Corsair Crystal Series 680X RGB Review

Features II

Fans, Fan control and RGB lighting

As stated, before Corsair includes three RGB fans and one regular fan with the 680X. All these can be controlled by iCUE, but that is provided you have all fans plugged directly into the motherboard. This naturally brings us to the next section, as the implementation of these fans and how one would control them. It isn’t what one would expect and in many ways, present a missed opportunity of sorts.

 

A missed opportunity

Missed opportunities characterise all cases, regardless of the manufacture or vendor. In as far as the Crystal Series 680X is concerned however, it’s doubly frustrating given how well everything else is executed. For some peculiar reason, bundled with case is one Lighting Node Pro and RGB Fan Led Hub. These cost $59.99 and $9.99 respectively, so that’s $70 worth of additional kit that fitted into the Crystal Series 680X. The issue here is that this doesn’t offer any fan control at all, thus – all four fans must plug into the motherboard.

That in itself may not be an issue as motherboards these days have typically five or more headers. Consider however, that the Commander Pro also at $70 USD packs everything these two devices offer and much more. We’re talking 6 fan headers, two RGB lighting channels, two USB 2.0 internal headers and four repositionable temp sensors.

As it stands, the Lighting Node Pro uses up one USB 2.0 header. Should you have an HXi, AXi or RXi PSU, that’s another USB 2.0. Add any of the intelligent series AIO Hydro coolers and you’re unlikely to have enough USB internal headers, as most motherboards only offer two. So, if you own a Corsair PSU, AIO and this case, one of these will not have access to iCUE. Given iCUE is the corner stone of the Corsair ecosystem and component functionality, the Crystal Series 680X undermines this. Again, this is solved with the Commander PRO which I would strongly recommend for 680X.

This oversight along with the inclusion of a single none RGB fan in the SP120 are the only down sides of the Crystal Series 680X. They prevent this from being the perfect chassis in my books.


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