Case Labs MAGNUM M8 Case Review
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Inside the MAGNUM M8 Case
The Case Labs MAGNUM M8 is split internally with a larger left side measuring 7 3/4″ (196.85mm) and smaller right side measuring 6 1/8″ (155mm). Opening the swing out doors on the Case Labs Magnum M8 is as simple as grabbing the handle and pulling. The same pin latch mechinism used for the top and front panels securely holds the doors closed. After we stopped drooling over all the space inside this case we noticed that there were no fans included anywhere in this case unlike the vast majority of manufacturers. Since this case is targeting extreme builders that typically throw away included fans and replace them with their preference this dose not really surprise us.
Case Labs really did design this case from the builders point of view. The doors not only swing open but once they are open you can gently lift and they come right up out of their hinges to be removed and go back on just as easy.
Pulling the left door off reveals the motherboard side of the M8. This is their smallest case to date and it has a ton of room with large openings with rubber grommets all around the removable motherboard tray. Given that this is a two sided case it is nice that they provide all of these access ports between the sides to give you plenty of options for routing. In case you do not want to use either of the large round opening at the front of the case, Case Labs provides you with two plastic plugs like the ones on the back to block these ports.
You might have noticed there were no 5.25″ mounting points on the inside. Being a highly modular case they supply you with 8 of these brackets to attach to 4 devices instead of having a pre-mounted drive space.
You simply would mount the brackets to your 5.25″ devices and then use the pins and thumb screws behind the front plate to mount to any of the 10 slots. This is clearly not a tool-free design but since you can mount the plates to the device outside of the case it is really easy to use.
If you were wondering where you mount your hard drives we have to flip to the PSU side of the case. By default, Case Labs provides a single four drive mount that is directly connected to a 120mm fan mount. You can have up to three of these HDD cages on the PSU side alone for a total of 12 hard disk drives. Also note the vast number of zip tie anchor points all over the middle panel for superb cable management options.
Case Labs supplies 16 heavy rubber grommets and the stand off screws to provide vibration dampened mounting four hard drives
Plastic Motherboard slot and guide
If being able to take the doors off the case is not good enough, the motherboard tray easily slides out making installation a breeze. This tray has the vented top with a vented 120mm rear fan port as default that Case Labs named Hex Mesh but you can also select a no charge optional fan tray instead with four 40mm fan ports above the PCI ports and a 120mm fan port.
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