Test – NZXT S340 Special Edition: Review| Specs | Hashrate | Review | Pros & Cons

Test – NZXT S340 Special Edition: Specs | Price | CPU | Profitability | Hashrate | best Coins | Config | Advantage (Pros) and Disadvantages (Cons) and other important features that will help you make better decision.

After a very good H440 we come back to NZXT with a special edition of its S340, in the colors of these Razer gentlemen! For this version we take what made the success of the “classic” version of the S340 but with Razer logos, green LEDs and even green front USB ports, basically a good case for Razer fanboy 😀
Offered at a price of 99.99 € TTC and very soon available it could be interesting if the beast turns out to be docile and efficient, which we will see immediately!

Specification: Hashrate – NZXT S340 Special Edition

The first thing that strikes here is the size of the NZXT S340 SE, indeed with a length of 43.2 cm it is one of the shortest case in its category, how is it? NZXT simply skipped the 5.25 ″ slots and was therefore able to substantially shorten its case, which between us is really not a bad thing! In addition to being very short, NZXT also made the S340 rather thin with its 20 cm. Despite these dimensions which could result in restrictions on the level of the graphics card and the processor cooler, this is not the case, the original graphics card can reach 36.4 cm (after you remove the thickness of what you install, fans, water-cooling radiator, etc.) and the processor cooler can reach 16.1 cm, enough to install good large components without asking too many questions. A quick word about the weight which is 7.3 kg, which is clearly not excessive when we know that the NZXT is almost completely covered in metal.

The cooling capacity is average for this type of case, namely 2 slots for 12 or 14 cm fans at the front, 1 of 12 cm at the rear and 1 of 12 or 14 cm above. Only 2 fans are delivered as standard, however, the 12 cm FN V2 running at 1200 RPM installed above and at the rear, this installation should ensure very good cooling for the processor but will have a very logical impact on the graphics card which has no direct air flow coming from the front.
Of course the dust filters are on the front and below (at the level of the power supply), the small of the special version resides in a green light (with on / off button) below, the logo Razer light on the front as well as a Razer logo inside the box at the bar hiding the wiring.

As for the H440 NZXT done in the sober and clean on the front face, a black box with a photo of the S340 SE as well as the make and the model, and that’s it! At the back, a listing of the main strengths of the case, a 90% steel design ensuring increased durability, a cleverly designed interior, etc.

When opening, we find the case in its plastic bag and sandwiched between 2 polystyrene molds, a classic.

The bundle consists of:

• 1 x Manuel
• 1 x cable tie handle
• The necessary screws

As you can see the bundle gets straight to the point, no frills here! Apart from the few cable ties we only find what is necessary, namely the screws and the manual! At the same time, as long as you can fit the configuration inside without missing a thing, there is no real need to complain!

Here is the beast! All black dressed with the Razer logo on the front. The least we can say is that apart from the logo, the sobriety is clearly there! There is not much to say about the quality of the whole except that it is excellent, the steel construction ensures very good solidity during handling, the “soft touch” type coating is very well done. Let’s take a closer look at all of this.

Is there really a need to do a novel here? The front is entirely black, always with this paint to the touch “soft touch” with only the Razer logo in its center which comes to break this sobriety.

Once the front has been removed, we come across a large magnetic dust filter, which is easy to clean. As you can see the air flow will not be affected by excessively restrictive grilles, since there is none behind the filter!

Sur les côtés il n’y a également pas vraiment grand chose à dire, le côté fenêtre propose une large ouverture qui permettra de voir l’intégralité de la configuration (à part la partie alimentation, qui est équipée d’un cache de toute manière), l’autre côté propose un panneau plein avec toujours cette même peinture et revêtement « soft touch ». Les panneaux ne sont clairement pas fins ni légers, ils ne se tordent pas comme on peut malheureusement trop souvent le voir.

Au dessus on trouve l’unique emplacement pour un ventilateur de 12 à 14 cm, encore une fois la sobriété est de mise. A droite on peut voir le trou d’aération qui permettra au boitier d’aspirer l’air extérieur.

there is also the connection and the various buttons on the top, a disk activity LED, headphone and microphone ports, USB 3.0 ports (green like Razer!) as well as the eternal power button.

