Thermaltake View 23 Tempered Glass ARGB Case Review

Hey everyone, time to get my toolkit out, we have a case review in the form of the Thermaltake View 23 Tempered Glass ARGB.

Thermaltake have been around for decades, they continue to produce PC parts and peripherals aimed at a wide audience at many price points, they have a long history of some pretty striking designs.

Today’s review takes us back to the days of the Thermaltake Soprano which was a stylish and popular chassis the less strikingly titled View 23 Tempered Glass ARGB case, brings back the swooping wavy front panel.

Lets see how this case stacks up…

Thermaltake View 23 Tempered Glass ARGB Case Specifications & Features

Thermaltake View 23 Tempered Glass ARGB Case Closer Look

A colourful box meets us from the nice delivery man. Pictures of the case along with features and other details around the box.

Unpacking the chassis we are met with a peelers paradise, I really need to start making videos. I don’t know why the packaging says 4mm Tempered Glass x 2 because the front panel is plastic.

A good selection of screws, anti vibration pads and zip ties accompany a proper manual. Did they need to use so many plastic bags though?

With the case ready to start building it is looking very smart, the paintwork is well done and the panels join together quite well. The far corner of the wavy front panel is quite sharp.

Speaking of the front panel, it is very well finished glossy and quite dark considering ARGB fans sit behind it.

Up top I am going to start from the back with the magnetic dust filter, we do like these although if you move around with a case like this to a few LAN parties, its an idea to package them separately to ensure they don’t slip off and get damaged.

Under the TT logo we have an illuminated ring power button, a small square HDD LED, two USB 3.0 ports, a reset switch, Microphone and Headphone front panel audio plugs and finally an RGB Mode switch for when you don’t have a software controller.

The backside of the case is quite well ventilated, these also include filters and should do an OK job of getting airflow into the rig when air-cooled and offering an intake/output for a radiator if it is to be forward facing, subject to space allowing which we will cover shortly.

The rear of the case isn’t anything too different with a bottom mounted PSU and an included 120mm rear fan, but what is this?

A most excellent full array of replaceable back planes, one huge thumbs up for this Thermaltake.

While I have my head inside the case, just take a look at that radiator gap in the bottom shroud, there’s a good 60mm available thickness there, you could install quite a monster 360mm radiator in there with the fans still in place. Next to it we also have a bottom HDD mount for a 2.5″ drive.

To the bottom of the case and with four nice shiny round rubber tipped feet, we have a slotted in dust filter for the PSU and four screws for the HDD cage.

Here we have the HDD cage, fitting up to two 3.5″ drives or 2.5″ depending on what you have, it is well placed to run cables up through the shroud to the motherboard and to take cables from the PSU.

The cabling side is quite generous with cable management options, plenty of tie down points and a decent space between the motherboard mounting plate and the side panel. We also have a rear board mount for a 2.5″ drive.

Installed very neatly inside the View 23 Tempered Glass ARGB is the addressable RGB controller, unlike some other cases, this one has it’s dedicated RGB Switch connector rather than sharing with the Reset Switch. There is a little expandability there and the capability to connect to a motherboard for software control.

Before I get cracking with putting components inside here is a shot of the main chamber, a decent cutout for the back of the motherboard with after-build cooler mounting available, no rubber grommets in the cable management holes but they do have smooth edges. The PSU shroud is vented meaning you could install a PSU with the fan pointing upwards, I am generally not a fan of this but it is possible.

The Build

As some readers will know I like to test cases with my chunky Navitas PSU, at 1250W this thing can take some serious components and is generally suited to bigger builds. In the default configuration the View 23 Tempered Glass ARGB’s 3.5″ HDD bays get in the way of this monster PSU.

Quite a smart HDD cage assembly here, it’s flat pack that IKEA would be proud of. A few screws and the panels are out of the way for the PSU.

So here we have the main components installed ready for a boot test, there is a bit of an issue with space for a forward facing AIO or Radiator and that is down to the cable management holes being covered by a standard ATX or M-ATX width board; slim boards would be fine, however this just makes creating a tidy build a little more difficult with some cable routing taking place to compensate for using holes further away.

Included cables are quite well managed out of the box, I didn’t see the need to change them. A couple of zip ties later and other cables are held neatly in place. The HDD mount provides easy access for cabling and has enough distance from the motherboard plate to not crush the power connectors, another thumbs up for that one.

Powered on the case does look very elegant, the slight tint on the side panel doesn’t darken the view too much.

The front panel has a very dark tint, this causes the fans to almost disappear bar the hubs in normal light.

Thermaltake View 23 Tempered Glass ARGB Case Review: The Verdict

Building into the View 23 was quite a pleasant experience. The build quality is quite good the metal used isn’t too flimsy and most of the design choices work very well, with the exception of the cable management holes, which serve the out of sight cables better than those in the main chamber.

What’s hot:

• Stylish and Well built.
• Great front Radiator space.
• Removable HDD cage allows for big power supplies.

What’s not:

• Cable management holes covered by standard motherboards.
• Forward facing and top mounted radiators limited.
• Price is high because of ARGB.

At the time of writing I found this case for £89.89 on Amazon.co.uk. For a chassis of this level the price is pretty high but you are getting an ARGB controller and three accompanying fans included, so that should be considered. There is some serious competition at this level however so designs need to be spot on.

The build quality is pretty solid and the paint work is great. The design, apart from the cable management cutout placement, is well done with some great space for big radiators at the front, and the ability to remove the drive cage and store it easily should you need to install a large PSU is quite handy. The build experience was pleasant and mostly painless, I did catch my arm on that sharp front panel corner though.

Custom water cooling is possible in this case and ample space is provided for two long GPU’s, I have to also reiterate the thumbs up for a full array of removable backplane plates and not ones still fixed from the manufacturing process, or worse yet, welded in place.

The packaging used for the case is ok but the number of plastic bags could be reduced, and the polystyrene replaced with egg-box material.

The View 23 Tempered Glass ARGB is an attractive chassis and I am pleased to award it our SILVER award.

Thanks to Thermaltake for sending a sample of the Thermaltake View 23 Tempered Glass ARGB Case in for review.

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