Cubitek Magic Cube is just the trick

Review: A truly innovative modular design wins our seal of approval. Abracadabra!

Have you ever seen that magic trick where the beautiful assistant gets into some case-like arrangement, with head poking out one end, and feet the other? You know, the one where the magician saws them in two or three pieces... but the assistant comes out fine? That’s kind of the trick that Cubitek’s Magic Cube case pulls off, by separating your prized PC possession into three still-working pieces.

It’s an elegant and supremely practical trick of modular design, and one we can’t help but really dig.

Split infinitives
We’ve seen single-case modular designed before – ThermalTake’s Level10 case comes to mind – where various PC parts have been housed in their own enclosures or chambers. The idea is that you then don’t get heat leakage between, say, HDDs and your motherboard.

The Magic Cube takes that idea one step further, and is in fact three distinct and separate enclosures, designed to be stacked or stored away as your workspace requires.

First up, there’s the motherboard enclosure, which pretty much does just that. It’s the largest of the three pieces, though still far smaller than a similar, more conventional case. Next in size comes the HDD enclosure, and then the ODD enclosure, which is the smallest of them all.

Each part uses the same design aesthetic – black anodised aluminium sheets, artfully curved and reinforced. It’s kind of brutalist, but in the black looks suitably aggressive. What’s more, each panel and plate is secured not by rivets, but by either small thumb screws or smaller hex screws – you can pretty much take the Magic Cube completely apart. If you like detailed case-modding, or think you can improve on the Cube design, it’s a real plus. The modules are even designed so they can attached to one-another. By removing the rubber feet on the ODD module, for instance, you can screw it onto the HDD module.

One of the things we’d think the Cube would be great for is keeping your desktop neat and tidy, by only having the ODD module actually on the desk. Or you could stack different modules to either side of your monitor, or even stack them all into one, giant uber-tower.

Aside from the convenience of how you place the modules, there’s also the added ease of installation. In many cramped, high-end systems, you’ll often need to remove a number of parts to get at other sub-systems. Large coolers can make it hard to get to your optical drives, while multiple GPU setups can often make getting at HDDs a pain. By separating those subsystems, any upgrades or maintenance becomes far easier. Swapping drives in and out of the Magic Cube is simple, as you’re not dealing with any clutter from PSU cables or GPUs.

Finally, there’s a definite advantage when it comes to thermal properties. Most cases bring in cool air in the front, which first must pass over HDDs before then moving into the GPU/CPU area – not so in the Magic Cube. And with less parts in each enclosure, airflow is also simpler, and there’s less obstacles for dust and grit to build up on.

It’s an elegant solution across the board – pun intended. Also, yes, the Cube comes with all the extra cabling you’ll need to make sure all the modules are properly connected.