The Lian Li Lancool 216 has been specially designed for maximum airflow, alongside being optimised for air and AIO cooling. The front and top panel feature fine mesh that permits ample air to flow both into and out of the case. Furthermore, Lian Li has totally redesigned the front fans for the Lancool 216, utilising dual 160mm fans. They are able to produce an astounding 118.85CFM of airflow with a static pressure of 3.10mmH2O. In addition to this, these fans are incorporated into a specially designed shroud that channels air for minimal turbulence. So my Strix B550-E is paired with an AMD Ryzen 5 5600x mildly O.C to 4.55Ghz, 2x 8Gb of 3200Gt RAM and a Corsair H100i 240 cooler and in the Corsair 600T it ran at about 55-60C at idle at 18C ambient. Now in this chassis runs at around 42-45C at idle, there's thermally lots of headroom . Adding additional 120mm fans to the PSU shroud helped drop GPU temperature again and installing the rear external fan mount, equipped with a 120mm Lian Li UNI Fan SL120 V2 reduced GPU temperature even further. With these extra fans installed the case cooling goes from good to great. KitGuru says: The Lian Li Lancool 216 is an impressive chassis for its price point. There is some tough competition in that sector of the market but Lancool 216 is up there with the best of them, what do you guys think? By installing the external fan slightly wonky and with only one screw I was able to connect to one HDMI port on the graphics card and run the thermal tests. Hopefully, Lian Li can take a second look at the fan mount and modify it so that it can compatible with more system configurations as it is genuinely a good feature, especially when combined with the PSU shroud mounted fans.

For users who take dust management to the next level, a magnetic front panel dust filter is available as an optional accessory. The dust filter fits perfectly between the front panel and the front fans. The LANCOOL 216 supports ATX, Micro-ATX, MINI-ITX motherboards, and E-ATX under 280mm in width (when the grommet bar is flipped 180°). In addition, thanks to its symmetrical design, cable management in the 2nd chamber remains unaffected. After comparing the Lancool 216 to the best-performing cases from this year, it’s safe to say that this case is worth strong consideration, especially if you want impressive GPU thermals. Bottom LineFor vertical GPU mounting, only an additional riser cable is required. With a PCB that has a hole spacing of 112.7mm, the Lian-Li PCIe 4.0 X16 RISER CABLE is compatible with the LANCOOL 216.

Located in the second chamber behind the motherboard, a SATA-powered fan hub can support up to 4x ARGB and PWM fans. Extensive cable management is provided by three large cable straps in the central channel, an additional cable management channel to the right of the motherboard tray includes three clips for CPU EPS power cable routing while multiple cable cutouts are placed in handy locations. Lian Li’s 216 chassis is very versatile, supporting motherboards that are up to EATX in size and up to 280mm wide. The case also supports ATX power supplies that are up to 220mm in length, which means that this case can support large PSUs with insane maximum wattages. Another factor that’s worth noting about the Lian Li 216 is that it supports a range or accessories, which include an ARGB/USB expansion module, a PCIe riser cable for vertically mounted graphics cards, an a optional dust filter that can allow PC builders to take their dust management to the next level.

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The GPU placed at the top of the expansion slots in air cooling mode opens up the possibility to add a 120mm fan at the rear of the case without obstructing the GPU I/O. This is also possible with a vertically mounted GPU in both air-cooled and water-cooled mode. The additional 120mm fan provides better cooling for the GPU and a greater intake/exhaust balance for the system. The 216 is a chassis from Lian Li that is designed to act as a blank canvas, offering PC builders the option to exploit this case’s unique features to create truly custom PCs. We will look deeper at this case’s custom features later in this review. The included 160mm ARGB fans feature two channels of LEDs (one on the outer rim of the fan, another at the shaft of the fan blades) that can be controlled separately via an optional accessory, or via the motherboard lighting software by connecting them directly to a motherboard 5V 3pin header. Supported hardware includes motherboards up to E-ATX form factor, CPU cooler height of up to 180.5mm, a maximum graphics card length of up to 392mm and power supplies up to 220mm long. The LANCOOL 216 offers multiple options for easy cable management. Along the cable grommet bar, 3 large velcro straps can hold 2 different sets of cables. 3 small clips are located along the rear side panel, ideal for cleanly routing the CPU 8pin cable, and 2 additional velcro straps are located near the PSU chamber to help hold down the extra PSU cable length away from the ventilation path in the bottom chamber.