstructed by the power supply and they're unusable if the internal two and a half inch drive trays are mounted on top of them if only one drive tray is needed and if the power supply isn't too long the mount towards the front of the case might actually be usable as an additional intake fan for the GPU obviously that's not officially recommended but we again appreciate the same approach of having the option and not having the manufacturer try to claim that it will definitely work and completely improve your life with the bill given that silverstone intends to use this tool in for multiple cases perhaps another related chassis will officially support EE B motherboards or fans on top of the PSE you in the future let's get into the Thermal testing the first chart will show only the Farah r1 and the RL o6 we'll save the comparative tests for next the only stock fan in the whole case is positioned directly behind the CPU so if anything at all is getting cooled it's that during the torture test we logged an average CPU temperature of 65 degrees Celsius telson see over ambiens almost at the point of throttling but we never dropped clocks even with no fans mounted directly behind the front panel removing the panel proves beneficial with a drop down to 57 degrees over ambient as the rear exhaust fan could more effectively pull air from the front of the case and create the pressure system needed to rush cool air in a drop is expected from panel removal in every instance but the larger the drop the more obstructive the panel is in this instance an eighth degree drop wouldn't typically be as significant but the lack of front fans makes it more important for tastic usually removing the front panel results in better thermals than any of our other tests but using the RL o6s fans in the farah r1 with its front panel resulted in a significantly lower CPU temperature of 50 degrees even with the obstructions of the front panel and the filter is still there stopping more fans in a case really does work especially with a mesh front panel the original RL o six measured at about 48 degrees for the same test marking the r1 a poor successor to the original it's got potential but it really needs the fans to realize it and then you might as well just buy a more expensive case in many instances like the P 400 a because you'd be spending about the same with the fans plus the AR one compared to the other cases we've tested 65 degrees Celsius is terrible an easy retort is that silverstone intends the users to add more fans but the similarly priced cooler master and our 600 includes two fans and scored massively better in the stock test vs. stock at 56 degrees celsius over ambient adding one front fans the NR 600 brought it down to forty seven point one degrees Celsius over ambience replacing the r1 single fan with the four from the RL o six still didn't bring it that low the RL o six itself averaged about one degree better than the r1 using the exact same set of fans it's allowed to remind you but we'll talk about that more in the noise normalised section are still some margin for error here as well coolermaster skipped a filter altogether relying on the fine mesh of the NR 600 phone panel itself to keep the dust out it's hard to fault Silverstone for spending the money on a feature that the NR 600 doesn't have but the filter in the r1 is permanent and non removable unlike the older RL zero six is it feels like a regression from the previous design GPU temperature was 61 degrees over ambient with the standard torture workload that we use for our torture testing it also improves by several degrees with the front panel removed down to 54 degrees there's no intake fan pointed at the GPU and the only exhaust fan in the case is above the level of the backplate so any improvement in temperature here is just due to unsealing the case and keeping the hot air from building up inside a single exhaust fan isn't adequate buy more fans in order to use this case giving the GPU direct airflow with the RL 0 6 fans lowered temperatures further down to 51 degrees Celsius over ambient since we only control fan speed on the test systems GPU it's free to adjust clocks up or down based on thermal Headroom so thermal differences usually aren't as dramatic as the CPUs the original rlo vi at about forty seven point one degrees in this test when stock comparative GPU thermals are next 61 degrees Celsius on the GPU is again right at the top end of some of the hottest cases we've tested the NR 600 average 54 degrees delta T over ambient with its stock fans which in the context of the original review for that case wasn't overly impressive but it's a definite improvement over the r1 the original RL oh six average forty seven point one degrees GPU temperature one of the best stock results we've ever seen but the r1 misses that mark by a few degrees still 51 degrees delta theory' ambient would have put it on the cooler side of the chart along side cases like the cooler master aged 500 blanc mesh specifically the blank and the corsair 570 ex this case would have the potential to be high performance if the right fans were purchased for it the fire strike extreme stress test confirmed what the torture test showed with an identical GPU temperature of 61 degrees over ambient that's just as high relative to the rest of the chart as the torture result was but the cpu results is also warm with 35 degrees in this test placing it above most the other results on the chart even without a load on the CPU hot air builds up at the top of the case and can't be effectively exhausted by a single fan blender is a serious workload by CV benchmarking standards but compared to the torture workloads we used for case torture testing it's relatively light the cpu render averaged 40 degrees over ambient only a couple degrees warmer than the NR 638 degrees but much further toward the hot end of the chart smaller differences mean more here due to the nature of the test the original RL o6 did 34 degrees out doing that successor markedly the GPU accelerated render a verdict Rees on the GPU while the NR 600 averaged 27 degrees neither of these temperatures compared to cases with GPU focused cooling like the SL 600 M which averaged 22 degrees over ambient in this test if we haven't set it enough by now this case needs an extra fan at the very least preferably an intake directed towards the GPU our standardized fan test is one that we added by community requests it's useful but it can also be misleading so we'd encourage you to watch our testing methodology content about this test to understand why before you paste the results all over the internet without understanding them the standardized fantast is an extremely appropriate one for this case specifically but only if the intention truly is for customers to buy their own fans see me a temperature here is 48 degrees lower than any other test utilizing a torture workload that we did in this case that ties it with the coarser 220 T airflow just slightly warmer than the ever popular fractal match of icees temperature of 47 degrees Celsius as well these are all within error of each other the r1 finally beat the NR six hundreds of