BE QUIET! DARK BASE PRO 900
Just keep doing what you’re doing, Be Quiet!
WHERE DO YOU START with a case like the Dark Base Pro 900? Seriously, this is difficult. This chassis is unlike anything we’ve ever seen before. At the beginning of the year, we reviewed Be Quiet!’s first chassis in the form of the Silent Base 800, and we’ll be frank, it just wasn’t up to scratch. It was a touch too plasticky, a bit fragile, and a little outdated. When the Dark Base Pro 900 was announced, we had a moment of head scratching, because there was a lot of room for improvement over the last series, and we certainly expected some changes, but what did we get? Well, it really was something else.
This case is flawless. In its base configuration, you’re treated to seven hard drive cages, one rear-mounted motherboard SSD mount, a fan hub capable of supporting up to eight PWM fans, two LED strips, and a wireless Qi charger located on the top. There’s a tempered glass side panel, cooling support for up to six separate 140mm fans, full ATX support, two 5.25-inch drive bays, and a glorious fan filter the length of the chassis, which you can remove from the front of the case. All of this is surrounded by a combination of brushed aluminum, steel, and sounddampening panels. MODULAR PERFECTION Yet that’s only part of what makes this case such an exceptional piece of hardware. What separates this spectacle from the crowd is what you can do with it. Let’s list what is possible: You can swap the motherboard tray around and invert it, remove the hard drive cages, remove the 5.25-inch bays, remove the entire hard drive bracket, reorient the power supply slot, add support for a third 140mm fan in the front, add a pump/reservoir mount, attach the tempered glass panel to the other side…. You get the picture, if there’s a component on here that you want to strip off, you can, with a Philips head screwdriver, and that’s it—no pesky rivets to be found.
We’ve never seen such a flexible, or well-equipped case. Hypothetically, you could fit two 420mm radiators in here, with an additional 280mm on the floor, and a 140mm in the rear. Then swap the motherboard cage around and have an inverse system. The additional fan panel you can add once you’ve removed the 5.25inch drive bay is also intuitively designed, because the door hiding the front of the chassis is a solid piece of aluminum and sound-dampening material, so there’s no unsightly unused slots. Then there are the fan filters littered around the chassis. The bottom filter is fully removable from the front, which saves having to shift your case around. Then you have the top panel, which is easily removable via eight clips, enabling you to install and hide the three 140mm fans in the top of the rig, still with ample airflow, and allowing you to install chunkier radiators in the top of the rig.
Aesthetically, the combination of aluminum, steel, and tempered glass creates a beautiful full tower. The sound dampening feels lush and premium, and helps reduce the hum from the plethora of fans you can install. The choice of orange, silver, or black accents will also add an air of style to your build.
So, there’s gotta be some criticisms, right? There just has to be. Honestly, we’re a little stumped on this one. Short of the electrostatic death bag this chassis comes wrapped in, and the horrendously tightly packaged box, there’s not a lot we can comment on. Any criticisms we’ve ever had with a case have been addressed; even the price is on point, at $250. Damn, Be Quiet! Just damn. –ZAK STOREY
Be Quiet! Dark Base Pro 900
DARK GOD Modularity perfection; brilliant build materials; tempered glass; wireless Qi charger; huge cooling support; excellent modding potential; price.
TOO DARK Static bag. $250, www.bequiet.com