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Cooler Master ATC-201C Aluminum Case Review

Cooler Master's cases are getting great reviews from other respected review sites for their style and performance, one problem that all the sites mention is that the price of the case is too much for what they are offering.  The ATC-201C has good looks, and great performance for its $150 dollar price tag, which is a lot cheaper than the $220, ATC-111-SX1 that we have reviewed.  Let's have a look at the ATC-201C.

The box arrives at our testing facility. 

The case is nicely packaged inside the box.

Manual and screws are included with the package.

Here are the specifications of the case from Cooler Master:

Weight: Case: 5 kg	Expansion Slots: 7
Material: All Aluminum Alloy	5.25" Drive Bay: 4 ( Exposed )
USB Port: Dual USB Ports	3.5" Drive Bay: 2 ( Exposed ) ; 4 ( Shadow )
P/S: Optional power supply unit 300 / 400 W
Cooling: Dual 80 x 80 x 25 mm fan attached front panel
Cooling: One 80 x 80 x 25 mm fan attached top panel ( Exhaust )
Cooling: One 80 x 80 x 25 mm fan attached back panel ( Exhaust )

So far, everything is packaged nicely.

The front view of the case is fantastic.  It is solid aluminum.  Just looking at this picture you can see that the Power and Reset buttons have a shiny polished outer ring, which gives it a boost in its visual appearance.  Above, the picture shows how shiny the sides and top of the case are, the paint job is almost as good as a car.

 Both of the above pictures show that this case is equipped with Cooler Master's ATC-S cooling system.  That stands for Active Thermal Convective System.  The ATC-S system works by strategically placing fans where heat is most likely to go, along with the all aluminum design of the case.

A picture of the two front USB connectors from the behind.

This Cooler Master case features a front panel USB connection.  The USB slots are hidden behind a small flap located in the from on the case.

In this picture you can see that there is plenty of room to fit up to 5 Hard Drives, 4 optical drives, and one floppy.

Before I go on to the drive bays, I would like to point out that the ATC-201C along with other Cooler Master cases feature feet with a gold ring surrounding it. These feet look like the ones found on expensive DVD players, and VCR's.  

This case features 4 visible 5 1/4" drive bays for installing optical drives.  It also has 2 visible 3 1/2" floppy drive bays.

There are drive rails to hold the hard drives, this is good because you don't want your HDD to fall down while you are installing it.

One problem I found was that the case did not feature drive rails for the 5 1/2" drive bays.  While installing the CD-ROM drive, it was moving around a lot with nothing to hold the drive still.  Even some really cheap cases feature rails for the cd-rom drive.

Part of the ATC-S cooling system involves fans.  During the testing of the ATC-201C, the fans were whisper quiet and produced enough air to ventilate the case properly.  The case has one 80mm fan in the back...

Two 80mm fans in the front...

and one 80mm fan on the top of the case.

Both the front and top fans feature a fan grille, which houses a filter.  The filter prevents dust from entering the system and causing problems.

Cooler Master's ATC-201C also features a removable motherboard tray.  This feature is great, if you change your motherboard, CPU, or memory frequently.

Note that taking out the motherboard tray not only removes the motherboard, but the expansion cards as well.  Cheaper cases only allow you to remove the motherboard tray after you take out the expansion cards.

In the picture above you can see that the motherboard tray slides on rails.

A PSU shim is included to install the power supply for the case.

It fits nicely on the power supply, although some sites report that it may not fit at all on some power supplies.

You can see that almost everything is secured by thumbscrews, which makes installation and upgrading easier.

Cooler Master has included a pack of screws for the case and motherboard installations.

In the picture above, it shows that the screw on the right is the one that Cooler Master gives you, and the one on the left is a generic / standard screw.  I feel that the one that Cooler Master includes is has higher quality.

Installing the motherboard was flawless and easily done.  Everything fit snugly.

You can see that there is still a lot of clearance between the edge of the motherboard and the tray.

On the tray, you can see that there are thumbscrews to secure the expansion cards.

Outside, the expansion cards fit nicely and are flush to the case.

Inside, when everything is installed, is like any other mid-tower sized case.  This case offers the same amount of room.

When everything is installed, the final product looks like the picture above.

Testing:

On all of the tests, I used an

AMD Athlon 1700+ @ 2000+

2 Maxtor 7200 rpm HDD's

and a Dual Fan 400 watt power supply

The Cooler Master ATC-201 case had an internal temperature of 33 degrees Celsius after being on for an hour.  This is a lot better than the ChiefTec aluminum server case that I had before switching to the Cooler Master ATC-201C case.  The ChiefTec case had an internal temperature of 36 degrees Celsius.

In the two above pictures, you can really see the quality and workmanship put into the case.

This case for people who want the same great interior of more expensive Cooler Master cases, and the same great looks for a cheaper price.  The ATC-201C is cheaper than most of Cooler Master's line up of cases, but at ~$150, it seems more reasonable to get than the $220 ATC-111-SX1

Let's have a look at some Pros and Cons:

Pros:

-Excellent case design.

-Exceptional case cooling.

-Removable motherboard tray.

-Almost all the screws included in the case are thumbscrews

Cons:

-Expensive

-No rail for CD-ROM drives.

Techaddicts.net is proud to give this case a 9 out of 10.

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