NZXT Noctis 450 Mid-Tower Case Review

By Jason Maxfield

Manufacturer: NZXT
Product Name: Noctis 450 Mid Tower Gaming Case
Model Number: CA-N450W-M1
UPC: 815671012418 EAN: 5060301692705
Price As Tested: $139.99 (NewEgg | Amazon)

Full Disclosure: The product sample used in this article has been provided by NZXT

I have the pleasure of NZXT shipping their new Noctis 450 case to my door for review. NZXT has taken the great H440 Mid Tower design and made some improvements to performance and aesthetics. The NZXT Noctis 450 has most of the same interior layout as the H440 before it, with some improvements to it’s water cooling capabilities, with more of an emphasis on performance than being as quiet as the H440 was.

The NZXT Noctis 450 styling on the outside has undergone a major face lift. The Noctis 450 has taken a bit of the popular Phantom series styling queues and wrapped them around the Noctis 450 chassis, creating an attractive looking case. According to NZXT the Noctis 450 allows the case to have 10 times the ventilation surface with the use of floating plastic panels compared to the H440. The Noctis 450 isn’t just about style, but form with function.

With a host of features including a PWM 8 port fan hub, 4 included FN V2 fans (3 120mm and 1 140mm), support for water cooling up to 360mm, and a built-in LED lighting system for a bit of that custom look, the Noctis 450 is sure to please any PC builder. In this review for Benchmark Reviews, I’ll be putting the NZXT Noctis 450 to the test.

Features & Specifications

Tech Spec.

Model Number	CA-N450W-M1 (Black) CA-N450W-W1 (Glossy White)
Drive Bays	External 5.25″: 0 Internal 3.5″/2.5″: 6+2
Drive Bays	External 5.25 Internal 3.5″/2.5″: 6+2
Cooling System	Front: 2x 140/3x120mm (3 x 120mm FN V2 Fans Included) Top: 2x 140/3x120mm Rear: 1x 140/120mm (1 x 140mm FN V2 Fan Included)
Filters	Front (Included) Bottom Rear(Included)
Radiator Support	Front 2 x 140 or 3 x 120mm Top 2 x 140 or 3 x 120mm Rear 1 x 140/120mm
Clearance	GPU Clearance with HDD Cage: 294mm GPU Clearance without HDD Cage: 406.2mm CPU Cooler: 180mm Cable Management Lowest Point – 17.7mm; Highest Point: 32.5mm
Dimensions	220mm x 567mm x 544mm
Material	SECC Steel, ABS Plastic
Motherboard Support	Mini-ITX, microATX, ATX
Expansion Slots	7
External Electronics	1 x Audio/Mic I/O Panel and Lighting System LED On/Off
Fan Model	FN V2 120mm (Link) Fan Speed: 1200 RPM Airflow: 45 CFM Air Pressure: 0.9mm – H20 Noise: 21dBA Bearing: RifleFN V2 140mm (Link) Fan Speed: 1200 RPM Air Flow: 50 CFM Air Pressure: 0.9mm-H20 Noise: 21dBA Bearing: Rifle
Product Weight	9.5 kg
UPC	815671012425 (Glossy White) 815671012418 (Black)
EAN	5060301692712 (Glossy White) 5060301692705 (Black)
USB 3.0 Ports	2
USB 2.0 Ports	2
Warranty	2 Years

 

 

NZXT Noctis 450 Overview

After pulling the Noctis 450 out of the box we get a look at the nice matte black finish on the front of the Noctis 450. You can see a combination of metal mesh grille and floating plastic panels attached to the front of the chassis. The plastic vent covers are suspended above the mesh grille allowing for more air flow to the fans. With the ‘V’ shape and the mesh grille further away from the fans, this also helps the fans have less constricted airflow from the front of the Noctis 450.

At the back of the Noctis 450 we have a pre-installed black 140mm FN V2 fan. There is also mounts for 120mm fans and the ability to use 140mm or 120mm radiators for water-cooling options. The Noctis 450 also allows you some leeway in positioning of your exhaust fan by being able to move them slightly higher or lower to help improve heat dissipation in your case.

There is also a button at the top left of the Noctis 450, which allows you to toggle through the different LED light settings, but I will go into more detail about that in the build section of this review.

