Fractal Design Core 2300 Review

Performance Analysis

The CPU and GPU temperatures are both pretty unimpressive, leaving the Core 2300 near the bottom in both charts. Thankfully, the chassis is at least very quiet – it may not do much to actually suppress noise, but the fans that it ship with are very quiet indeed, and we could barely hear them from a standard distance.


The problem with the fans being so quiet is, evidently, that they don't move a lot of air. The CPU temperature, for example, which is affected mostly by the exhaust fan, is only on par with the Cooltek Antiphon, and even the Corsair Carbide Spec-01 is only 2°C warmer, despite not having an exhaust fan at all. Then you have the front fan, which is further impeded by the mostly solid front panel. With its 140mm fans, the Core 3300 does a better job, especially when it comes to GPU cooling, and with its faster front intake and more ventilated front panel the Spec-01 is also favourable in this regard.

Conclusion

Like Corsair's Spec-01, the Core 2300 is a very well-rounded chassis, and actually has even more features. The presence of USB 3, dust filtering, the innovative storage mounting bracket and even a healthy amount of water-cooling support (something the Spec-01 doesn't have) is awesome to see in a sub-£40 chassis. Corners have been cut in the right places compared to the Core 3300 too, with the build quality unaffected, and the lack of one USB 3 port, extra SSD mount and the smaller exhaust fan unlikely to bother most people shopping in this market segment.


You even get two fans in the box too, so in terms of value there's very little that matches the Core 2300. However, the cooling these fans provide is hard to ignore. Of course, not everyone will want to cram powerful, overclocked hardware into a budget case, but many will, in which case the Core 2300 will probably cope, but that's about it. If you have some spare fans around, you'd be wise to install them, but otherwise it's probably worth just upgrading to the Core 3300 for £15 instead of buying this case as well as more fans. As such, we can't give the Core 2300 universal approval through an award, but that's not to say it isn't a fantastic option for budget builders who will be using less demanding hardware and want a well-made, easy to use chassis for as little cash as possible.