MeanIt 5PM ARC Red Case Review

By Meng Vang

Manufacturer: Mean:It (www.meanit.co)
Product Name: 5PM ARC RED
UPC: 763230157936
Price As Tested: $119.99 (Newegg)

Full Disclosure: The product sample used in this article has been provided by Mean:It.

Mean:It is a rather new company out of Colorado that focuses on building high quality products at an affordable price. At the time of this review, the company offers two tempered glass computer chassis with multiple variants. They were kind enough to send Benchmark Reviews the MeanIt 5PM ARC Red edition, which has 5mm of tempered glass goodness on both sides and on the front of the case. It also comes with four pre-installed ARC Red fans, a built-in fan controller, water pump/reservoir mount, and a cable cover/GPU support bracket for supporting long graphics cards. The 5PM ARC Red looks very promising, so let’s take a look at a quick overview in the next section.

The MeanIt 5PM ARC Red currently sells online for $119.99 (Newegg). It comes with a user’s manual, some zip ties, motherboard standoffs, and plenty of screws for the motherboard, storage devices, and power supply. We can see the screws all come in their own labeled bags for convenience.

The tinted, reflective glass gives the 5PM ARC Red an attracting appearance and doubles as a mirror so you can check yourself out. Front air intake ventilation gaps are stealthily placed around the tempered glass panel.

The rear includes a pre-installed red LED ARC fan. This fan mount will also support a 140mm fan for future upgradeability. Everything else is pretty standard as there are seven expansion slots and a bottom mount for a power supply.

Like the front panel, the main side panel also includes a reflective tempered glass window to show off the internal components of the system. There is nothing else to see except for the company logo towards the front of the case.

The opposite side is similar but without the company logo at the front. Having tinted glass panels can be helpful for hiding cables behind the motherboard tray.

At the top is a large magnetic dust filter over of the top ventilation area. Front I/O ports include the standard USB 2.0 and 3.0 ports with a reset button, power button, and headphone/microphone jacks. The front panel I/O also includes three more buttons for fan control.

Here at the bottom, we can see the four rubberized feet and a power supply dust filter. There is also a 3.5″ mount for a hard drive.

Now that we have seen a quick overview of the 5PM ARC Red, let’s take a look at the features this case has to offer.

With the tempered glass side panel removed, we can see the internal layout of the 5PM ARC Red. There is a lot of interior room since the bulky 3.5″ HDD cages that are normally present towards the front are not there. A power supply chamber covers the power supply unit and its cables from ruining the looks of your build. The chamber does not span all the way to the front of the case, which does allow for a front 360mm radiator. Motherboard standoff screws are already in place for an ATX motherboard as well.

There are three Velcro straps included for cable management, but no rubberized grommets on the cable cutouts. Plenty of cable tie-down points are strategically placed around the motherboard tray to route other cables. Below the CPU cutout are three 2.5″ SSD mounting brackets and are easily removable via thumbscrews. To the side of the CPU cutout is the built-in fan controller module. The power supply chamber does have a hard drive cage for two 3.5″ HDDs.

The 5PM ARC Red has three pre-installed red LED ARC fans at the front. There is enough room to mount a 240mm, 280mm, or 360mm radiator. Unfortunately, a front dust filter is not present with this case.

With the top dust filter removed, we can see the large surface area for cooling accessories. The top does support a 360mm and 280mm radiator along with three 120mm and two 140mm fans.

The 5pm ARC Red comes with a cable cover that doubles as a graphics card support unit. Long and heavy graphics cards would slide into one of the three groves to prevent sagging. This is great especially for transportation. Of course, the cable cover/graphics card support bracket is removable via a single thumbscrew. There is also an adjustable water pump/reservoir bracket on the power supply chamber, which can mount farther or closer to the side panel depending on the build.

The built-in fan controller can control up to six 3-pin or 4-pin PWM fans; four fan headers are already in use because of the four pre-installed fans. There is a small switch in the center of the PCB to toggle between DC and PWM mode.

Let’s take a look at the build in the next section.

• Motherboard: ASRock Fatal1ty 990FX Killer
• System Memory: 2x4GB 1600MHz DDR3
• Processor: AMD Phenom II X4 945 @ 3GHz
• Audio: Onboard RealTek HD Audio
• Video: Gigabyte R9 270X 2GB GDDR5 Windforce Edition
• Disk Drive 1: Toshiba Q Series 128GB SSD
• Enclosure: MeanIt 5PM ARC Red
• PSU: Thermaltake 430W TR2
• Monitor: HP 23bw 23″ IPS display
• Operating System: Windows 10 Professional 64-Bit

I did not have any major problems installing a standard ATX motherboard and a large graphics card in the 5PM ARC Red case. There was still plenty of room at the front and the top for radiators if I ever wanted to upgrade. The cable cover/GPU support bracket did a nice job hiding the cables going to the motherboard. It was difficult to route thicker cables through the bracket, but everything turned out okay once I bolted on the thumbscrew. Suppose you did go with an E-ATX build, you would not be able to use the cable cover/GPU support bracket.

