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bgiddins
Joined: 14 Sep 2008
Posts: 175
Location: Australia
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 Posted: Sun Mar 08, 2009 3:18 am Post subject: M350 Mini ITX case |
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http://www.mini-box.com/M350-universal-mini-itx-enclosure
Anyone seen these in the flesh or bought one?
I'm still thinking of cooking up an Atom 330 build... this case ticks all the boxes for me except for the lack of filtering and 40mm fan mounts... just not sure how hot an Atom 330 board gets that would be mostly idle.
Maybe a 120mm fan could be hacked into there somehow.
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DanielV
Joined: 30 Oct 2007
Posts: 12
Location: Aarhus, Denmark
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| Posted: Mon May 18, 2009 5:16 am Post subject: Re: M350 Mini ITX case |
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| bgiddins wrote: | http://www.mini-box.com/M350-universal-mini-itx-enclosure
Anyone seen these in the flesh or bought one?
I'm still thinking of cooking up an Atom 330 build... this case ticks all the boxes for me except for the lack of filtering and 40mm fan mounts... just not sure how hot an Atom 330 board gets that would be mostly idle.
Maybe a 120mm fan could be hacked into there somehow. |
I'm been drowling over this since I saw it combined with Zotac's ION-ITX-A: http://www.mini-itx.com/reviews/zotac-ion/default.asp?page=1
My idea is to mount a single 500 GB 2.5" harddrive on the left harddrive/fan rail and ditch the right rail and mount a Scythe KAZE JYU SLIM 100mm fan to the cabinet itself - it should be able to fit as it is only 2 mm. thicker than the standard 40mm. fans that comes with the M350 and has to be mounted on the rails (that obviously takes up space aswell).
Then hook it all up with 4GB RAM, 2 x Cinergy HTC USB XS HD and Windows 7 64-bit.
And then hide it all behind my LCD TV.
Later on I'll proably combine it with a Synology NAS.
Daniel... |
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Cov
Joined: 04 Feb 2008
Posts: 366
Location: London
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| Posted: Thu May 21, 2009 2:54 pm Post subject: |
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Good to see that other people like the M350 case as well.
Thought I was the only one 
Well, I'm about to order the following parts. Might have to wait until the end of the month.
1. Mini iTX case: M350 192 (w) x 210 (d) x 62 mm (h)
2. CPU: E8400 3.0 GHz
3. motherboard: Zotac GeForce 9300 iTX
4. RAM: G.Skill F2-6400CL4D-4GBHK (2x 2GB)
5. HDD: WD5000BEVT (500GB / 2.5 inch) ... I'd prefer the OCZ Vertex but the price ...
6. Pico PSU: 150 XT (12V / 24PIN)
7. Adaptor: 150W (12V / 12.5A)
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jessekopelman
Joined: 13 Feb 2007
Posts: 1404
Location: USA
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| Posted: Thu May 21, 2009 6:28 pm Post subject: Re: M350 Mini ITX case |
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| bgiddins wrote: |
just not sure how hot an Atom 330 board gets that would be mostly idle. |
Which board, though; that's the question. 945GSE would probably run the coolest, but is there one with a 300? Other than that, one of those new Zotac Ion-based 330 boards seems like it would be the best choice. |
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DanielV
Joined: 30 Oct 2007
Posts: 12
Location: Aarhus, Denmark
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| Posted: Fri May 22, 2009 3:20 am Post subject: Re: M350 Mini ITX case |
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No matter what I would wait and opt for the Ion platform, it's guaranteed to be worth the wait over all other solutions! 
Daniel... |
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Cov
Joined: 04 Feb 2008
Posts: 366
Location: London
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| Posted: Fri May 22, 2009 5:09 am Post subject: Re: M350 Mini ITX case |
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| DanielV wrote: | | ... it's guaranteed to be worth the wait ... |
From I have read so far, I doubt it very much. |
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DanielV
Joined: 30 Oct 2007
Posts: 12
Location: Aarhus, Denmark
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| Posted: Fri May 22, 2009 7:01 am Post subject: Re: M350 Mini ITX case |
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| Cov wrote: | | DanielV wrote: | | ... it's guaranteed to be worth the wait ... |
From I have read so far, I doubt it very much. |
Why do you say that?
It has low power usage, heat dissipation and potentially "zero" noise combined with more than enough CPU and GPU power for such a small system.
Not trying to start a argument here, I'm just very interested in your point of view on this.
Best regards, Daniel... |
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Cov
Joined: 04 Feb 2008
Posts: 366
Location: London
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| Posted: Fri May 22, 2009 12:28 pm Post subject: Re: M350 Mini ITX case |
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| DanielV wrote: | | Why do you say that? |
Daniel, for someone who's looking for as much power as possible on 170 x 170 mm, the new ION series just can't compete with socket 775 CPUs.
