Do you have a need for a larger than life PC case? A massive canvas in which to sculpt PC perfection? Well, we might just have an idea for you, and no, it’s not even a new one! Last year the Havn HS 420 line came to market, backed by UK tech retailers Overclockers. We were confronted with this colossus in October when we took a trip down to Epic LAN, and we immediately knew we had to build one. The design just speaks to us, from the 90° curved glass on the front to the detailing on the top and mental side of the case. It’s been quite the journey for it since. There was a lot of planning for this one, then delays on getting the parts to build with, so much so that we had everything we needed just as the RTX 50 series launched - so we had to put it on the back burner for a few weeks while we dealt with that. Finally it’s time to have a proper look at what we’ve got on offer here, it seems like the whole industry likes this case - unanimity is rare - so lets get into it.
Case Overview
To even get as far as unboxing the HAVN we first have to get both versions of the case into the studio, as I alluded to, this happened a few months ago. Getting them up the stairs was no mean feat - looking at the specs the case weighs in at 19kg unboxed.
Once we had them out of their packaging the quality of materials and sturdiness became apparent. There are 2 versions available: the HS 420 and the HS 420 VGPU. As luck would have it we have one of each! As you’d expect they’re part of the same range so they are very similar, the big difference is that the VGPU version has a vertical GPU mount and gen 5 riser cable included. There is one other not-so-subtle difference, on the bottom of the VGPU case the fan mounts are raised and angled towards the glass panel, with an included glass wind deflector to be mounted on the side to direct air. The standard HS 420 has typical bottom fan mounts, so why the difference? It seems the VGPU configuration is so the bottom fans blow air at the glass which is then directed back at the vertically positioned graphics card fans for easy air intake. It’s an interesting idea, one that if works could be game changing, the airflow visualisation should let us see how well this works, more on that later. As there is more kit involved with the VGPU version there is a price hike, coming in at around £70 more than the standard HS 420. We’d say it’s justified as £70 is around what we’d expect to pay for good quality gen 5 riser cable. We chose to build with the black VGPU variant as we were curious about the airflow possibilities.
As mentioned the case is ginormous and heavy, so as you’d expect it can pretty much support any hardware - so much so that a typical rundown is almost pointless, but for those who are curious here are the headlines:
Max graphics card length: 470mm
Motherboard support: up to E-ATX
Radiator support (top): up to 420
Radiator support (side): up to 420
Max air cooler height: 185mm
Fan support (top): up to 3 x 140mm
Fan support (side): up to 3 x 140mm
Fan support (bottom): 3 x 140mm (no support of smaller fans)
Fan support (rear): up to 2 x 140mm
Max PSU length: ATX up to 220mm
Storage bays: 8 x 2.5 inch or 4 x 3.5 inch drives
It is worth noting that HAVN supplies with the case a Vesa mount for an internal screen inside the case - a cool edition and perhaps something we’ll play around with in future.
Parts List
How Was The Build?
Comparison, it’s a powerful tool. Of course you have direct comparison between two things, useful when you need to pick what is right for you. Equally, it is useful in a descriptive sense, one of the common ones is ‘building a PC is like Lego, it all just fits’. This one is not a simple kit, if this was Lego it would be one of the more adult focused sets, with more pieces, greater complexity and a need to closely follow the instruction manual. Of course as we build PC’s as a living we might have overlooked this part a little!
It all started so well, getting the case stripped was simple. The top is held down by magnets and has a nice pull tab to help remove it. The side and back panels have screws holding them in at the top, once removed they come off easily - though the curved glass panel is particularly heavy. All seemed well at this point, so on to building the motherboard - simple stuff. We then removed the VGPU bracket and mounted the motherboard and radiator, to quickly realise that we now could not get to the rear-top fan mounting screws - so out came the radiator. Once we had access we saw that there was a shroud for 120mm fans installed, it’s a very nice touch, it’s designed to make the fan edges look pretty (there is also one on the rear-bottom fan cutout). Of course we were using 140mm fans throughout so we removed it and mounted the fans. The oversight should have clued us in to fitting the bottom-rear intake at this point too but it didn’t! Once the radiator was being fitted we did notice that it had to be pressed against the motherboard, it would be nice to see a few mm clearance on any revisions to the case.
Fitting the 3 x 140mm fans on the bottom didn’t go as smoothly as we would have liked either. The Phanteks D130-140mm fans chosen are solid performers and we love that we can link them together in blocks for easy installation. The fans being in a 3 fan run did cause a headache though, the holes in the case are spaced for 3 individual fans and not a block of 3 so not all of the screws lined up. We managed to circumvent it by using some thinner fan screw which allowed just enough tolerance to get them properly attached. We did try attaching the fans individually too which worked fine, but when you have fans that link you don’t want to wire them individually.
Once the bottom fans were in we then looked at the rear-bottom intake and had to remove the bottom fans to get that in. Luckily the wedge to which they were attached unscrews and removes easily.
Mounting the power supply is always a simple job, but cable management often causes a headache. We are pleased to report that the HAVN HS 420 has set a new gold standard for cable management. There are channels in every possible space and they’re all labelled with recommendations as to which cables to route through them. I followed the labels pretty closely and it made it super easy and perhaps the cleanest looking cable management on the channel to date. Other manufacturers please take note! I cable manage every week but yet still found great benefit from channels designed and labelled to hold specific cables! Now to adopt following manufacturers recommendations for the rest of the build…….
Next came fitting the graphics card, it’s a fairly simple process, just remember to fit the graphics card to the bracket and then fit the bracket.
