Specifications, Availability and Pricing

Cutting through the first six lines of the chart, I will say that the NZXT Crafted Series Tempest 210 is an all steel mid tower chassis that is painted black both inside and out. The front is made of mostly plastic offering three external drive bay covers under the front I/O that can be removed from the outside. The lower half of the bezel is covered in a steel mesh backed with a dust filter. The drive bay covers share the same mesh to give a clean overall look to the chassis. The left side of the chassis has a rectangular shaped venting cut into the panel, while the right side panel is flat and boring. In the back you will find thumbscrews to remove the panels, a bottom mounted PSU, a pair of water cooling holes and seven expansion slots. There is quite a bit more going on around the outside, but I will cover that after we check out the packaging for the Tempest 210.

Inside, out of the six possible locations for 120mm fans, only two are filled with a fan. In the rear of the chassis you get a 120mm fan acting as an exhaust, the other is a 140mm mounted to the top of the chassis also acting as an exhaust. Only the top pair of fan holes are accepting of 120 or 140mm fans; all the others are 120mm only. The drive bays get a similar treatment as the Source 210 did with large tool-less clips for the three optical drives and insert and twist to lock tool-less clips for the eight hard drive bays. NZXT has supplied some limitations on the chassis for certain lengths and heights. They are one of the first I have seen to declare a measurement behind the motherboard for wiring, and with the Tempest 210 it is 20mm deep. Other recommendations are the use of CPU coolers less than or equal to 160mm tall, and the last one is that with a hard drive at the end of a card, you will have 230mm of room. If the hard drive is moved, you have 330, until you have issues with the cage for the drives.

Going through the normal routine of Google shopping, I was unable to locate the Tempest 210 for sale yet. Digging a little deeper, I actually searched the chassis at many e-tailers and still came up empty handed. Even though I was unable to actually locate this chassis anywhere, there is a major benefit to waiting this chassis delivery to your favorite retailer. That is the fact that NZXT has put a very budget friendly MSRP on the Tempest 210 of $55. With that in mind, I don't expect a whole lot in this chassis. I mean to say that sub-$100 cases usually end up lacking something. This case is going to be offered for sub-$60 pricing, so I am a bit leery, but I will hold my thoughts until we finish. I have been surprised by many cases in the past, so let's get the packaging out of the way so we can see just what this $55 Tempest 210 has to offer.