I understand your point of view though.
If the advantages, outlined in your last posting, are important to you, then the ION system seems to be spot on.
I'd be very curious about whether the differences in consumption are equivalent to the performance or even better compared to socket 775 systems.
It's been said to be Vista (incl Aero interface) capable, which speaks for itself.
I wonder how much "smoother" Windows 7 would run compared to Vista on this very system.
The integrated DC-DC PSU is another good looking thing to have, next to the new standard DDR2 DIMM slots.
Only the price might not be as attractive as it could be.
Sorry if I appeard like dismissing the Ion system, we both have just different preferences - that's all.
Despite not using the powersaving / low noise potential of Mini iTX, the system I'm planning to build will be still so much more economical (and quiter) than my current mATX one.
Leaving the descrete HQ graphics card, an ODD and two 3.5" HDDs away in favour for a single 2.5" HDD and later a SSD of course, that's gonna be a great improvement (in my situation) I guess. |
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DanielV
Joined: 30 Oct 2007
Posts: 12
Location: Aarhus, Denmark
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| Posted: Fri May 22, 2009 2:38 pm Post subject: Re: M350 Mini ITX case |
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| Cov wrote: | | DanielV wrote: | | Why do you say that? |
Daniel, for someone who's looking for as much power as possible on 170 x 170 mm, the new ION series just can't compete with socket 775 CPUs.
I understand your point of view though.
If the advantages, outlined in your last posting, are important to you, then the ION system seems to be spot on.
I'd be very curious about whether the differences in consumption are equivalent to the performance or even better compared to socket 775 systems.
It's been said to be Vista (incl Aero interface) capable, which speaks for itself.
I wonder how much "smoother" Windows 7 would run compared to Vista on this very system.
The integrated DC-DC PSU is another good looking thing to have, next to the new standard DDR2 DIMM slots.
Only the price might not be as attractive as it could be.
Sorry if I appeard like dismissing the Ion system, we both have just different preferences - that's all.
Despite not using the powersaving / low noise potential of Mini iTX, the system I'm planning to build will be still so much more economical (and quiter) than my current mATX one.
Leaving the descrete HQ graphics card, an ODD and two 3.5" HDDs away in favour for a single 2.5" HDD and later a SSD of course, that's gonna be a great improvement (in my situation) I guess. |
Yeah, it's just a matter of purpose, need and goal for the system.
I'm interested in the Ion platform for a totally hidden HTPC and nothing else. (See earlier post for my idea for configuration.)
It, or any other small form factor, would never do for me as a workstation, there simply isn't enough power in it for my kind of work (photography).
Best regards, Daniel... |
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Cov
Joined: 04 Feb 2008
Posts: 366
Location: London
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| Posted: Sat May 23, 2009 6:59 am Post subject: |
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Hi. I have taken a few pictures of the 1:1 paper model ... 192 (w) x 210 (d) x 62 mm (h)
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In comparison to the keyboard you can see how tiny this case really is.
The smallest active ultra low profile cpu cooler is just about small enough to fit in.
Here a comparison of the M350 to the Silverstone SG01 ...
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jessekopelman
Joined: 13 Feb 2007
Posts: 1404
Location: USA
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| Posted: Sun May 24, 2009 12:14 am Post subject: Re: M350 Mini ITX case |
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| DanielV wrote: | No matter what I would wait and opt for the Ion platform, it's guaranteed to be worth the wait over all other solutions!
Daniel... |
What do you mean wait? It already exists and is available for sale (at least in Asia and the US). The truth is that it is not the best solution for every situation. 945GSE uses less power, so if you don't need video acceleration it would seem to be the best platform. However, it does not seem to be available with a 330 Atom, only a single core 270 . . . Also, Ion is perfectly acceptable for MPEG/2 and H264 playback, but it is pretty anemic for Flash and even general web browsing and desktop operation. If you want your HTPC to do more than just play downloads and discs, going with a socket 775, 9300 chipset, mini-ITX board and any modern proc. would yield much superior performance for not that big a power consumption penalty. There are also some overpriced 780G and 8200 chipset socket AM2 mini-ITX boards that support undervolting and would actually provide superior performance to Ion with no power consumption penalty (but would cost more money).
Ion is decent solution, but it is no pancea. Just like everything else in the mini-ITX world it has some very significant limitations. Mini-ITX, more than any other formfactor, is really lacking in obvious bang for the buck wins. The stuff that does exactly what you want is too expensive and the stuff that is priced nicely doesn't do exactly what you want. At least Ion is competition for Intel. Things are already much better than when VIA was the only game in town. Maybe in another year or two we will get the point where it becomes hard to go wrong no matter what solution you choose. |
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piglover
Joined: 08 Jun 2009
Posts: 59
Location: California
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| Posted: Mon Jun 08, 2009 10:05 am Post subject: |
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I bought one of these to house a small, near-silent PC to live in a bedroom. Just needed light web browsing, itunes and e-mail. Took whatever parts I could get cheap/on sale/out of my bins.