The rear is well ventilated, in addition to the grille for the rear fan, the PCIe brackets also act as a grille as well as the space between them and the side panel.

The little button above the fan controls the LEDs on the case, in case you don’t want to show yourself with green lights everywhere!

A good point is the addition of a removable plate allowing an easy installation of the power supply, we unscrew the plate thanks to the 4 hand screws, we fix the power supply and we put the block in the box, nothing simpler!

The brackets on the S340 are fixed to the back of the case, it is not bad to gain a precious centimeter inside the tower!

Below there are 4 rubber feet which will isolate the case from the surface on which it is placed, a removable dust filter as well as 2 green LED strips (in white on the photo).

Here is the interior of the beast! As we can see NZXT has tried to purify the thing as much as possible, everything is the same color / paint as the exterior, namely black to the touch “soft touch”. The 2 fans are positioned at the top and at the back of the box leaving the front devoid of active ventilation. The small Razer logo is affixed on the part that will hide the cables. It’s time to take a little tour of the owner.

On the power supply cover are 2 carriages allowing to install 2 SSD / HDD in 2.5 ″ format, each of them has an opening at the back in order to let the cables pass and to have the most installation. clean possible.

This part is composed of a metal plate and leaves space for the power cables (and the others) coming from the back of the motherboard, it changes holes here and there and gives complete freedom to the cable storage!

At the front the 2 slots for the 12 or 14 cm fans are desperately empty, if you opt to put 1 or 2 the air flow can easily pass thanks to the absence of restrictive grilles.

The 2 fans present are 12 cm NZXT FN V2, if they have the same sound signature as the 14 cm then they should be very pleasant to the ear (no parasitic noises, no motor etc.) even s ‘they will necessarily be audible fully (1200 RPM).

The brackets are attached to the back of the box and are also secured by a side bar, they will not move!

At the back NZXT has really well studied its baby, cable glands where needed (4 + 4-pin CPU, front fans, etc.) as well as a large recess for the power cables, it is clear that the organization of the cables will really not be a problem here. Let’s take a closer look at all of this.

The 3.5 ″ hard drives have their own cage in the power supply part, however there are no anti-vibration pads and they are fixed by only 2 screws via the front of the case. How come cold I would say that the vibrations of the discs will be a concern for the beast, but we will see that during the tests!

The power supply will be perfectly comfortable in its dedicated space, even the longest on the market, a good point for the S340 SE.

The configuration used during the tests is as follows:

A rather large configuration therefore due to its huge cooler and the 3 slots taken by the graphics card. The NZXT S340 SE will be tested once with 5V fans and once in 12V with only the SSD connected. Another test will take place at 5V with the Raptor hard drive connected, it being literally hell in terms of its vibrations, which will allow you to see the box’s capacity to contain them.

The assembly in the NZXT Source 340 SE went very well, the only concern came from the height of the second Noctua fan which touched the window of the side panel, a pity because it was perhaps only 1 or 2 millimeters missing! Apart from that everything went like butter, even the huge graphics card has all the space it needs. Thanks to the different openings for the cables, the assembly is also very clean, nothing to say about this.

At the rear there is no lack of space, you can push the cables like a piglet behind the power supply without the slightest problem in order to have the minimum length that goes to the various components. This is not about making a work of art though, as long as the front is clean 😉

As one of the points differentiating the base S340 and the Razer version I still had to take a small photo of the beast once it was on, which is done above! Everything makes it very good, we will not be able to miss the case overnight, that’s for sure!

In order to test the box, I will carry out an OCCT Power Supply test for 30mins and then take the temperatures of the main components such as the processor (average of the 4 cores), the motherboard, the graphics card as well as the hard drive.
Regarding noise pollution, I will proceed as in the file on silent PCs namely 1 statement in front, right, left, rear and above.

The NZXT S340 SE will face the case used for the silent pc backrest, the Corsair Carbide 300R modified for the needs of the same backrest as well as the NZXT H440, be quiet! Silent base 800, Cooler Master Silencio 652S, the Fractal Design Define R5 as well as the Aerocool DS200. The choice of boxes is not random, all these boxes are rather silent so the NZXT S340 SE will have a lot to do!

