Cooler Master offers three versions of the MasterFrame 360: its Panorama version for around $220, the Stage Mirror for around $230, and our tested Stage LCD, for around $300.
The Panorama features a boxed front area suitable for holding figurines or other collectibles you want to show off, while the open-faced Stage Mirror uses a fixed mirror in place of the Stage LCD case’s 1,080-by-1,920-pixel LCD panel. The front ledge of the Stage LCD version is rubberized to help keep anything on it from sliding around, and two ARGB spotlights above it can be angled to highlight various portions of whatever you place there.
Above the spotlights are a power button, a hole for the power-on indicator LED, two USB 3.x Type-A ports and a single Type-C port, a combined headset audio jack, and a reset button. As typical, the fourth (microphone) pole of the combined headset jack goes unused when connecting standard headphones, which makes single-cable headsets, headphones, and headphone/microphone splitter cables equally compatible.
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
The MasterFrame 360 Stage LCD has zero expansion slots in their standard positions, but instead relies exclusively on its included PCIe 5.0 x16 riser cable to position a single card vertically in its three-space holder. Space above and below the motherboard area is left open to support multiple radiators, and the area behind the motherboard tray is designed to hold the power supply and cables, and leaves ample room.
Cooler Master surpasses visual expectations by installing a second glass panel behind the motherboard on the case’s right panel and using concealer panels to hide power supply cables.
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
Stuck under the front edge of the Stage LCD is a wired remote for its panel controller, which features a mode button and two brightness-control buttons. Pressing the mode button switches the panel’s controller among photo-gallery, video, and desktop display modes.
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
The mesh covering the bottom differs from the top in that it’s secured with screws rather than magnets and hooks. Both panels are perforated steel measuring 1.0mm thick, though the painted finish likely makes up a small portion of that measurement (for example, 20-gauge steel measures ~0.91mm without paint).
The MasterFrame 360 Stage LCD has enough space between its I/O panel and its interior drive cover to fit boards up to 10.8 inches deep, including examples such as ASRock’s EATX-labeled X870E Taichi Lite (10.5 inches deep) and even the odd SSI-CEB part. A column of standoff holes labeled “E” for EATX actually refers to SSI-CEB, which is the smaller of two common commercial form factors that fall within the EATX (up to 13 inches) envelope.
While this case also fully supports full-ATX boards with reverse-facing connectors, it does not have the rear-facing connector hole needed to reach the front-panel header of MicroATX reverse-connector boards like Asus’ B760M-BTF WIFI or MSI’s B760M Project Zero. For cable-hiding builds, stick to ATX boards only.
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
A card brace is the one thing that will prevent most users from installing a larger-than-ATX motherboard in this case (such as the previously mentioned X870E Taichi Lite). Factory installed, it barely clears the front edge of standard ATX boards. Removing the brace (one screw) forces the card to hang from its rear bracket. Thus, users who want to run a 10.5-inch-deep motherboard and an 11-inch or longer graphics card will be forced to devise their own card brace.
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
A hider cover conceals your drives from view through the right side panel. The drive cover is really only intended to cover the back of the drives, as Cooler Master instructs builders to put either two 2.5-inch or one 3.5-inch drive on the other side of the tray. But after measuring 5/8 inch of space behind the drive cover, I tried mounting a pair of 2.5-inch drives there and found that the cover was even designed to provide connector access in this configuration. You’d still need to add some thin spacers on this side to make room for the 3.5-inch drive’s hardware to poke through from the other side, but I can’t think of a much easier way to crown yourself a modder.
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
The top and bottom panels are each designed to hold two 360mm-format radiators side-by-side. While we found the opening large enough to hold an even longer (420mm) radiator, the inset center section of the front panel is too shallow (38mm) to hold any fans below that oversize part. Meanwhile, anyone hoping to just use that shallow space to hold a third oversize fan will find that there’s no place to mount the bracket in this area.
Thus, while six 120mm fans fit in two rows of three, anything larger (140mm/180mm/200mm) is limited to a single row of two.
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
The back of the motherboard tray is concealed behind two cable covers, with the rear holding a two-position adjustable cover for the power supply’s intake fan. These covers dictate the case’s rated 210mm power-supply depth limit, which applies only to the lid’s depth. (The cables can stick out much farther.)
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
This is the side that you’re supposed to mount your drives to…
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
And a basket design helps keep your cables from drooping out from below the cable cover….
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(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
ARGB cables for the top lights hang out from behind the forward cable cover on the motherboard tray. Note that these are conveniently fitted with pass-through connectors; the cables are not long enough to reach a motherboard on their own.
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
You won’t need to pull the face panel off as I did, even though doing so is super-easy (know that I also had to disconnect its cables to get it to lie flat for this photo). The LCD panel’s controller is found here, its four-pin connector interfacing the previously mentioned wired controller and its Type-C-appearing connector, featuring a custom data and power interface. A microSD card allows for local storage of photos and video; the mode button lets you play back the contents of folders on the card. A warranty sticker covers the factory 16GB microSD card, so that upgrading the controller’s storage cancels Cooler Master’s warranty coverage.
(Credit: Thomas Soderstrom)