Atom 330 ITX MB (D945GCLF2)
2Gb generic DDR2
Hitachi 160Gb 7200 RPM laptop drive
2 40x10mm Mini-Kaze fans (one on the case, one replacing stock chipset fan)
M350 case + PicoPSU 150
Trend-micro mini USB wifi
Pros on the case
- About as small as you will ever get for Mini-ITX. No wasted space.
- Drive mount is very creative
- Front USB holds micro-WiFi card
- VESA mounts to back of most monitors (zero footprint)
Cons
- Too many holes. No way to control airflow. Good if your rig can run near passive, con for much more than 50watt total system idle. Not sure I'd run more than than an Atom in it.
- Fan mount at front (top when vesa mounted) has almost no effect. Half blocked by standard ITX ram placement. Plus with all the holes the 40mm fan does nearly nothing. I ended up removing it with almost no effect on temps.
- There are a bunch of holes in the front of the case right behind the USB mounts. I had to seal these up to prevent severe overheating of the WiFi stick.
I'm generally very satisfied with the build. Its nearly silent, zero footprint, and really pretty slick. I think mini-box could do a bit more work on managing airflow but otherwise its a good box for certain applications. |
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Cov
Joined: 04 Feb 2008
Posts: 366
Location: London
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| Posted: Mon Jun 08, 2009 10:15 am Post subject: |
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| piglover wrote: | | I bought one of these ... |
Pic please, or it never happened  |
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Lockheed
Joined: 19 Jun 2003
Posts: 84
Location: Eastern USA
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| Posted: Mon Jun 08, 2009 5:24 pm Post subject: |
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Mine's in the mail, I can post pictures once it comes in.
I bought the D945GSEJT a few weeks ago and the case was backordered, so I've been waiting.
It's booting FreeNAS off a 512mb Sandisk USB thumb drive, and I'm using a single WD Green 1.5TB drive for storage.
About 33MB/sec samba read speed, which is more than enough for my needs. I realize it will be faster if I put linux on, but I like the convenience of having the system booting off of USB flash.
The whole thing idles at about 13W when the drive spins down. I found that the AC brick draws 1W even when I have nothing plugged in, so maybe it's idling at 12W.
Even when I have full file copying going, the system only draws around 18-19W.
Power figures were measured using a Kill-A-Watt. |
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Lockheed
Joined: 19 Jun 2003
Posts: 84
Location: Eastern USA
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Taxidermista
Joined: 30 Nov 2008
Posts: 4
Location: Spain
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| Posted: Tue Jul 07, 2009 6:58 am Post subject: Re: M350 Mini ITX case |
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| DanielV wrote: | | ... and ditch the right rail and mount a Scythe KAZE JYU SLIM 100mm fan to the cabinet itself - it should be able to fit as it is only 2 mm. thicker than the standard 40mm. fans that comes with the M350 and has to be mounted on the rails (that obviously takes up space aswell) |
That fan seems the perfect match for this case, even the 3.5" HD mountings that come with the fan would be handy to attach it to the case top cover. |
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mark19891989
Joined: 26 May 2009
Posts: 185
Location: UK
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| Posted: Fri Jul 17, 2009 4:01 am Post subject: Re: M350 Mini ITX case |
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| bgiddins wrote: | http://www.mini-box.com/M350-universal-mini-itx-enclosure
Anyone seen these in the flesh or bought one?
I'm still thinking of cooking up an Atom 330 build... this case ticks all the boxes for me except for the lack of filtering and 40mm fan mounts... just not sure how hot an Atom 330 board gets that would be mostly idle.
Maybe a 120mm fan could be hacked into there somehow. |
that case is nice, id like that style of case, but big enough to fit a matx mb and full pci cards, same layout for the psu/hd mounts etc, and id be a happy person :d
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specs:E8400@4ghz,4gb ddr2 1066, DFI LP jr p45-t2rs,Super talent 64gb ssd,8800gts @ 513/792/1674, 8800gt @ 555/800/1782 corsair tx650
Cooling:XSPC Acrylic top, MCP355, D-TEK FuZion v2,XSPC RS360 Black,swiftech MCW60,D-TEK FuZion GFX+uni sink,EK-NB S-MAX
Server/htpc: Zotac GeForce 9300-ITX-I-E - E5200 - 4gb ddr2 800 - 2* 1.5tb f2 drives- Pico PSU - minja |
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