Verdict: The ultimate case for high-end water cooling, but it's very expensive

The moment that the courier arrives at your door, panting and sweating, holding the colossal box containing the Cooler Master Stacker, you know you've ordered something special.

Weighing in at a Godzilla-like 14.7kg and measuring 227 x 584 x 536mm the Stacker is a beast of case. It's like a Centurion 530 on steroids, and shares the same fully ventilated mesh front panel. However, while the Centurion 530 has five external drive bays, the Stacker has 11. Three of these are filled, as standard, by an adaptor that supports four 3.5in hard disks and a 120mm fan. There's also an adaptor for fitting a floppy disk drive. Unfortunately, Cooler Master doesn't supply a blanking plate, so if you don't have a floppy drive to install then you'll be left with a nasty gaping hole in the front of your case ... tut, tut Cooler Master. The top bay is filled with a control panel, which has a generous six USB 2 ports, a FireWire port, microphone and headphone jacks, and power and reset switches.

Additional cooling is provided by a 120mm exhaust fan at the rear and an 80mm exhaust fan on the roof. Should you need further cooling, then hard disk/120mm fan adaptors, known as 4-in-3 Device Modules, can be purchased separately for £16.50 from www.xtreme-hardware.co.uk. You can also buy a Cross Flow Fan for £22.33 from www.scan.co.uk. This sucks in air from a lateral hole on the right side panel and blows it lengthwise over the motherboard, helping to cool hot-running components, such as the Northbridge and VRMs. The Cross Flow Fan has three speed settings that vary the noise level between relatively quiet and ear-blisteringly loud. The only problem is that, with the Cross Flow Fan fitted, you won't be able to fit an E-ATX motherboard. However, it's also worth mentioning that the Stacker also supports BTX boards, when they finally appear.

Our review model was fitted with a huge side-panel window, and it's also available in blue for £126.84 from www.xtreme-hardware.co.uk, and in black without a window for £99.57 from a href="http://www.scan.co.uk" target="_blank">www.scan.co.uk.

The build quality is up the usual superb Cooler Master standard, from the hulking great big steel chassis to the aluminium and mesh front panel. All the edges are nicely rolled or smoothed so you won't cut your hands while installing components.

Because of its huge dimensions, the Stacker is the only case in this Labs test that can accommodate a dual 120mm fan radiator without requiring any modding. This can be suspended vertically in the lower 5.25in drive bays. You'll still need to do a bit of a Heath Robinson modding job to attach the radiator, though, and our favoured method is to use four plastic cable ties. At the bottom of the case is a bay for fitting a second PSU, if you have a particularly power-hungry system. Alternatively, this space could be used to house the pump of a water-cooling kit, such as Cooler Master's own Aquagate system.

No other case on the market today has the ability to fit a dual 120mm fan radiator without resorting to some serious Dremeling and, for this reason alone, the Stacker deserves its recommendation. However, for a high-end, air-cooled PC it's not nearly so impressive. To get the most out of it in this environment, you'll really need to add some of the optional accessories, which will send the costs spiralling up to as much as £160. This is a lot of money to pay for a case, regardless of how good it is.

Nevertheless, there's still no escaping the fact that the Stacker is one of the best cases around for housing a high-end PC.

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