At the top of the Noctis 450 you can see the stylish floating panel design carried from the front. Off to the left front side you have your 2 USB 2.0 and 2 USB 3.0 ports, headphone and jack, and your power switch. The top panel can be removed to allow easy access to the top of the chassis for installing up to 3 120mm fans or 2 140mm fans. The shroud also gives enough clearance to mount fans in a push-pull array and use thicker radiators than with the previous H440 case.

The bottom of the Noctis 450 features 2 red LED strips that can have them set to off, low, or high. You can also see the included PSU fan filter on the bottom. The feet of the Noctis 450 are capped with rubber to give you a very stable grip on your desktop. A feature I’ve noticed lacking in some other cases.

There isn’t much to shout about on this side of the Noctis 450. The side panel here conceals your cable management section of your chassis.

Here is a tasteful panel with a stylish window allowing you to pear into your computer to gaze upon your PC components. The NZXT logo on the side of the PSU cover also lights up and is controlled by the switch on the back of the Noctis 450.

Continued on the next page, I’ll get into more details of the Noctis 450.

 

 

NZXT Noctis 450 Detailed Features

The Noctis 450 comes with a handy manual that explains all of your options for fan mounting and water cooling, as well as how to properly pull the front and top panels off of the chassis. Also included is your box of hardware, which contains all of the screws you need to build your PC. NZXT has even gone through the trouble of individually bagging each set of screws so you don’t have to fish around 1 baggy to find what screws you need. A very nice touch. Something simple, yet saves a bit of time when building your PC. You also get an NZXT logo with 3M backing tape and an NZXT product pamphlet.

I declined to put the logo onto the case. The matte black finish looks so good as it is, I didn’t want to add the shiny logo on there. The Noctis 450 looks akin to a stealth fighter with the matte black finish. The photos just do not do it justice.

After pulling the front and top panels off of the Noctis 450 we can get a look at the pre-installed black FN V2 120mm fans. The mesh filter has a very nice magnetic catch to keep it in place at the top, while at the bottom it just slides down into a plastic clip.

There are options for mounting 2 140mm fans in the front instead of the 3 120mm included with the Noctis 450. You also have the option of mounting a water cooler up to 360mm in size.

You’ll also notice there is no support for 5.25″ drive bays on the Noctis 450. This case is designed purely for the performance and cooling of your PC hardware. If you aren’t a fan of optical drives or need 5.25″ bays this won’t be an issue, and it keeps the design of the front of the chassis nice and clean.

With the windowed side panel taken off you can see there is ample room for building inside the Noctis 450 and gives the chassis a clean appearance with the PSU cover isolating that section of the case from the motherboard. You have your standard 7 PCI expansion slots, and M-ITX, M-ATX, and ATX motherboard compatibility.

The cable management section of the Noctis 450 is very nice and well thought out. You can see the included 8 PWM fan hub and the smaller PCB at the top that connects the LED’s that light up the case.

The 8 hub PWM fan hub works by plugging into your motherboard via a PWM header and can control all the fans from that one single header. In your BIOS you can set fan curves to control all the fans, even 3 pin fans connected will have their voltage regulated by the hub. You need to use a molex connector to power the hub. NZXT recommends using your CPU header to connect it, but I chose not to because my motherboard only has the one PWM header and I didn’t want my system to have the fans controlled by CPU temperatures alone. With most modern motherboards this won’t be a problem. Most of them have more than one PWM header these days.

The rubber grommets and cut outs are generous in size and there are plenty of tie-down points to keep all your power cables nice and tidy. Another feature of the Noctis 450 is the area where the grommets pass-through is slightly angled toward the inside of the chassis giving you a bit more room to deal with the cable management.

According to NZXT you have cable management space at the lowest point of 17.7mm, and highest point: 32.5mm. Which is roughly .69 inches to 1.28 inches of space for cable management.

Below the cable management section you can see the space where the PSU cables and routing will go. There is plenty of space in this area to tuck cables underneath keeping the jungle of wires hidden from site for a nice clean looking build.

At the top of the Noctis 450 we have all the fan mounting options visible. There is enough space for a 360mm radiator, or mounting 3 120mm fans or 2 140 mm fans.

The power switch, headphone/mic jacks, and USB hub are all bolted to the top so you don’t have to worry about moving them when you take the top cover off of the chassis to install fans or radiators.

