NZXT H510 Elite Review
The new NZXT H510 Elite case has got both side and front tempered glass panels, RGB lighting and a clean looking design. We’ll see what else it’s got to offer in this review, and I’ll also be giving one away to a lucky viewer in the video. The H510 Elite is available in a couple of colours, black or white, and I’m showing the white version in this video. The case is made of steel, and unlike previous NZXT cases has a tempered glass panel on the front as well as the side.
This mid-tower case is 43cm deep, 46cm high and 21cm across, and weighs in at about 7.5kg. The main tempered glass side panel can be removed by unscrewing one thumb screw and pulling the metal tab towards the back of the case to pull it down from the top, as it’s held in by two extrusions near the top. The front glass panel is removed in a similar way after removing a screw from each side first. Behind the front glass panel are two 140mm RGB fans, these pull air in from underneath and from the side with the metal panel, and both have removable dust filters, but we’ll see how thermals go a bit later.
Inside there’s space for an ATX MicroATX or Mini-ITX motherboard. In terms of clearance there’s room for a CPU cooler up to 165mm tall or GPU 368mm in length. Like many other NZXT cases, there’s this metal bar which can be used to hide cables behind, and you can move it slightly, but it takes 5 screws to move. On the other side the metal side panel is removed by first taking out two thumb screws. Behind the metal panel we’ve got two vertical 2.5 inch drive bays, and these can actually be removed and placed on the mesh above the power supply if you prefer to show them off here.
Back to the other side there’s also routing for cable management, and smart device v2 just above this. The smart device connects the three fans and RGB lighting and has one four pin fan header spare, which then connects to SATA power and a USB 2.0 header on the motherboard, allowing you to manage lighting and fans through the NZXT Cam software, more on that later.
Towards the bottom near the front there’s room for two 3.5” drives, though there are no convenient sliding bays, and you can optionally remove this section if you want more space for the power supply, though there seems to be plenty of space available there already.
I didn’t see the amount of clearance specified, but my 180mm unit still had plenty of space. Underneath there are some large rubber feet, and a removable dust filter towards the back for the power supply which slides in and out, as well as our front air intake.
On top there’s a fan mount for you to add either a 120mm or 140mm fan but no dust filter if you wanted to use it as an intake, then the front I/O which from left to right includes a 3.5mm audio jack, USB 3.1 Gen 2 Type-C port, USB 3.1 Gen 1 Type-A port, and the power button which lights up white while powered on.
On the back from the bottom up there’s a hole for the power supply, 7 PCIe slots, including two for vertical mounting which is supported by the case, rear 120mm non RGB fan which is included, and your usual space for motherboard I/O. To unscrew some of the regular PCIe slots you need to first remove the covers on the vertical section which gets in the way, and unlike other NZXT cases I’ve used these aren’t managed by thumbscrews.
As mentioned the Smart device V2 connects to the motherboard via an internal USB 2.0 header. In Windows you can install NZXT’s Cam software, which did show a lot of useful information about the system, though it was laggy maximizing the screen, didn’t seem to detect the temps of my 3600X in some cases and also doesn’t seem to allow you to access settings like lighting in full screen mode, though that was easy to manage.
I should also mention that in addition to the two front RGB fans there’s also a strip along the top of the side glass panel which can also be controlled independently of the fans. I’ve also run the Aida64 CPU stress test and Heaven GPU benchmark at the same time, and we can see that with the front panel off we’re getting lower temps as expected, as it allows the front case fans to fully breathe.
I’m just using the stock cooler with the Ryzen 3600X, and while this is kind of a worst case multicore stress test, there is also space in the case to mount radiators for liquid cooling. The front fans can be replaced by a 240 or 280 radiator with 60mm thickness, while the back fan can be replaced with a single 120mm unit, again with a 60mm thickness. So what did you guys think about the H510 Elite case from NZXT? Overall I personally think the case looks quite nice, though that will of course be personal opinion, and as we’ll see soon it does come at a cost. While I’ve got it spewing RGB in the video you can of course customize the lighting how you want or turn it off if you prefer. It was good to see the USB 3.1 Gen 2 Type-C port on the front I/O, and built in option for vertical GPU mounting was a good choice for a case that appears to be all about showing off what’s inside. The updated method of removing the glass panels was noticeably easier when compared to my H700 too, though I wasn’t a fan of the lack of 3.5” drive caddys and would also like to see the inclusion of a mesh front panel option, either as an optional accessory or optional configuration of the case.
While the front glass panel looks good, as we saw we could reduce internal temperatures by a few degrees without it, granted nothing earth shattering, but it still may be good to have a mesh option for those that prefer to run cooler over looks. Alright now for the give away, there’s one NZXT H510 Elite case to be won. Unfortunately it’s only open to those in Australia due to shipping costs which I’m paying, but hey to be fair most other competitions are only open to the US and we always miss out. Otherwise if you’re in another region and looking to buy it, I’ll have updated prices linked in the description once it’s available. In the US it looks to be going for around $169 USD though it should be $149 USD globally, while here in Australia we’re looking at $255 AUD. It’s worth considering that the two RGB fans in the front with controller alone go for $105 USD, or $33 for a single fan, so worth factoring that in when comparing to a cheaper alternative.
You can find the giveaway entry page on Twitter as my pinned tweet. Don’t worry you don’t need Twitter to find the link, just view my twitter page which is linked in the description and you should find the competition link as the top post. The competition will run for a week and the winner will be contacted by email, so use a valid address. Otherwise let me know your thoughts about the new H510 Elite case from NZXT down in the comments.