average here with cooler Master's case a couple degrees warmer at 51 degrees C via thermals in the r1 don't have to be bad with fans equalized the r1 outperforms many more expensive cases that stock line really illustrates how far it is from the rest when left alone though GPU temperatures with the standard knock to a fans averaged 55 degrees that's more toward the middle of the case as we've tested so far and definitely above the NR 600 at 50 degrees we try to stick to a normal layout for the standardized fan test with two 140 ml front intake fans above the level of power supply shroud and one back 120ml fan so the NR 600 gained the advantage here by forcing ours to mount one of the 140 ml intakes partially below the level of ESU shroud where it could more strongly benefit the GPU create a fan placement could narrow the gap between the two cases in this test but this is one of the instances where standardized fantasti isn't always as standard as people like to think it is and a surprise to nobody putting a single fan in the very rear of the case makes it quiet we measured the noise level of the r-1 with case fans at max case case fan at max speed and the CPU and GPU fan controlled as usually at our usual 20-inch distance at a reading of 36 DBA that's exactly the threshold for our noise normalized testing we can treat the standard torture results as noise normalized results but even for this test it seems that the r1 could have benefited from more fans running at a lower rpm the 65 degree average CPU temperature is higher than any case we've run through the noise normalize testing so far other than the DIY PC Zonda o the GPU temperature of 61 degrees is higher than any except the BitFenix and so the Zonda o may be old and ridiculously cheap but it comes with three fans one of which is aimed at the GPU it's also the flimsiest case we've ever worked with so you win some when you lose some we want to like the r1 and to some extent we do this is a very function focused product it's something that Silverstone is well known for their adherence to strict SSI ee b nomenclature is one of the things that illustrates what silverstone cares about which is being pedantic in a good way and trying to get a functional product that people understand without overselling its features they've done all those things and silverstone deserves tremendous praise for that because as we stated in the script in the build section there's a lot of small stuff on here where they could kind of get away with advertising support for a 360 ml or kind of get away with advertising fan mounts on the top of the power supply shroud that would mostly do nothing on this particular case but they didn't do that because silverstone understands that those things are questionable at best and so it's best to just let the user try it if they want to but not actually push it as a major point because then the user wants to try it that's on that but Silverstone's not going to market something that's only halfway or accidentally a feature that won't be wide support across I look at ei TX for example you can kind of fit at some of you ATX boards in there but it'd be awfully tight and it wouldn't be particularly fun to work with and some won't fit so silverstone has accounted for that so we give them a bit a lot of praise for that build quality is overall improved but there are lo6 still beats it in some ways like the front panel on the o6 wasn't attached physically to the front i/o so it had things that benefitted it beyond thermals and this is just seen worth where silverstone has come from and where the farah r1 lands disappointing really is the best word for it now it's got upsides we've described them mostly build quality paint quality stuff like that and you can account for a lot of this with buying extra fans but it's just not really what we want to see you stock in terms of the case overall it's supposed to be $60 or 65 with tempered glass everything about this case implies that's very low margin or that they've done their best to trim the fat where they can we'd love to have a for fan our l06 back at its original MSRP of 75 dollars but it doesn't seem like that's going to happen that was also in the days of the lower tariffs and and even with the old acrylic panel that'd be fine but it's a sad reality of making and selling cases that they're not going to stick around forever even when there's some of the best ones we believe the fara are ones main competition is the cooler master and our 600 which reviewed fairly well in our review it's got relatively similar appearance except not available in white that's potentially a key difference for some people it has a tempered glass side panel it has a mesh front it's got the ultra fine mesh so there's no dust filter that's a bit of a trend to this year as well the NR 600 includes two fans that the managed to outmatch the r1 is a single exhaust fan unsurprisingly and it also trims another few dollars off the PC shopping less because if you buy this you do need to buy at least one fan and that adds to the cost the case it's not 60 anymore now it's maybe 67 or 70 it's not 65 a tempered glass is like 70 something so should be about the same price between the NR 600 and this is the key phrase here because as writing it's difficult to find if not impossible the NR 600 near its MSRP of $70 Coolermaster increased its cased pricing by about 18% as a result of the tariffs and that really kind of knocks them out of the range that we're looking at so the are one that might be the only advantage it needs here it's good to see some tight competition for the budget space it's unfortunate that the competition requires an extra fan so it kind of exits what we consider to be a proper budget solution which would be 50 to 60 bucks and becomes more of like a low low mid-range $70 case and there's a lot of really good cases once you start getting up into the 75 range so where that leaves this case is that in an objective sense in a vacuum it is a good case meaning as it's designed it's good but it needs an extra fan in a relative sense where other cases exist it is thermally inferior in a massive way and that might be the difference of you buying something else instead so that's what it boils down to the way we cut it is this if you like the case you like how it looks you like the features of it and you can stomach a fan purchase because maybe it's not that big of a difference to your budget then they're not a ton of reasons we would advise against it other than some related to drives things like that that we've mentioned you shouldn't have a ton of reservations if you like everything you see cases are of course also very subjective so that matters but in an objective sense it is not what we would call good out of the back of the box in fact it's quite bad out of the box so yeah that's a massive downside and we expect better Silverstone but they've delivered elsewhere so it's a bit mixed on this one and that will cap it for now so thank you for watching subscribe for more as always go to store documents nexus net or patreon.com slash gamers nexus helps out directly subscribe for more we'll see you all next time\n"