Cooler Master Announces TUF Gaming Alliance with ASUS
by Joe Shields on May 16, 2018 5:00 PM EST
Cooler Master recently announced a partnership with ASUS to produce a new line of TUF Gaming-branded products in collaboration with ASUS’ TUF Gaming initiatives. TUF Gaming is a product series from ASUS that is focused on durable and reliable gaming products. ASUS’ TUF Gaming Alliance, in turn, is a joint effort between Cooler Master, ASUS, and others in order to create a line of products for ‘an aesthetically cohesive gaming PC’.
Cooler Master’s role in this collaboration is to provide select chassis, cooling, and power supply options with three main design concepts: functionality, reliability, and visual consistency. In essence, we are looking at multiple partners rebranding products under a common aesthetic umbrella in order for a PC builder to more easily find and build a themed PC with quality products.
As far as which Cooler Master products will get the new digs, users will see the Masterbox MG500 mid-tower case, the MasterAir MA620P and MA410M heatsinks, and the MasterWatt power supply range in 450W, 550W, 650W, and 750W capacities. These specific components, Cooler Master says, were ‘specifically chosen because of their ability to run your games smoothly and reliably’.
The Masterbox MB500 incorporates the TUF Gaming camouflage/military styling with greyscale camouflage on the top, front, and on the edge-to-edge tempered glass side panel. The other difference is on the inside where the PSU shroud is cut out in order to display the PSU underneath (no doubt a MasterWatt TUF is what they are thinking). Otherwise, the case itself is the same allowing up to an ATX sized motherboard, 160mm clearance for CPU heatsinks, 400mm for video cards, and a maximum PSU length of 180mm. The MB500 case is able to house up to 3 120mm fans (2x 140mm), or up to a 360mm radiator in the front panel, 120mm radiator or fan in the back, and two 120mm fans up top.
The MasterWatt series of power supplies available for this endeavor comes in four wattage choices - 450W, 550W, 650W, and 750W models all receiving the same TUF Gaming treatment with the digital camouflage. We can see the same design on all sides except for where the specifications table is printed. The MasterWatt lineup is 80 Plus Bronze rated and offers users semi-fanless operation, modular cabling (outside of ATX/EPS cables) that is said to be thicker than standard market cables at 16AWG, and a 5-year warranty.
In order to keep the CPU cool, Cooler Master has selected two air cooling options in the MasterAir MA620P dual tower heatsink and the MasterAir MA410M single tower heatsink. Like the other products in the TUF Alliance, these get the TUF Gaming treatment as well with the camouflage on the top of the tower(s) a TUF Gaming Alliance sticker on the fan hub as well as the TUF ‘yellow’ color on the fan mounts. Both coolers include MasterFan MF120R RGB fans (one with the single tower MA410M) able to be controlled through motherboard software or using the included wired RGB LED controller. Both coolers use Cooler Master’s Continuous Direct Contact Technology (CDC 2.0) that is said to increase the contact surface area of heat pipes by 45% thus enhancing heat transfer. Each cooler is said to be tool-free mounting and the universal retention brackets support Intel LGA 115x, 1366, and 775 sockets, while on AMD it is compatible with AM4, AM3+, AM3, AM2, FM2+, FM2, and FM1.
MA620P
MA410M
Overall, the TUF Gaming Alliance appears to be a neat way to simplify a themed build and ensuring users are using quality parts that should match exactly. The alliance takes the work out of picking functional, reliable, and visually consistent parts as it intended, but at what cost? Pricing has not been listed however we do expect a slight price premium for the added convenience the program provides. Along with Cooler Master, it appears ASUS has teamed up with TeampGroup, as well as G.Skill and Micron for a complete TUF ecosystem. The MasterAir MA410M and MA620P are available now for pre-sale in North America while the MasterBox MB500 and MastwerWatt TUF Gaming Edition Power supplies are expected to be available in North America at the end of June 2018. Availability of the Cooler Master TUF Gaming components may vary per region and component.
Related Reading:
- The ASUS TUF X299 Mark I Motherboard Review: TUF Refined
- The ASUS ROG Maximus X Apex Review: X Marks the Sport, Literally
- Cooler Master Announces ML120R/240R AIO Liquid Coolers: Addressable RGB
- Cooler Master Announces Availability of New H500P Mesh White Mid-Tower Case
- Cooler Master at CES 2018: New MasterWatt V and Maker Power Supplies with Connect v.20 and Overlay.live telemetry
Source: Cooler Master
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ಬುಲ್ವಿಂಕಲ್ ಜೆ ಮೂಸ್ - Wednesday, May 16, 2018 - link
A 160mm Fan would be nice, as well as a 650 - 800 Watt power supply with 2 (count them - TWO) 24 pin motherboard cables and a case with a built in KVM switchThen I could fit 2 Mini ITX motherboards as well as high end graphics in a box approximately 8" X 9.5" X 18" and use it for a monitor stand in a box 1/4th the size of the Corsair Obsurdian 1000D
I would like to mount 1 motherboard face up and one above it face down with 1 (or two) graphics cards on each side and 160mm fan on the right end with a single power supply on the left blowing hot air out
B.T.W...
Why are so few making high end cases as Monitor stands to save desk space???
I would think there would be a market for space saving cases, even for 1 motherboard
Dragonstongue - Wednesday, May 16, 2018 - link
fractal design define C...I gots one, not the best of everything you could ask for, but very very good dust filtering included in the box, space for almost anything you could throw at it, and quite a bit "smaller" then pretty much all other ATX class mid-tower I have ever owned ^.^Dragonstongue - Wednesday, May 16, 2018 - link
I personally do not know why Asus "dumbed down" the TUF line because when it first came out, they were much much better than other vendors "top end" lines whereas if you look at them now, they tend to be at best "mid range" as far as specs are concerned, the audio used, the VRM, the amount of sata, as few as required fan connectors, hell if anything just going by their naming, the VRM/heatsink design for TUF should be very near the best they can do even if they decide to cut back on the audio chipset etc...screw the has to have RGB before it becomes yesterdays garbage O.o
had a few friends that had TUF motherboards as well as Maximus, Formula etc etc, the Sabertooth AMD/Intel was an amazing board (for its time) the "new" ones really are kind of blekk in comparison (instead they focus the good stuff will only go into the ROG or STRIX branding at least it seems to be this way) personally I would expect ROG is extra special over the top type designs, STRIX is "extra fast" whereas TUF should be second to none durability factor (which means best in class cooling, not "comparable" to other more main stream offerings)
IMO Asus really has "slipped" in the past decade or so compared to other company offerings, they used to be quite top notch, they seem to be more of "just another option" these days, granted I have always found their BIOS layout to be quite good compared to many, easy to find things, easy to use.
as for cooler master, their Master Air, are a bloody joke 9/10 at best only comparable to previous offerings (such as hyper 212 Plus) but they want even more $$ for them, real world performance vs marketing fluff always...silly fools ^.^
Ket_MANIAC - Thursday, May 17, 2018 - link
The TUF series is an entry level series now. Even ASUS admitted it a while back. I loved the Sabretooth series. They were fantastic.Eletriarnation - Thursday, May 17, 2018 - link
That MA410M has a more than passing resemblance to the Hyper 212...