Fractal Design Define XL Black Pearl Review

The newest member of Fractal Design's Define family is the aptly named XL, a full tower enclosure that incorporates a number of innovative features at a great price. With Fractal's history of forward thinking mentality, its hard not to find something to like about this new case.

[Niels_K]

I truly appreciate the honesty, showing all the flaws. Nice job Dimitry.

[madsmadser]

@N1mro8 If you know how to mod the case then it can become good for watercooling. The angled 180mm fan can easily be removed, and 3 120mm fan holes can be cut out in the top so you can mount a radiator + fans (I think it will cost you the top 5.25 bay). You can put a grill on the top to make it look nice. If you drill out the rivets from the 2 bottom hdd-cages, and cut out holes for 2x120mm fans in the bottom of the side panel, you have for a 2x120mm radiator.

[wyzemann]

With the exception of the top mounted fan, this case is a major triumph for those of us who demand pure silence from our gaming chassis. It also possesses a naturally elegant exterior.

NEAR PERFECT WINNER!

[UberDurable]

Very strange that Fractal does not offer tool-less drive bays.

[Qhonication]

the best and beautiful i ever had or saw

[iceveiled]

I'm perfectly content with my case, but I love watching your reviews because they are well done. As for this case, that top angled fan is just a terrible idea on an otherwise awesome case. Have the engineers at Fractal Design seen today's CPU heatsinks?

[thesmallterror]

Since when was a thumbscrew not tool-less? They better that a cheap plastic button. How many times do you switch out an optical drive anyways? I do agree it's a major flub with the 8-pin though.

[pitiflauticus]

Hardware Canucks make the best cases reviews, but as most of other reviewers, they dont do thermal tests... please implement them :)

[Mr_Wh]

This guy really needs to see the cases for what they are meant fore, and not rack down on every case this does not have mesh everywhere.
If you think about it, you will see this case is for silence. Not plastic suit with fans in every crack.
And watercoling can be mounted at front. He votes it down because it is not a r3? Wtf man.

[zabadaja]

Im thinking to build a silent gaming pc with this case.
I7 3770k, Noctua nh-d14, mpower z77 msi, 680 lightining msi, one hdd and ssd as boot, 16gigs or ram, sesonic 750w psu.
Im not interested in high overcolcks since i want it to be silent as posible with high performance, but i would apply small overclock.
So my question is can this case support this hardware im concerned with nh-d14.
also tell me what u think about build, can it be silent like this ?
ty

[BoBBaBoN]

@PCGAMER35353vr haha, yeah. so wat should i call that case? casing or chassis ?

[anothersiguy]

Only reason to buy this case is for like a workstation or server with lots of HDDs, and even then the R3 is cheaper, smaller, and better at this job unless you need more than 8 HDDs, which almost nobody does.

[BoBBaBoN]

hey im new with pc component, i dunno wat to pronouns this thing between chassis or casing ?

[kshiflett]

Pretty sure the top fan can be removed using the OBVIOUS clips, as I've seen in other reviews. So I'm not sure I'll be paying much attention to this video.

[SomeGirth]

It isn't really a bad case, its just not geared towards gamers. Its a server case, and nothing more.

[McManus]

I reckon the top fan is a good idea. if only it was refined a bit more :(

[anhtransport]

What is the point of having such a big case without any support for water cooling system. U cant mount a rad anywhere. May be the front but it will takes some mod.

[madsmadser]

@N1mro8 Try to search on google, I have seen forum threads about watercooling mods on this case.

[FrostyTheBeerMan]

HEY ! it's nice to finally see the guy that does the voice overs for the videos !
Cool ! Check out his channel : Jesse B Andersen
he just did a video review of Mimo's USB monitor

[BYEBYE]

@thesmallterror thumbscrews are tool-less cause you don't need a screw driver to unscrew them...DUH