- Must fit a full ATX motherboard.
- Make it as small as possible. No huge towers!
- Effecient air flow.
- Filter intake if possible.
I was looking at my current case and noticed that it's slightly wider than some. But it doesn't really take much more space. There are two 80mm exhaust fans next to the pci slots. I was thinking that a PSU is only slightly wider than an 80mm fan. So if you put a PSU on the side and down at the bottom, that would shrink the height of the case while not making it much wider. I thought about it and came up with my new idea.
** Warning ** Cheap MS Paint drawings below....
There are other cases that put the PSU on the side like that for a shorter ATX case. But they usually put it next to the back plate right over the CPU. That doesn't leave any room for an exhaust fan meaning the PSU has to exhause all the heat from the case and limits the CPU HS height. My idea puts the PSU at the bottom of the case where more cool air is. If you're using a bottom mounted PSU, it also will allow for some cooling of PCI devices like video. Although with a hot GPU or SLI, you could still be pumping some hot air through the PSU. But I don't ever expect to be implementing any high end graphics setups myself.
Like many cases, it has a nice big 120mm fan in the normal position for exhaust. But since the case is shorter, this will be getting rid of all the hot air that's rising up which normally runs into the PSU.
Since the case is a little wider, I was also hoping I could make it a little bit shorter on the depth as the CD/DVD drives would be over far enough that they won't interfere with the memory. As long as the CPU is far enough back, this shouldn't be a problem.
The door would keep dust from getting in through the drives. Again, since it's wider, I was also thinking it would be cool to make the door slide into the case when it's open.
The rest of the front below the drives would be open to allow plenty of air in. The front below the door being spaced forward could then have a design of some sorts cut into it. Maybe with something behind it to prevent a direct opening for sound to get out. (Notice the cheesy attempt to draw attention to my idea by using the spcr logo =) Also, the bottom may be open some too. I was thinking that there could also be room to fit some filters over these two openings as well. Than the optional front intake fan might help to keep the air flowing in through the filters. I didn't draw it in, but there would be some feet on it to raise it up off the ground.
Last the HD could be mounted on the bottom or maybe on the back wall in some sort of suspended setup. At the front there, it should get plenty of cool air passing by it with or without the intake fan.
I drew it and plan on building a test setup out of wood. Although there would be no reason this case couldn't be built out of steel. I just don't have the skill or tools for it. I had enough trouble cutting out a motherboard tray/pci slots from an old case as that would be difficult to make out of wood. I'll be making my prototype out of MDF.
