Raijintek Asterion Plus Case Review

Conclusion

Let’s not beat around the bush.  We like the Asterion Plus, we like it a lot.  Actually that statement doesn’t really do our lust for this case justice.  On the exterior you have stunning aesthetic of line brushed Aluminium panels that seem to effortlessly wrap over the roof and under the floor.  Both the side panels are windowed in smoked grey and have suicide door style openings.  They can of course be easily removed to gain full access to the interior for the build or serious maintenance.  The front panel is a minimalist sheet of line brushed Aluminium, with subtle ventilation for the front intake almost perfectly hidden along its lateral edges.  The roof has a full size fine mesh black steel panel, which somehow manages not to ruin the beautiful lines of the case.  

Open up the Asterion and you’ll discover a cavernous interior, one that belies it’s external dimensions, and one that will accept anything up to a full size E-ATX board, and even then it’s going to look a little lost.  All this space is by virtue of there being no HDD racks up front and the designers getting the measurements just right.  What do we mean by this?  Well we’ll get to that in a minute, for now let’s satisfy ourselves with the fact that you can fit air coolers up to 180mm in height and GPUs up to 340mm long.

But what about water cooling we hear you ask.  Well the Asterion can take up to 360mm or 280mm in the front, and 360/280mm in the roof.  That’s “and” mind, and not “or”.  Now this is what we meant when we talked about the designers getting the measurements just right.  How many times have we concluded a review by saying that a case was ok but could have been truly great if only the designers had thought things through, or made a dimension just a few mm bigger.  Well in this case they have had a think, they have got things right, and as a result of a few extra mm in height and depth of the case, combined with intelligent internal layout, it’s entirely possible to satisfy even your wettest water cooling dreams.

So the Asterion Plus has aesthetics in spades, and great water cooling potential, but does it tick all the other boxes?  Hell yeah, you bet it does.  There’s plenty of storage, a decent front I/O, eight expansion slots at the rear, heck it’s even got the option to stealth mount a slim line DVD drive behind the front panel should you so desire.

Is there anyhting not to like?  Nope, we can’t think of a single thing.  OK, so the rear water tubing holes are bit unnecessary but we can’t really call that a fault.  Even the £130 price tag seems quite reasonable especially when you take into account the feel of quality you get when you open the case up.  Yes £130 will buy you quite a lot of other cases, but take your time to look around and we think you’ll find there’s nothing that comes even remotely close to what the Asterion Plus offers.

What else can we say about the Asterion Plus?  Put it this way.  Tom’s just built his new daily driver, it’s a thing of beauty it really is.  If I had the time and resources to build one for myself, i’d do it right now, and i’d be using the Asterion Plus.  I really like it that much.  As it is though, my shed roof where i do my modding has fallen in and it’s way too cold to be painting outside.  This case though is really stimulating my modding DNA.  It offers almost everything I want, with just a little scope for adjustment.  I have a yearning for a black and copper build in me, one that I’ve tried and failed to satisfy twice now.  I really think this is the case for me.

From an Awards perspective owing to its drop dead gorgeous looks it gets the rarely imparted Aesthetics Award

 

 

Damn it, We don’t have the modders choice award any more so we’re awarding it the Enthusiast grade Award.  Now, this case doesn’t need modding to be truly great, what we’re saying with this award is that what we have is actually a fantastic case that still manages to offer scope for those with an itchy Dremel finger.  

You can discuss your thoughts about the Raijintek Asterion Plus Case Review on the OC3D Forums