Key Specs
MicroATX; ATXNone
Five
None
Five
Two USB; headphone; microphone
19.6x8.3x24.3 inches
33 pounds
Viewed head-on, SilverStone’s Fortress FT02 looks much like any number of computer cases that the company has been pumping out for years: big, boxy, solidly built, and tending toward expensive. Indeed, the Fortress is all of those things—particularly the spendy part. It sells online for around $240, a fair amount pricier than many other luxury-level PC cases.
But get a closer look from the side, or better yet, get inside and start doing some system building, and you’ll soon realize that SilverStone armed this Fortress with enough useful features and design innovations to outclass the current crop of high-end cases on the market. This chassis sets a new high-end standard for PC-case designers to live up to, even though we noted a few little details SilverStone could have improved.
In any piece of decor this big, color matters, and the Fortress comes in black or silver. (We looked at the black model.) You can also opt for a version with a side-panel window. Our test model lacked a window, but if you go for that option, keep in mind that the window will be on the right side of the case, rather than the usual left. More on why later.
First off, let’s look at the exterior. Like recent Apple MacBooks and MacBook Pros, the Fortress uses a so-called “unibody” construction technique, a feature borrowed from the company’s Temjin TJ07 chassis. What this means, essentially, is that instead of the typical internal steel frame supporting the weight of the case and your components, the external shell supports the structure. With one large, curved, thick piece of aluminum forming the rear, bottom, and front of the case, this is probably the sturdiest PC chassis we’ve ever handled.
At 33 pounds empty, it’s also one of the heaviest. The Fortress is large, as well, but its dimensions (19.6x8.3x24.3 inches, HWD) are a little strange for a PC case, in that it’s much longer than it is tall. Popping off the large, grilled cover on the top of the case begins to reveal why. Under the cover, aside from a fan and switches that control the speed of other fans in the case, you’ll find a hole for the motherboard’s I/O-port shield, as well as seven expansion-card bays. Like SilverStone’s Raven case, the Fortress rotates the usual tower-case motherboard-mounting scheme 90 degrees clockwise, so that the “back” of the motherboard (the part with the ports) faces the top of the case when installed. This is done, ostensibly, so that heat can rise naturally from the bottom of the case. Cool air is pulled in by three large, bottom-mounted 180mm intake fans (each with a nice removable dust filter) to the top, where heated air is expelled by a single exhaust fan.
But there are other benefits to rotating the motherboard. For starters, because all the external ports are now on the top of the case, you won’t have to fish around the back of your PC tower to connect a cable. You will have to remove the large top cover to do so, but that’s much easier than pulling out the whole machine to get behind it to plug something in. The top cover keeps all the cable runs hidden, while an opening at the back of the case's top keeps the cables from splaying out in a disorderly fashion. The only downside to this scheme that we can see: It eats up considerable cable length for things like keyboards and mice, whose cables have to make their way from near the front of the case all the way out the back. This wasn’t a problem for the Microsoft SideWinder keyboard we were using, and our mouse was wireless. But keep in mind you may need one or more cable extenders if your peripherals are on a short leash.