Of all of the build issues we faced, most of them were user error, and were explained in the manual. Only the issue of fan spacing at the bottom is of minor concern. It could be an issue with our unit and I’m not aware of anyone else reporting similarly.
Airflow
The HAVN HS 420 is an airflow focused case, which is becoming more common in cases with wrap around glass. We decided when building not to go for max airflow with this one and neglect putting in side intake as having 8 140mm should be overkill, but you could boost it to 11 if you wish. As expected the build performed admirably, with air being taken in and exhausted rapidly, so much so that we had to turn the fans down!
It is also our first opportunity to test the airflow of the ROG Astral in a closed case. It got through testing in horizontal orientation on an open chassis with flying colours, but since it was announced we wanted to see how it would do vertically. For those unaware the Astral is ASUS ROG’s first 4 fan graphics card, with 3 fans on the bottom and one on the top. The configuration is supposed to act as a push-pull to aid in getting air across the cooling fins more quickly. We wondered if using it in vertical orientation would have a negative effect as it would be exhausting at the side of the case. It got lucky this time thanks to the wide, largely open grommet on the side of the HAVN allowing it to exhaust out the side of the case. We did however see some evidence that the smoke was collecting towards the front of the case as it was exhausted, but it didn’t stay there long before being drawn away. We’ll revisit this in future i’m sure to figure out a definitive answer as to the viability of the Astral being vertically mounted.
Performance
We’ve decided, for the moment at least, to stick with Cyberpunk 2077 as our main way of game testing our builds, backed up by Marvel Rivals. We also threw in the motherboard temps for good measure this time, which is mainly down to the Astral exhausting towards the motherboard. The results are quite interesting to see:
Ambient Temp 21.4°C
Cyberpunk 2077
3840x2160
Location: Ghost Town - Afterlife
Custom Preset
DLSS Super Resolution Preset - Transformer Model
Texture Quality - High.
Ray Tracing - On
DLSS Multi Frame Generation - 4X
159 - 188FPS
40°C CPU
57°C GPU
41°C MOBO
Marvel Rivals
3840 x 2160
Anti Aliasing and Super Resolution Type: Nvidia DLSS
Super Resolution Mode: Quality
Super Resolution Sharpening: 80
Frame Generation Mode: Nvidia DLSS Frame Generation
Graphics Quality: Ultra
133-155 FPS
39°C CPU
59°C GPU
37°C MOBO
Furmark 2
3840 x 2160
176 FPS
63°C Temp
74°C Hotspot
CPU-Z
Max Temp 55°C
Fan Speed ~1000 rpm
CPU Power Draw 113.4
The temps across the board are admirable, it seems the 140mm case fans and 420 radiator were good choices. During gameplay sessions it appears that the exhaust from the graphics card had no meaningful bearing on motherboard temperature - though it is plausible thanks to the case having an unintended exhaust gap. There has been a lot of discourse online about noise levels from the ROG Astral due to its 4 fan design. We're also aware that other media may have received samples which came with unexpected noise due to turbulence. We’re hoping these are early release / isolated issues or similar as we haven’t experienced anything outside of what we’d expect for a 4 fan GPU. We’ve run the fans at 100% and it is noisier than a 3 fan card, but lets be honest, there is a reverse blade fan added in, it was always going to be! We very much doubt any normal gamer would ever need the fans at close to 100% during regular gameplay, that territory is for maximum overclocking, and if you’re going that far noise isn’t likely to be your priority! During 4K gameplay at maximum settings the Astral was running at a level that was barely audible.
Roundup
The HAVN HS 420 is a monster of a case, if you need massive hardware support, or just prefer a larger case you’d be hard pressed to find something prettier or more well built. There were a few minor niggles like working out the screw spacing for the bottom fans and 420 radiators being a tight squeeze against the motherboard at the top, but overall the case does as it is intended. The airflow is largely unmatched so long as you’re choosing to use 140mm fans throughout, but even if you’re not I’d be willing to bet airflow would still be more than adequate. The only issue of concern is that the order in which you have to build this case in not immediately obvious, but included in the box is possibly the thickest case instruction manual we’ve seen, so……. Read it? Master it, and then come back and help us build the white one next time? Reading seemingly isn't our strong suit! If you like the look of the HAVN HS 420 I say go for it, especially now you know it’s a challenge.
Blog post written by Sam Thwaytes
Full Video Below:
Affiliate Links
If you are interested in any of the products used and wish to support the channel feel free to use the affiliate links below. We get a small kickback if you buy the product without it costing you anything!
US Links
Case (VGPU): https://amzn.to/4hP39hn
Case (standard version): https://amzn.to/4jR29uV
MOBO: https://amzn.to/4k0N2PU
Cooler: https://amzn.to/3CI2Juk
Fans: https://amzn.to/4htkXiv
Storage (alternative): https://amzn.to/4ha9Af7
Keyboard: https://amzn.to/4hRLc1T
Mouse: https://amzn.to/4hvIaQC
Monitor: https://amzn.to/4hrs5vP
Espresso Machine: https://amzn.to/4apOwOY
UK Links
Case (VGPU): https://amzn.to/40NPJLU
Case (Standard): https://amzn.to/41ajsA8
GPU: not available
MOBO: https://amzn.to/4gzVbaO
Cooler: https://amzn.to/4gAlZrJ
Fans: https://amzn.to/42QBqbV
Storage: https://amzn.to/4hHzQ0p
Keyboard: not available
Mouse: https://amzn.to/4hcG4p4
Lamp: https://amzn.to/4jBUbWs
Monitor: https://amzn.to/4hNz41P
Espresso Machine: https://amzn.to/40lcTsK
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