Gigabyte Sumo 4112 Case Review

Results analysis

It’s clear from our results that the Sumo 4112 is an extraordinarily one sided case when it comes to cooling, with the twin 120mm exhaust fans on the rear panel efficiently exhausting hot air from around the CPU heatsink and allowing the Sumo 4112 to achieve an excellent loaded CPU delta T of just 22°C. Sadly, while the CPU cooling is great, the GPU cooling is dire: the Sumo ranks as one of the hottest case’s we’ve ever tested when it comes to graphics card cooling.

The severe restriction of the drive bay and solid fascia of the Sumo starve airflow to and from the front 120mm fan of the case, so much of the air that the rear twin 120mm fans exhaust comes via the meshed side panel. This means that there was little airflow over our graphics card during testing - our passively cooled GPU reached a scorching delta T of 58°C! Compare that to a case with copious intakes such as the Antec Nine Hundred Two, which offers GPU temperatures 23°C lower.

Even a simple, unobstructed airflow design such as that of the Akasa Omega delivers GPU temperatures 13°C cooler than the Sumo. As such, the Sumo looks very unattractive as far as a balanced cooling setup goes.

Thankfully there is a silver lining, as the Sumo’s fans are all ear-pleasingly quiet; they’re certainly some of the quieter case fans to have come through the labs recently, and won’t annoy you too much. However, be aware that the large meshed side panel fitted as standard does nothing to insulate the noise of your components, you’ll likely hear hard disks clicking away and the whir of noisier graphics cards.

Conclusion

Despite a fresh and attractive exterior and dependable build quality, the Sumo 4112 is unable to complete the package when you look inside, with a cramped interior and poor internal airflow that compromises everything but CPU cooling. While nice touches such as the pre-installed removable 2.5in hard disk bay and the neat fascia help to make the Sumo stand out from the crowd, the case as a whole fails to meet our expectations in many areas. For the asking price of around £100, you'd be better off investigating the spacious and flexible Cooler Master HAF 922, or the high airflow Antec Nine Hundred Two.

• Features
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• -
• -
• -
• 7/10

• Build Quality
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• -
• -
• 8/10

• Ease of Use
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• -
• -
• -
• -
• 6/10

• Performance
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• -
• -
• -
• -
• 6/10

• Value
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• -
• -
• -
• -
• -
• 5/10

• Overall
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• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• -
• -
• -
• -
• 6/10

Score guide