I was surprised to see no rubberized grommets on the cable cutouts given the price to this case, but at least the edges were smooth and did not cut through my cables. It was also difficult to close the side panel window because there was not a lot of room between the thick 24-pin cable and the window. A power supply with thin cables would have been beneficial here. On the up side, just look at all the cable tie-down points. With that many tie-down points, there really is no excuse for having poor cable management.

The power supply chamber had a small opening for the HD audio cable and a rubberized cutout for other cables. I really wished motherboard manufacturers would put the front panel audio headers in a more convenient place instead of way down in the bottom right corner. Thankfully, the 5PM ARC Red had a cable that was long enough to reach this silly location. I would have liked to see some more cable cutouts on the power supply chamber as many motherboards have USB, fan, and RGB headers at the bottom of the motherboard.

With the system powered on, the red LED ARC fans looked great overall. For some reason, the power LED was blue. On a red themed PC case, this did not make any sense. I would have preferred a white power LED because white can suit many colors. Of course if you really cannot stand it, just unplug the power LED cable from the motherboard.

The system ran very quietly with the window side panels on. Because of the tinted glass panels, some interior lighting would have brighten things up if installed. The middle fan at the front had a faulty LED as it was brighter on one half and darker on the other. This was just my unit, so not a big deal because fans are easily replaceable anyway.

For air cooling, the 5PM ARC Red does have 175mm of clearance from the motherboard tray to the side panel for tall CPU coolers. This means it can support large CPU coolers, like the Noctua NH-D15 and the Phanteks PH-TC14PE.

In the next section, we will finish this review with my final thoughts and conclusion.

The MeanIt 5PM ARC Red is a beautiful case with plenty of air and water cooling flexibility. The ARC fans are fairly quiet and well-built with anti-vibration pads. One of my fans were faulty out of the box, but the case does have a two year warranty if anything does go wrong. I would have liked to see more room behind the motherboard tray for cable management and a white LED power button, instead of blue. Other than that, the high quality 5mm glass panels and ARC fans make the 5PM ARC Red a very appealing gaming case.

In terms of performance, the 5PM ARC Red does very well as there is enough room for taller CPU coolers and water cooling accessories. Both the top and front support a 360mm radiator, which should allow for some creativity. Airflow is not entirely the best as the front ventilation is rather small. Tempered glass a trend in today’s computer chassis and case manufacturers must sacrifice some performance just to make the case look pretty. Sad but true, many people only buy things that look pretty even if the product is no good.

Speaking of looking pretty, the 5PM ARC Red looks fantastic with its three tempered glass side panels. Some people may like or dislike the tinted glass panels, but I do not mind the tint as it is enough to hide the cables and transparent enough to view the internal components with internal lighting.

When it comes to construction and build quality, the internal structure is very sturdy throughout. The tempered glass side panel is 5mm thick making it heavy and durable. Finger prints do not show on the metal parts of the case as it has a matte finish, but more room behind the motherboard tray would have been better especially for those larger cables.

When it comes to functionality, the 5PM ARC Red works great as a dedicated gaming case and has support for an E-ATX motherboard. I would not use this case for a server build as there are not enough 3.5″ drive bays. But for a productivity machine with an E-ATX motherboard, this can allow for some interesting multi CPU builds.

As of July 2017, the MeanIt 5PM ARC Red sells online for $119.99 (Newegg). The case is available in five different varieties at around the same price. It may be a few bucks more than the Thermaltake View 31 Tempered Glass and the Corsair 460X, but the 5PM ARC Red does come with four ARC fans, a built-in fan controller, thicker glass panels, and a cable cover/GPU support bracket for hiding cables and supporting longer graphics cards; all for just a few bucks more. If you are looking for an affordable tempered glass case for your next build, the 5PM ARC Red is a good case to look at, and I MeanIt.

+ Tinted tempered glass panels
+ Supports E-ATX motherboards
+ Supports large 280mm and 360mm radiators
+ Includes four ARC fans, water pump mount, and cable cover/GPU support bracket

– Blue power LED (a pro for the 5PM ARC Blue variant)
– Little space between motherboard and side panel for cables

• Performance: 8.50
• Appearance: 9.50
• Construction: 9.00
• Functionality: 8.75
• Value: 9.25

Excellence Achievement: Benchmark Reviews Golden Tachometer Award.