Corsair 7000D Airflow review

Our Verdict

82%

Perfect for extreme water cooling, but it’s expensive and lacks pizzazz.

Corsair’s 7000D is the latest cathedral of a case to be added to the company’s arsenal, and it offers some benefits over the already excellent 5000D Airflow we reviewed recently. For starters, you get an extra fan, with three 140mm models included out of the box, two of which are mounted in the front to create positive air pressure.

The water-cooling radiator support of this 60cm-tall and 55cm-deep case is substantial too, as you’d expect. As with the 5000D, there are side fan mounts that sit next to the motherboard tray, but here you get an extra fan mount, with room for a 480mm radiator. You can even squeeze a 420mm or 480mm radiator in the front too, where there’s space for a quartet of 120mm fans or a trio of 140mm fans.

Meanwhile, the roof offers a home to three 120/140mm fans, as well as a 360/420mm radiator. Like the Airflow 5000, all three of the large radiator mounts are removable, allowing you to fit fans, radiators or a combination of the two from the comfort of your desk, instead of reaching inside the chassis.

All four locations use dust filters and are quick to access as well, making it a pain-free experience to build a water-cooled PC. However, you’ll want to do some stretches before you try to lug this 18.7kg chassis around with you.

Needless to say, there’s the potential here for a cooling arrangement that can deal with almost any hardware you can throw at it. Plus, with so many radiator options, any system you build will benefit from that flexibility.

In terms of storage, you get six 3.5in hard disk mounts and four 2.5in SSD mounts, which is plenty, even for a high-end content creator. All the storage mounts are removable too, so you can ditch them to boost airflow, reduce clutter below the PSU cover or make way for front-mounted radiators, where you’ll need to adjust the PSU cover to open up the front of the case. This cover hides the bowels of the case in front of the PSU and the interior does look much smarter as a result.

There are plenty of ways to install your graphics card in the 7000D Airflow too. The case can configure its PCI-E slots in a vertical or horizontal orientation, keeping the graphics card cooler well away from the side panel. Alternatively, there’s a triple-slot mount located closer to the side panel, although we recommend only using that for water-cooled GPUs. Sadly, there’s no PCI-E riser cable in the box, which we’d expect, given the case won’t leave you with much change from £250.

The front panel doesn’t offer any standout features either, except for four USB 3 ports instead of the usual two, plus a Type-C port. The 7000D Airflow lacks the built-in RGB lighting and software control options you’ll see in the iCUE-versions of both it and the 5000-series cases as well, so there’s no iCUE commander Core XT hub included. However, you do get a 6-port PWM fan hub, with all three included 140mm fans already hooked up, allowing you to power them from a single fan header.

The side panels hinge outwards, so getting at the interior is simple, and another classy touch is a clear cover for a window in the PSU shroud. This gives you a view of the PSU, revealing its logo, but Corsair suggests this can be customised with stickers, vinyl or engraving. Cable routing is excellent as well, with three large Velcro ties, plenty of anchor points and cable-routing holes, although again, nothing here particularly stands out as unique or innovative.

Corsair 7000D Airflow cooling performance

The 7000D Airflow’s CPU delta T of 47°C is excellent, and slightly better than the result from the 5000D, which is to be expected since it has slightly better airflow. If you decide to kit the case out with an air-cooled system, it’s good to know it has what it takes out of the box to do a decent job of cooling your hardware. This result was a match for the be quiet! Silent Base 802 and Fractal Design Meshify 2 as well.

The GPU delta T was again a tad better than its smaller sibling and just ahead of the be quiet! Silent Base 802 and Fractal Design Meshify 2. While the fans were reasonably quiet, the be quiet! case was quieter still, but the 7000D Airflow isn’t going to annoy you with the fans at full speed. With so many fan mounts and room to install radiators, there are plenty of options beyond the stock configuration anyway.

Corsair 7000D Airflow pros and cons

Pros

• Fantastic water-cooling support
• Easy hardware installation
• Flexible interior

Cons

• Expensive
• No PCI-E riser cable included
• Extremely niche

Corsair 7000D Airflow specs

Corsair 7000D Airflow price

The Corsair 7000D is an very large, well-made case with a price to match. You won’t get change from $250 but for that you get masses of space and excellent cooling performance.

Price: Expect to pay $260 USD / £240 GBP

Corsair 7000D Airflow review conclusion

The Corsair 7000D Airflow is one of the easiest cases to water-cool we’ve ever seen. However, at £240, it’s not quite an unequivocal recommendation despite its excellent out-of-the-box cooling, cavernous interior, useful features and flexible design.

It’s missing the unique features and pizzazz we’d expect at this price. It’s far from a bland box, and it has plenty of extra features, but even the basic version costs nearly £250 and the iCUE RGB fan-equipped version retails for £300. That’s a lot of money for a case in anyone’s books.

You certainly get your money’s worth in terms of size, water-cooling support and volume, but it’s otherwise unremarkable. The main issue is that you’d need to fill at least two of the massive radiator mounts to make it worthwhile, which means you need a hardware specification to match, and not even high-end gamers will need that much cooling headroom.

It’s otherwise an excellent case that would look great fully kitted out with water-cooling hardware, but for most people, the 5000D or 5000X will do the job perfectly well for half the price.