NZXT Source 220 Case Review

Testing:

Testing the NZXT Source 220 required heating it up! Testing involved recording temperatures for the CPU, GPU, chipset, hard drives, and overall system during idle and load phases. Load was simulated by running Prime95’s small FFTs, HD Tune, and 3Dmark Vantage for one hour. The maximum temperatures were recording using HW Monitor. It is important to note that each case is tested from its factory setup, including location of fans, unless otherwise noted.

Although the NZXT Source 220 has multiple locations for fans, the case is shipped with only the 140mm in the upper deck as well as the 120mm on the back of the case, both positioned for negative pressure in the case (both are configured to be exhaust). Due to my water cooling setup, the radiator was mounted in the bottom of the case since the back of the case was too crowded for the radiator to fit without interfering with the motherboard. This isn’t too uncommon in these smaller cases — the same had to be done when I tested the NZXT Tempest 210.

Testing Setup:

• Processor: AMD Phenom II X3 720 @ 3.6 GHz
• Motherboard: GIGABYTE 990FXA-UD3
• Memory: 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-17000 9-11-10-28 Redline
• Video Card: 4870X2 2GB
• PSU: Antec TruePower New TP-750
• Hard Drives: 2x Seagate Barracuda 7200.11 RAID 1
• Optical Drive: N/A
• Case: Corsair Graphite Series 600T
• OS: Windows 7 Ultimate 64-Bit SP1

Comparison Cases:

• NZXT Tempest 210
• Corsair Graphite Series 600T
• HAF 932 Black Edition

The NZXT Source 220 really surprised me for its size and how cramped my hardware ended up being. The temperatures at load were comparable with those of the HAF 932, a rather large and roomy case, and were at no surprise comparable to the NZXT Tempest 210. I am very impressed with the ability for such a small case full of hardware to remain at such reasonable temperatures, if not excellent temperatures — major props to NZXT.

Results: