Corsair Carbide 200R review

Corsair Carbide 200R - Interior

The thumbscrews on the side panels make for a painless entry into the case. Once inside, it's evident that the build quality of the outside has been maintained. The PCI blanking plates are firmly attached and don't rattle, and the rest of the painted interior is nice and tidy too, with no sharp edges waiting to slice you up. Though the drive cage is entirely made of plastic, it too is firmly held in place with four screws, and as such exhibits little wobble.


The design of the interior is also sensible. Despite the relatively small size the case feels rather open, and the big motherboard cutout ensures those with large tower coolers and their accompanying backplates are in safe hands. The compact drive cage can hold four SSDs and four regular hard drives at the same time, but is small enough so as to barely block the front intake fan at all. The drive cage can also be completely removed, but doing so removes the ability to install internal drives and as it doesn't block airflow either we have only tested with it installed.

According to Corsair, the 200R is designed for easy building, and this certainly comes through with the case's interior design. The pre-installed motherboard mounts, most of which are actually a fixed part of the case rather than removable, make motherboard installation all the simpler. With thumbscrews for the expansion slots and tool-free installation methods available for all drives, we found that getting everything into place was quick and very easy, so kudos to Corsair for that.


Optical drives are slid into place from the front with the metal latch on the side pulled back and then put into place once the drive is aligned. For hard drives, too, you simply slide them into place and lock them there with a single catch, whereas SSDs slide straight into their bays, no latches or screws required. Though the SSDs are held firmly in place, hard drives and optical drives are less so, so it's nice that Corsair provides screws and the appropriate holes for those who like to stick to traditional and more secure mounting methods.

Once everything's in place, the last job is to tidy away those pesky cables. Three large holes on the motherboard tray as well as a smaller one above the backplate cutout provide adequate room for stashing cables in the side of the case, but we would have preferred if they were covered with rubber grommets, as this always gives a neater finish.


The flat right side panel does limit the room for stashing cables, but they can also be left along the bottom of the case near the PSU and in the drive cage without restricting airflow. Zip ties are also provided to help ensure wires stay where they should. Essentially, the 200R ensures the cables can be tidied away effectively enough so as to not block airflow, but this would certainly become more difficult if you increased the number of fans or internal drives installed.