Here is a closer look at the PSU cover and NZXT logo. You can see 2 2.5″ mounting trays on top of the PSU cover. These come in handy if you need to remove some of the HDD sleds to make clearance for GPU or radiators.

The Noctis 450 HDD sleds support mounting both 3.5″ and 2.5″ drives using supplied screws that come with the Noctis 450. They are attached with 2 thumb screws that easily come off and the sleds even have rubber washers on the 3.5″ drive mount locations to help keep vibration down from your mechanical HDD’s.

Here is a closer look at the black FN V2 140mm exhaust fan in the Noctis 450. NZXT has even pre-wired all the fans to the fan hub for you.

Just above the fan and to the right you can see the wiring for the LED switch. On the motherboard tray NZXT also has mounted the motherboard stand-offs for a full ATX motherboard. NZXT even installed one stand-off that has a peg in the center mount to help align and hold the motherboard in place while you attach all the other screws.

NZXT definitely helps you save some time with doing some of the little things like the wiring and stand-offs being installed already!

Next we’ll get into finer details of the lighting system and PC build…

 

 

NZXT Noctis 450 System Build

Building with the NZXT Nocits 450 was very easy. There was plenty of space to build in. I have large hands and the only time I felt a bit cramped for space was when I got to plugging in my power cables for the PSU. Granted I had never built a PC with a PSU cover at this point. If I had to do it again, I’d figure out what cables I needed and installed them with the PSU and that would take care of that issue.

Test System

• Motherboard: MSI 870 G45
• System Memory: Crucial Ballistix 4GB (2×2) 1600 @ 8CL
• Processor: AMD Phenom II X2 555 BE @ 3.4ghz
• CPU Cooler: Cooler Master D92
• Audio: Onboard
• Video: Sapphire HD 5750 1GB @ 800 GPU / 1175 RAM
• Disk Drive 1: WD Black 750GB SATA II
• Disk Drive 2: WD Blue Scorpio 2.5″ 360GB SATA II
• Optical Drive: None
• Enclosure: NZXT Noctis 450
• PSU: OCZ ModXstream Pro 700W
• Monitor: Acer X223w 1680 x 1050
• Operating System: Win7 64 Ultimate Edition

Results

This came out to be the cleanest looking build I have achieved with any case. The Noctis 450 cable management system and the PSU cover really help achieve this. Too bad my MSI board is the wrong color scheme and clashes with the red of the NZXT.

As you can see you have plenty of clearance around the Cooler Master D92. There is just so much room at the top of the Noctis 450. It’s really a shame I don’t have a water cooler to put in there to show off just how much room there is there.

At the bottom where the PSU cover is, there are a couple of cable pass-through points that allowed me to connect my CPU power cable on the front side, since the cable is too short to make the run around the back side, as I would prefer.

Around the back-side of the Noctis 450 cable management was easy. I had plenty of room and even with me being a bit sloppy with the cables you can’t even notice thanks to the PSU cover.

The CPU cut-out is more than generous. There should not be any issues with aftermarket back-plate mounts.

The HDD cage section has 5 drive sleds, which should be enough space for a small RAID array. And with the front having all fans installed you should have plenty of cooling for those drives as well.

One thing I did notice while building the Noctis 450 is that the motherboard tray can get a bit flimsy if the HDD sleds are not installed. The bottom most corner where I installed the 2.5″ drive, when I removed the sled to install the 2.5″ drive, that’s when I noticed the flimsiness of the motherboard tray without the sled to keep it stable.

It’s not a huge issue though, it’s not going to break or anything, but could bend if accidentally bumped wrong while the HDD sleds are not installed to add extra rigidity.

Now for the explanation of the lighting system of the NZXT Noctis 450. Below you see the white LED that adds illumination to your input/output area of the case. This feature is helpful when in a dim environment so you can see where to plug in your peripherals.

The LED is controlled by the same switch on the back of the Noctis 450. It is a toggle switch that goes through a preset for all the LED’s on the case. When first powered on, all the LED’s are on. Press the switch once, the input/output shield LED turns off.

Below I will go through the rest of the LED sequence. This is the Noctis 450 with the LED’s on high and the back LED turned off. The LED’s underneath and the NZXT logo are lit up.

After pressing the toggle button on the back for a second time, it dims the bottom lights, but still leaves the NZXT logo on.

Once you press the button for a third time, the bottom lights shut off and the NZXT logo is the only light left on.