Rest

At rest, the temperatures of the components inside the NZXT S340 SE are correct, without being exceptional, in fact the lack of fan (s) on the front is felt, especially in 5V with temperatures a little higher than the other boxes . That said, nothing is critical here, we stay only 1 or 2 degrees of difference, it will be necessary to see in charge to really get an idea.
By switching the fans from 5V to 12V we lose between 2 and 3 degrees depending on the components, which is my faith quite normal, the hard drive meanwhile is not really very satisfied with the lack of direct air with 41 °, which is high although again not critical.

Ambient sound level: 31dB

The small S340 SE is doing admirably well in terms of noise pollution, the fans are really very pleasant to the ear, in 5V they really have nothing to envy to the high-end fans of other brands, they are a pleasure devoid of any parasitic noise! Once set to 12V on the other hand and due to their placement (one at the rear and one above) the noise pollution increases very logically to reach 45 dB at the rear, at this level the configuration is audible but the “quality”. »Noise means that it is not really disturbing (no fan motor noise, no squeaking etc.).
On the other hand, it should be noted that the hard drive WD Raptor but very clearly hurts the carcass and transmits its vibrations without the slightest restraint, which gives a significant increase in noise pollution, so you will have to be very careful when choosing the disc if the disc is hard there is and take a model that vibrates little!

As for the other boxes, the fans managed in PWM remain at their minimum value at rest, namely 600 RPM for the processor and 500 RPM for the graphics card.

Charge

In load we feel that the lack of fan on the front (in addition to the fact that we have lost a fan on the cooler due to the limited thickness of the case) is felt, indeed the graphics card suffers a little more than in the other boxes due to lack of direct air to reach 75 ° in 5V. Once the fans are fully adjusted, we find very correct values ​​even if it remains once again a little higher than in the other boxes of the comparison, nothing too bad though because with 67 ° for the processor and 69 ° for the graphics card there is no risk to the components.

Ambient sound level: 31dB

The noise level of the NZXT S340 SE is once again very contained once charging, as long as the fans remain at 5V, in fact except at the rear which rises to 41 dB (a single fan on the cooler does not help. again) all other sides remain at 37dB, which will not bother anyone except the more silent. Once the WD Raptor hard drive is installed, vibrations can be heard even under load, which once again increases the general sound level by a few dB.
Once the fans are supplied with 12V there on the other hand, there is absolutely no difference compared to the results at rest, in fact the noise emitted by the fans of the different components being much lower, they do not increase the general sound level.

We can see that the use of a single fan on the cooler forces the latter to rise very slightly in the towers with a maximum of 1015 RPM, against 750 RPM for the fans of the graphics card. Here we are a little higher than the other boxes but it is not radically different.

Here we are at the end of this test, what to say about the NZXT S340 SE?
NZXT is teaming up once again with Razer to create a box in their image, and it must be said that this is rather successful! The S340 remains what it is, namely a very sober case but has the little touch that any Razer fanboy will appreciate, namely a luminous logo on the front and LEDs below, all of course in the green color of the brand which is now well known!

The build quality as usual with NZXT is very good, the layout is well thought out making cable storage and assembly very easy and the now well-known fans are most pleasing to the ear. The cooling is quite good, even if NZXT has clearly bet on the processor by installing 2 fans around it as standard, suddenly the rest of the components are seen a little damaged (nothing prevents however from removing a fan and to put it on the front that said!).

The only small defect that I could find concerns the vibrations of the hard drives, indeed if we install one or more hard drives that tend to vibrate (like the WD Raptor) then they will propagate to the carcass and will be heard very clearly. , to have a truly silent PC, you will have to be very careful at this point!

Offered at a recommended price of € 99.99 (when it can be found) the NZXT S340 SE despite its some very slight flaws has very serious advantages for it, especially for Razer fans (for others the classic S340 version a little less expensive will do perfectly!), it will undoubtedly be a very good choice for those who want a gamer config that is both sober and “bling bling” if the need arises!

Advantages

• Manufacturing quality / finish
• Very good quality fans
• Perfect for Razer fans (for those who love!)
• Silence to a minimum.

Disadvantages

• .. but quite noisy thoroughly
• Hard drive vibration

A big thank you to NZXT who allowed me to do this test.

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