Montech XR Wood - An Airflow Update?

Montech XR Wood ASUS Prime RX 9070 AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D

ATX PC cases, we’re spoilt for choice at the moment. There are panoramic options, wood clad show pieces, air flow focused chassis and even the occasional ATX case masquerading as something smaller. So which way do you go? Of course the answer is not clear cut, after all, the right choice is a combination of having the right hardware support and personal aesthetic preference. The market seems to be leaning back towards air flow focused and the most popular choices seem to be wood clad, something Fractal popularised with the North. Other brands have thrown their hats into the ring with this, most recently Montech, with the XR Wood.

The Montech XR Wood cases arrived a few weeks ago. It was a bit of a surprise, we weren’t expecting it. We immediately unboxed the white version, curious to see the changes, and compared to the standard XR visual updates are major. It’s no longer a case with panoramic glass, the front being replaced with an airflow focused panel, with some subtle wood cladding to the top and bottom. On first inspection the aesthetic appealed to our minimalist sensibilities and it also felt well built for the price. So I guess given the sensible, minimalist, air flow first design we should probably build a system to compliment it, while also managing to draw the eye!

Case Overview

I did consider starting this section with a comparison to the previous Montech XR, but there will be a large section of the audience that has limited knowledge of it. I think it’ll suffice to say the chassis is lifted from a tried and tested case, with thoughtful additions.

On the front of the panel there is a walnut panel, top and bottom, with the Montech logo etched into the top. That’s it for the wood really. It’s less than we might expect of a case with wood in its name. That is not to say it's necessarily a bad thing, it allows for choice of theming, if you want to play into the wood vibes you can, equally full RGB would also work. In our opinion it’s a nice touch, it brings in some earthy tones and does bring a little of the premium feel that high end materials can introduce. The issue here is less the inclusion of the wood - we’re all for that, it’s focusing the case name on a smaller detail. Perhaps calling it the Montech XR V2, or XR Airflow would have been more suitable. A magnetic dust filter is provided to be fit inside the front panel, it’s quite a tight mesh so should do well keep dust out, but is also a very tight fit, making removal a bit of a pain.

Talking of airflow, as mentioned the front of the chassis has been updated to house up to 3 x 120mm fans behind the grille. Both versions we received had preinstalled 120mm RGB fans, 3 on the front and 1 as exhaust. This is something we love to see at this price point, and we’ve had positive experiences with Montech fans in the past, so see no reason to expect any difference. For this build though we wanted something a little different, most of the industry is likely to build with the included fans, so we decided to pivot to using Noctua fans. It should help us bring the wood theming through the case a little more.

As for additional fan support, there is space on the side for 2 x 120mm fans, though with a longer graphics card this might be a bit of a squeeze. The top can handle up to 3 x 120mm fans or a 360mm radiator and interestingly the PSU shroud can support 3 x 120mm fans. If you decide to go down the route of using fans on the PSU shroud, note that they'll be redistributing air provided by the front intake only as there isn’t really any other airflow to the region. We feel support for these fans is a hangover from the original XR which had a vented panel on the side of the PSU shroud, which has been updated to be solid and also covered by glass.

Overall, the build quality of the chassis is good considering its budget price tag, especially when it’s considered there are RGB fans included. Construction is reasonably solid, with a little movement in the panels, which is normal in the budget sector.

As for hardware support, it’s an ATX midtower so it’ll be largely as expected, the headlines:

Motherboard: ATX / MATX/ ITX

Graphics Card: Up to 420mm

Air Cooler: Max (h)175mm

Radiator Support: Up to 1 x 360mm (top)

Dimensions: (l)461mm x (w)230mm x (h)456mm

Parts List

How Was The Build?

The build had one stand out - simplicity. From a building perspective the Montech XR Wood is a simple, no frills chassis, its goal is to be aesthetically pleasing while having plenty of room for the components. On this front it absolutely delivers, it doesn’t overcomplicate things by trying to be too clever, or have a modular design. It was as simple as an ATX tower gets. The addition of the Noctua NF-A12 fans furthered the cause by removing any RGB cables.

When it comes to cable management there is a little more to consider. The area for cable management is tight. There is a channel running down the centre with some velcro to keep the cables tidy, which is always welcome. The channel is however just an anchor point for each strap, so in practice it makes it difficult to keep cables flat. We’d love to see a proper channel implemented where the strapping runs between two points which would help out a lot! All that said, it was manageable, it just took a little extra time.

