INTRODUCTION

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

   While I’m typing these lines things are probably heating up at CES 2014 because of all the intriguing and innovative products unveiled there for the first time including several PC cases of all sizes by most (if not all) of the leading manufacturers. Certainly we all know how hard it is nowadays for some people to decide on the right PC Case for them because of all the countless available models in the market so the introduction of even more will probably make things even harder for them but in the end i think that it's always good to have more variety (not to mention that competition is always good for the consumer). Now some of you may recall that a few weeks back we promised to increase our focus on PC Case reviews something which we didn't really follow through due to extremely heavy workload. Well the Urban S41 mid-tower windowed chassis by Thermaltake is the first tower which we will be looking at in an effort to make up for that.

 

   The beginning of every myth and legend is about dreams and desire: the challenging, creative and combative features of Thermaltake Group create an exciting and fascinating user experience to share with everyone, while allowing users to enter a selfless state in terms of function and potential. Thermaltake Group's 3 main brands: Thermaltake, Tt eSPORTS and LUXA2 have been merchandising throughout the world, and have successfully established 6 business footholds in areas such as Europe, America, Oceania, Japan and China, with 95 regional distributors and over 4000 premium retailers. All product planning is orientated by observation of global PC peripheral market and understanding of consumer demands. Thermaltake creates direct contact opportunities with resellers and consumers by participating major global ICT exhibitions and trade shows every year, and develop innovative marketing strategies for the promotions of new products. Meanwhile, Thermaltake incorporates the composite marketing system by making branch offices and regional distributors both the distribution channel and technical support or service center to provide instant support; by maintaining close contact with end users, we manage to strengthen corporate competitiveness and create the momentum for the growth of accomplishments. With its outstanding wisdom and strength, Thermaltake Group is recruiting creative talents to build a cultural brand for the enjoyment of entertainment, e-Sports, technology and lifestyle!

 

   Although I’ve always preferred full towers a over mini and midi ones for the obvious space issues when swapping hardware components i have to admit that the specifications and features sheets of the Urban S41 Windowed Edition are both quite interesting. So our friends from Thermaltake have given the Urban S41 Windowed edition a top 2.5/3.5" HDD/SSD docking station, 3 pre-installed fans (2x120mm/1x200mm), three removable dust-filters, a two-way (low/high) fan speed controller, good interior space, top 240mm radiator mount, removable drive cages, 4 optical drive bays (most midi towers have 3) and a completely tool-less design. Pictures speak a lot stronger than words when we are talking about a PC Case so let's take a closer look at the Urban S41 Windowed Edition (VP600M1W2N).

 

 

SPECIFICATIONS AND FEATURES

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

PACKAGING AND CONTENTS

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A picture of the top front part of the fascia is placed on both the front and rear of the box.

 

 

The features of the Urban S41 are placed on the left side in 12 languages.

 

 

On the right we see the specifications table and the model selection (normal or windowed).

 

 

The case is wrapped inside a plastic bag and placed between two thick Styrofoam spacers.

 

 

A small box placed inside the tower contains the 5.25" to 3.5" brackets, 5 metal cable ties, case speaker, warranty policy paper and three small plastic bags with all the necessary mainboard mounting screws.

 

 

THE URBAN S41 WINDOWED EXTERIOR

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Urban S41 has a nice sleek design paired with an large piece of brushed aluminum covering its fascia. Size-wise it measures 516mm in length, 220mm in width, 520mm in height and weighs 8.9kg.

 

 

A rather small clear plastic window is placed on the left side panel.

 

 

The brushed aluminum used on the front fascia looks and feels nice but you need to take extra caution when removing the plastic cover otherwise it may leave some residual glue which is not very easy to clean.

 

 

Thermaltake has placed their logo at the lower end of the fascia.

 

 

The door opens clockwise and is primarily made by hard plastic.

 

 

All of the 5 available 5.25" bays have easily removable covers (one of them is also 1.44" ready).

 

 

Beneath the 5.25" drive bays we find a removable dust-filter behind which lies an 120mm intake fan.

 

 

The I/O is placed right above the fascia and includes 2 USB 2.0 ports, 2 USB 3.0 ports and the usual microphone and headphones 3.5mm plugs (a blue power LED is placed right above the USB ports).

 

 

Right above the I/O we see the on/off button, reset button, HDD activity LED, 2 way fan controller and the 2.5/3.5" HDD/SSD docking station.

