Cooler Master reveals in-house PSU, new Hyper 212, and premium cases

Cooler Master had a plethora of new products on show at Computex, so prepare yourselves for a wealth of photos (and these are only the highlight products from the booth) from its PSU, cooling, peripherals, and case divisions, as all four were there in force.

Starting with power supplies, the headline news is definitely that Cooler Master is moving into in-house PSU production and will be debuting its own fully custom platform known as TEP (Thermal Enhanced Platform) sometime in early 2019 or possibly late 2018. The layout inside is very clean with minimal clutter, and the layout is designed to guide airflow from the fan to the hot spots. Cooler Master also pointed out the smaller-than-usual transformer that also helps to keep temps down. The platform has been developed with a three-year roadmap in mind, and will allow Cooler Master to swap bits out easily to achieve different 80 Plus ratings.

The XG Gold PSUs will be the first build around TEP and will come in 550W, 650W, and 750W flavours all rated 80 Plus Gold. A 135mm fluid dynamic bearing fan will keep things cool, and the PSU will have RGB lighting that can be used to show various system or PSU status readouts.

Onto cooling, we first saw the H212 Concept, a reworking of the popular Hyper 212 cooler. The design isn’t final, but the one we saw had closed off aluminium fins to guide airflow, an extra heat pipe (five not four), a design that avoids memory conflicts, and an RGB fan and logo. This is expected to launch at the end of Q3.

Next is the Transparent Liquid Cooler, so called because the pump block allows you to see inside and view the pump impeller, with which the addressable RGB lighting works to create a ‘mirage’ effect. It also comes with two MasterFan 120mm Addressable RGB fans.

Another all-in-one cooler with a more unique twist is the Thermoelectric Liquid Cooler, which deploys thermoelectric technology for boosted cooling. This results in an odd design of two radiators, where the second one actually appears to be a heatsink in a radiator housing (presumably for easier mounting). The pump block here is built from aluminium, and there is of course addressable RGB lighting. The Transparent and Thermoelectric coolers are estimated for a Q4 release.

Joining the stand a little later in the show was the AMD Ryzen Wraith Ripper, which Cooler Master has manufactured for AMD to support the launch of second-generation Ryzen Threadripper CPUs.

On the peripherals side, one key product was the MM830. It has a ludicrous 24,000 DPI sensor (seriously, this is getting stupid), a D-pad in the thumbrest zone for four-way control, Omron switches, a Japanese ALPS encoder, and an OLED side display that can be customised to show different things like team logos or stats. This is coming late Q3 and expected to retail for $60, although we wouldn’t be surprised to see that increase.

More interesting was the SK600 Series of keyboards (shown as CK600 Series at the booth), as these use Cherry’s new MX Low Profile RGB mechanical switches that reduce the height of traditional Cherry MX Red switches by nearly 35 percent. The actuation point drops to 1.2mm and the overall travel to 3.2mm; the operating force of 45cN is kept the same. The keyboards will come in three sizes: full-size SK640, tenkleyless SK630, and a nifty little 60 percent keyboard, the SK620. Each has a brushed aluminium top-plate, RGB lighting, and a Type-C detachable cable. The smaller two also have batteries so can be used wirelessly (Bluetooth only). These will arrive at the end of the year or early next year – no price yet.

There were quite a few cases on show too, so we’ll limit ourselves to the two newest and most interesting ones. The MasterCase SL600M will debut the SL series. The aluminium on the outside is anodised rather than brushed like most other implementations. The front I/O includes multiple USB ports including a Type-C header, and it has an integrated proximity sensor that can be used to turn the port lights on. Inside is a chimney-style bottom-to-top airflow configuration. This is very much a prototype, but Cooler Master is aiming for a $230 price point in Q4.

Finally, there’s the Cosmos C700M, a monster case that will be the new flagship Maker product. It has plenty of addressable RGB lighting, huge hinged tempered glass doors that give way to a highly customisable interior – note in the photos that the motherboard is fitted at a right angle and the GPU is mounted vertically towards the front of the case and can even be swung out like a door. Again, this is a concept/prototype case for now, but a Q4 release and $400 price tag are the aim.