After pressing the button for a forth time, all the LED’s are turned off. I know the shot with the light off is hard to tell, but the NZXT logo is not lit up very brightly to begin with. It’s more of a soft glow and doesn’t over power the inside of the case with a red glow.

At night when your room is dark the contrast is much easier to see on the NZXT logo. Once all the lights are turned off and your room is dim, you can barely even make out the NZXT logo with the case lights off.

With the LED’s set to low, they cast a soft red light onto your desk, even with lights out watching a movie on the computer it isn’t annoying. I could even sleep with the lights on if I left my computer on all night.

Unfortunately, the sequence of the LED’s can not be changed. If you just wanted the bottom lights on and the case logo shut off for instance, you would have to find the leads and unplug those to keep them off. Although for me, I find the sequence to work fine and I usually just leave them with the bottom lights set to low and the case light on since it’s not overpowering and doesn’t flood the case or my room with light.

Just to be thorough, I took a shot of the power LED switch. This LED is not controlled by the back panel and just acts as your standard ‘power on’ indicator. NZXT kept the design simple and clean, as you will notice there is no reset switch, or HDD LED activity light.

Moving on to the next page I’ll summarize my thoughts about the NZXT Noctis 450 and render my ratings…

 

 

NZXT Noctis 450 Final Thoughts

NZXT has done a fine job with the Noctis 450. It is a worthy update to the H440. Having improved on that design by adding extra performance and features and keeping the price close.

The Noctis 450 build quality is excellent. I was a bit concerned with all the plastic panels, but with the underlying metal mesh acting as a backbone they are a lot more rigid than they appear to be.

Styling on the Noctis 450 is also excellent. The matte black finish on this case is beautiful. It’s a nice change from all the other black cases on the market. The photos I took do not do this case justice at all. You have to see the matte black finish in person to really appreciate it.

I do have a suggestion for NZXT. I have a bit of a concern where the cable management tray is and if someone were to remove all the sleds that area might start to feel a bit too flimsy. Functionally-wise I do not think it is a problem, as the cables attached to it after it’s built aren’t going to move around. If they had run a piece of metal from the bottom edge to the floor of the chassis this would of added more rigidity. Although, this would put something in your way when dealing with the cables from your PSU, and is probably why it wasn’t done.

NZXT Noctis 450 Conclusion

The performance of the Noctis 450 was excellent. Everything worked as intended and was a breeze to build with. There was plenty of space to build even with my large hands. Having thumbscrews through-out the chassis made the build even faster since I didn’t have to reach for a screw driver very often.

The appearance of the Noctis 450 is just beautiful. The matte black finish and borrowing some of the design of the Phantom series really make this case stand out. It’s bold without appearing too gaudy. Even the lighting system is done just right. It’s bright without being overly blown out and annoying.

Construction of the Noctis 450 is top-notch. Everything fits in place snugly and nothing is out of place. Even the pre-installed wiring is nice and tidy without being in the way when you build your PC.

The Noctis 450 functionality is superb. If you want to air cool your PC you are covered. If you want to do a custom loop, you are covered. You have plenty of room for large GPU’s and options to remove unwanted drive sleds to keep the case clean looking and have better airflow from the front of the case to the back.

As of this writing, the Noctis 450 is priced online for $139.99 (NewEgg | Amazon). That is a higher price than it’s predecessor the H440, but offers even more features and functionality for that price. Those not needing the fan hub, or the lighting system, will find most of the same interior features in the H440 chassis.

Having said this, I still think the price is a bit high at the moment. I think $120 would be a much better price for what you get, since I have reviewed cases that offer the same functionality or better at lower price points. Although, those cases did not offer a lighting system and 8 hub fan controller either.

I would highly recommend the NZXT Noctis 450 to anyone looking to have a very solid case to build with, specially if you plan to go water cooling and it has a bit of that custom feel with the lighting system and you can’t go wrong with the integrated 8-hub fan controller. And what more can I say about that matte black finish, it’s just down right sexy!

Pros:

+ Sleek design
+ Great cable management
+ Easy to build with
+ PSU cover
+ Nice LED lights

Cons:

– No support for 5.25″ drives
– Motherboard tray can feel a bit flimsy without drive sleds attached
– Price

Ratings:

• Performance: 9.5
• Appearance: 9.75
• Construction: 9.5
• Functionality: 9.5
• Value: 8.25