Airflow

As a mid-tower ATX case with an airflow focus we knew the Montech XR would perform well. The only thing we had to really question was how it would perform with the air filter fitted? The filter is quite a tight mesh, something which has caused issues in the past. We tested both with and without the filter and the results either way were very good. With the filter on the air intake was good, dealing with the smoke without too much issue. Taking the filter out did speed things up quite a lot, with no restrictions, intake was swift and uncompromising. These results bode well for performance testing, but we’re curious as to whether the dust filter will affect noise greatly.

Noise Testing

As we're testing the full build the results are indicative of that, changing out components would alter results. We use a decibel meter at a distance of 50cm from the PC - which is approx normal seating position in a set-up where the PC is on the desk. The lowest reading available from the device is 30db.

We were very pleased with the results from this one:

Ambient noise: <30db

Fans at idle (400rpm): <30db

Fans at 50% (900rpm): 32.2db

Fans at 100% (1800rpm): 48db

Performance

We’ve previously tested the Ryzen 7 9800X3D and Radeon RX 9070 pairing in a similar case, so know roughly where to expect 4K performance to be. Our results:

Ambient Temp 23.0°C

Spider-Man Remastered

3840 x 2160

Preset: Very High

AMD Fluid Motion Frames 2.1: Disabled

169-208 FPS

56°C CPU

53°C GPU

Preset: Very High

AMD Fluid Motion Frames 2.1: Enabled

VSync: Off

289-343 FPS

54°C CPU

52°C GPU

Cyberpunk 2077

3840 x 2160

Location: Dog Town

Quick Preset: Ray Tracing Medium

AMD Fluid Motion Frames 2.1: Disabled

Vsync: Off

53-71 FPS

59°C CPU

52°C GPU

Location: Dog Town

Quick Preset: Ray Tracing Ultra

AMD Fluid Motion Frames 2.1: Enabled

Vsync: Off

99-108 FPS

54°C CPU

52°C GPU

Marvel Rivals

3840 x 2160

AMD FidelityFX Super Resolution 4: Off

Anti Aliasing and Super Resolution Type: Off

Super Resolution Mode: Off

Super Resolution Sharpening: Off

V-Sync: Off

Graphics Quality: Medium

71-84 FPS

49°C CPU

53°C GPU

AMD FidelityFX Super Resolution 4: On

Anti Aliasing and Super Resolution Type: Off

Super Resolution Mode: Off

Super Resolution Sharpening: Off

V-Sync: Off

Graphics Quality: Ultra

AMD Fluid Motion Frames 2.1: Enabled

99-141 FPS

51°C CPU

54°C GPU

Furmark 2

3840 x 2160

108 FPS average

53°C Temp

72°C Hotspot

CPU-Z

Max Temp 64°C

Fan Speed ~ 1650 rpm

The build managed to stay cool during heavy gaming, with frame rates staying where we would expect for the system.

Roundup

The Montech XR Wood has been a pleasure to build with. It’s a solid and well built chassis for the price. The walnut accents do bring some of the premium feeling of a wood clad case but it doesn’t feel like the standout part of the case. Though, with that said, having small wood accents has allowed us to theme the build in line with their colouring without the earthy tones feeling in any way over powering. We were quite surprised how well the bronze tones of the pump head on the Hydroshift Silent 360 played into the theming; it remained subtle but brought with it a point for light to shift as the viewer moves around the build. If I was to give any advice to Montech it’s to do a little more work on making sure cable management options are as good as can be: currently they’re not bad, but there is room for improvement.

As for moving the XR away from a panoramic design to a more air flow focused chassis, we’re quite happy with the reinvention, it just works. Giving the option for 3 fans on the bottom of the case does seem a little unnecessary, but, let’s be frank, using them is optional, and not something most will use anyway.

Overall, it was a fun and simple build, and we think the final result really stands out. It would be at home as either a productivity or gaming build. The question is, would you build in the Montech XR Wood? Let’s have a chat in the comments.

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!

USA Links

Case: Coming Soon

CPU: https://amzn.to/41RfdZb

GPU: https://amzn.to/4iUhv0B

RAM: https://amzn.to/4hBclWi

MOBO: https://amzn.to/4ixnMQa

PSU: https://amzn.to/4bSCEpF

Cooler: https://amzn.to/41Tq84H

Storage: https://amzn.to/4ireXXZ

Cable Extensions: https://amzn.to/4itGJ6a

Fans: https://amzn.to/41SRyI1

Thermal Paste: https://amzn.to/4hulxM4