 

 

Most of the top area is perforated to allow air to exit with the help of the 200mm exhaust fan placed beneath.

 

 

The rear is also painted black and has 3 interesting features.

 

 

 

So aside the top dust filter which can be removed from here we see 3 grommets used to route liquid cooling tubes right above an 120mm exhaust fan and 7 PCI expansion slots which are secured via thumbscrews which are placed outside.

 

 

Turning the tower upside down we see 4 quite tall feet and a large removable dust-filter.

 

 

Both side panels are secured in place with regular thumbscrews.

 

 

THE URBAN S41 WINDOWED INTERIOR

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The interior also has the same black paint as the rest of the tower and looks quite spacious at least at first glance.

 

 

All 4 optical drive bays feature tool-less locking mechanisms.

 

 

Right beneath them we see two drive cages capable of holding up to 5 HDDs.

 

 

The drive trays are quite sturdy and can hold both 2.5" and 3.5" drives.

 

 

You can take the drive cages out from the tower by removing the 2 thumbscrews (each) found at their bottom and the 4 thumbscrews (each) found at the rear.

 

 

That way if you want to mount two very long mGPU graphics cards you can just use the two spot drive cage (shorter).

 

 

The 120mm intake fan mounted at the front belongs to the Turbo family of fans manufactured by Thermaltake and can reach speed up to 1000RPM with just 16dBA of noise.

 

 

As you can see the mainboard tray has 4 large rubber grommets used for cable management and a very large opening beneath the CPU area for the swapping of backplates.

 

 

The rear 120mm exhaust fan is identical to the front intake fan.

 

 

There's room at the bottom of the tower to install yet another 120mm intake fan.

 

 

Leaving out the 200mm exhaust fan placed at the top you can mount an 240mm radiator beneath it.

 

 

For people who care a lot about cable management the good news is that behind the mainboard tray there's quite a bit of room to route cables.

 

 

BUILDING THE SYSTEM

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

As always the purpose of this section is not to build a fully working system but rather to showcase what you can expect from the case at hand in terms of interior space.

The interior of the Urban S41 is quite spacious even after you mount an ATX sized mainboard.

 

 

There's also enough space for even the largest CPU cooler around without having to worry about clearance issues.

 

 

Without removing either one of the drive cages you can mount any graphics card up to 315mm long while if you can do without a drive cage (or both) that extends to 435mm.

 

 

There's also plenty of room inside the Urban S41 for even the longest PSUs.

 

 

NOISE LEVEL TEST

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

After giving it much thought we decided on performing noise tests with each PC Case we receive by placing our ExTech HD600 vertically ontop of each case to measure the noise levels emanating from the pre-installed fans at both 50% and 100% with the help of a fan controller.

 

 

CONCLUSION

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

   With the Urban S41 Thermaltake aims to introduce into the market a sleek midi tower with good build quality and enough features to even rival more expensive solutions and i really think that they've come pretty close to achieving that. So as mentioned before the Urban S41 does have plenty of interior space for a midi tower (including room for a top 240mm radiator and the longest graphics cards), has good airflow levels right from the get go (3 pre-installed fans), comes with a top 2.5/3.5" docking station, two removable drive cages, 2 way fan controller, 3 removable dust-filters and a completely tool-free design. There is however a slight problem with the Urban S41 Windowed model and that's its somewhat high noise levels which can even compare to those of the 900D something which i didn't expect. However thanks to the fan controller i doubt anyone will have a problem with that.

 

   Right now the Urban S41 Windowed Mid-Tower (VP600M1W2N) by Thermaltake retails at around USD150 inside the USA and for 127Euros inside the EU (Amazon.co.uk) and although this is a quality feature-rich midi tower i do in fact think that Thermaltake could had followed a more aggressive price policy since at around the same price point you can find quite a few full towers. Regardless however the Urban S41 Windowed Mid-Tower is a very good PC Case with almost no drawbacks at all and that's why it gets our Golden Award.

PROS

- Build Quality
- Design (For Some)
- Top 2.5/3.5" Docking Station
- Removable Drive Cages
- Space For The Longest Graphics Cards (By Removing The Drive Cage)
- Top Space For Two 120 Fans, one 200mm fan Or An 240mm Radiator
- 3 Pre-Installed Fans
- 2 Way Top Fan Controller
- Bottom/Front/Top Dust Filters
- Cable Management Space
- Tool-Free Design

 

CONS

- Price (For Some)
- Current Availability In The USA