Aerocool P7C1 Project 7 Mid-Tower Chassis Review

Final Thoughts

Price

The Aerocool Project 6 P7C1 chassis is available from Box.co.uk for the fantastic price of £89.99, making it one of the most affordable tempered glass chassis on the market today. There are two colour choices, black and white, and both come fitted with the 8-colour LED lighting kits.

Overview

This isn’t the greatest chassis in the world, but it’s a damn fine impression of one. There’s a lot to love about this chassis despite a few minor imperfections and while I would normally be put off by minor faults, the visual impact this chassis offers at such a competitive price makes it easy to forgive any shortcomings.

The build quality is not the best, but in a roundabout way, that’s how it was designed. Some of the plastics are a little thinner than I would like, for example. There are tiny details that aren’t quite 100%, such as the layout of some components and routing holes aren’t perfect either. Take the 3.5″ drive bay, it’s mounted very close to the PSU which makes it harder to route cables, but on the plus side, it means you can fit a full height front panel radiator easily. There’s no GPU cable pass-through on the PSU shroud, so that cable has to trail a bit, and the same is true from some cables on the bottom edge of the motherboard. There are dust filters where you would need them, but you have to pull off the front panel to get to them, and the rear expansion slot covers are snap-offs. These are the hallmarks of a low to mid budget chassis, but these things are by no means deal-breakers on their own.

What’s clever here is that the P7C1 looks stunning, the LED lighting features really stand out and give you an interesting visual dynamic to play around with, especially true with the addition of the magnetic LED strip. Then you’ve got that freaking huge tempered glass side panel window which dominates the left side, giving you a beautiful view of the interior of the chassis and a visual appeal that you simply cannot replicate with a plastic panel. The PSU shroud keeps things looking neat and tidy, and there’s room enough on the interior for some pretty serious hardware, such as long graphics cards and plenty of water cooling.

When it comes to getting high-end premium looks you won’t find anything else with a glass panel and lighting kit like this at such a competitive price. I don’t feel like this chassis made compromises to a high-end design to be more affordable, but rather the visual design standards for a mid-budget chassis just went up, and seeing tempered glass in this price range is simply amazing value.

Pros

• Room for high-end hardware
• Great water cooling support
• Multi-colour LED lighting
• Built-in card readers
• Tempered glass side panel
• PSU shroud
• Fiercely competitive price

Cons

• Snap off expansion slot covers
• Some plastic sections could be stronger

Neutral

• Cable routing can be tricky, but it still does a decent job
• Dust filter access isn’t ideal, but the filters themselves are very good
• GPU cable routing hole could be added to PSU shroud

“The Aerocool P7C1 is one of the most unique looking chassis on the market, offering premium aesthetics and hardware support at sub £100 prices, making this a great option for those who want a gaming rig that stands out from the crowd, without destroying their bank balance.”