quest_for_silence wrote:
[..] Unless you are going to consider "tower" the smallest Lian-Li and Cooltek/Jonsbo/Rosewill mITX offerings, I'm sorry, but I'm not aware of such a design: the only mITX tower enclosures reasonably sized are the already quoted Ncase M1 and Evga Hadron; I would add the
Inwin 901 but it's pretty rare and expensive.
To be fair, tower-style is to be regarded also the new Raven Z from Silverstone, but it looks like pretty ugly in my humble opinion, unless you may like the "nouvelle-steam-vague".
Anyway, set aside the M1, the other tower enclosures seem somehow close to the smallest mATX offerings, such as the Antec NSK3480 or the Silverstone SG03 and its derivatives: so YMMV with reference to your needs.
EVGA and IN WIN are both with a side window, so in my eyes a NoGo, NCASE ofc still a case of dreams, maybe in a few months. The Raven Z is indeed some ugly case

Mats wrote:
I haven't read the whole thread, but the 4770K is overkill for gaming with that graphics card, and overclocking won't make any difference.
Use that money for a faster GPU instead if you want to spend money.
[..] Now I'm not telling you to get a 2600K, but maybe a 4670K. OCing just isn't for me at least, you have fun for a couple of days and then you get bored. It's much better to invest in a better GPU and not having to upgrade anytime soon.
No OC > less heat > smaller heatsinks > smaller cases.
Yes, I plan on purchasing a 4670K, not for the purpouse of OC but rather underclock it even. The 4770K would be more of a prestige for me than of actual use.
Mats wrote:
On the other hand, the 750 Ti is a very good choice, maybe save the money for a NCASE?
If you can settle with a 750 Ti, the system will draw less than 150 W.
MSI makes one quiet model at least. Combine this with a 4670 CPU, Silverstone SFX 300 W with a semi passive psu
(Edit: a regular ATX PSU makes more sense here), and maybe a
Cooltek U2 case (smaller than a 304) and you won't have to pay much for any of the components, and no monster heatsink is needed.
I am starting to fall in love with the 750 Ti, BUT since I am playing with
"How small can I go?", the
MSI GTX 760 Mini ITX Gaming got my attentions with its cute 170mm length. So it can fit even into the smalles of small enclosures.
In the end, the most quiet video card my be the key factor anyway, meaning, GTX 750 Ti, 760, Radeon 265, 270 and maybe 270X are still possibilities.
Mats wrote:
Whatever you do, put the most effort in finding a quiet graphics card, or at least a decent separate cooler that fits the case you want.
In the end it will most likely be the noisiest component. I know that some Nvidia cards can stop the fans when in idle.
With the PSU fan stopped when in idle, no HDD, and a slow spinning fan for the CPU, you'd better have a quiet graphics card.

Yes, I completely agree with you in this point.
Mats wrote:
One of
my personal favorites is the Cooltek Coolcube, half the size of a 304 and smaller than a NCASE.
The upcoming Silverstone ML07 may be an alternative, similar to Raven Z.
The 605 is 25 l, here you have a list of cases smaller than that with room for dual slot cards. Make sure there's room for the graphics card you want.
http://geizhals.de/?cat=gehatx&xf=1002_ ... 8_2#xf_topSilverstone is about to launch new SFX PSU's with semi passive fans, 500 and 600 Watt.
ohhgourami wrote:
I like the Cooltek U2/Jonsbo case. It has potential to be a nice small quiet case, mostly because it can fit a full sized air cooler and has intake vents for the GPU.
I was surprised when I saw the german tounge sides.

Saw some of these while on my (still ongoing)
"How small can I go?" quest. I will read some reviews after I've written this post. The idea of a really small enclosure is becomming more and more powerful.

Guys, thank you very much for the imput and getting me to reason (in case of the enclosure into a quest I might get totally crazy with

).
I will post any new ideas or questions, but first I have to finally inform myself about cases and GPU (fans).
One more question: I was told, the distance from vent -> wall should be >1/2 of the radius of the fan; e.g. 120mm fan -> at least 30mm. Is this a good indicator? If so, even "perforated" cases wouldn't be such a problem and I wouldn't doubt a mITX case such much anymore.
myselphabet
PS:
THIS is just crazy small, something I would aim for.

Still powerful, I'm just doubting it may be really quiet near idle
