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Its my scratch made brushed stainless steel ITX gaming case!

Niels_at_home
By Niels_at_home
in Build Logs
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Posted

Hello!

 

I couldn't find the ideal case for my new build. So I designed my own! Its been a long and expensive project, but I'm super pleased with the results! Read on if you want to find out more. And I've also made a video:

 

 

What I wanted and why I wanted what I wanted:

2008 is the last time I made a new pc for myself. Yes I'm still going on a 4ghz Core 2 Duo! Most of the time I am the weak link in the productivity chain, not the computer... :)  My objective with computer cases / modding is always to reduce noise as much as possible. I am not a fan of windowed cases and the maximum number of LEDs I tolerate is 1. I also like products that take up no more space than needed. This is my list of requirements for the case:

  - Small, very small!

  - Quiet, very quiet!

  - Dual slot long graphics card

  - Big tower cooler

  - Slightly long powersupply (up to 160mm)

  - Enough 3.5 and 2.5 inch soft mounted drives

  - (slim) Optical drive

 

 

The parts:

The parts itself are really nothing special, just a solid gaming build:

  - Coolermaster G550M power

  - Asus Z97i plus

  - I5 4690K (@4.7ghz)

  - Noctua NH D15

  - Kingston 16Gb DDR3 2400

  - Gigabyte GTX970 G1 GAMING 4GD

  - Crucial M550 512Gb SSD

  - Samsung Slim DVD SN 208 FB

  - Be Quiet Silent Wings fans (3x 140mm, 2x 120mm)

 

 

The Case:

Considering it fits all these large components, it is really really small:

  - 20cm wide, 32cm deep, 28cm high (32cm with feet)

  - 7.9in wide, 12.6in deep, 11in high (12.6in with feet)

  - 18 liters volume, 0.64 cubic foot

 

To give you some idea, the Coolermaster N200 which is one of the smaller 'normal' micro ATX cases that I sometimes use, is 34 liters in volume, almost twice the size!

Personally I quite like the brushed stainless steel look with chrome fan grills. It has a nice industrial / minimalistic type of look about it! I've attached some pics.

 

In order to make things workable, the fans are all mounted from the outside. This way I can just about get to all the mainboard connectors without going all "Go Go Gadget Arms" to get to impossible to reach places. :) Its been surprisingly 'easy to get to' and no blood was spilled during the build.

 

 

The cooling:

The top fans are intake, 2x 140mm fans blowing onto the graphics card and down into the case. The bottom and rear fans, close to the cpu cooler, are exhaust fans. The powersupply has the intake on the front and exhaust on the bottom as well. This goes against natural convection and I am an idiot!  :) Actually I think any sort of forced airflow will be many times more potent than the natural tendency for hot air to rise. The fan direction can be changed, and I might do that at some point to compare the two situations. Top intake, bottom exhaust has the benefit of attracting a lot less dust into the case.

 

At idle the fans all run at about 350RPM. At full load it was about 650RPM to give you some idea. That is really not very high speed, nice and quiet. The GTX970 does have a bit of coil whine, though its not as high frequency as I feared.

 

 

The Temps:

Temps? Do we care about temps? :) If you're building a silent computer, low temps mean your fans need to be slowed down! I've been quite conservative with the fan profiles so GPU and CPU top out at about 75c. Most likely I will change the profiles to get 80 .. 85c maximum temps, in return for even less noise. Remember we're talking a few high quality 500RPM soft mounted fans, this thing is really quiet!

 

Hey if you've seen any Linus videos, you know hardware can take quite a beating, it will be fine for years! :)

 

 

The conclu$ion

Making a 'one off' is expensive. This case cost about 500 Euro or 550 USD! Gulp!  Sometimes you just have to do a crazy thing. :)

 

I could make more, and it would cost less because of the production volume benefits, but lets not get ahead of things for now, I'm happy this one is done! :)

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post-237899-0-20820300-1435224963_thumb.

post-237899-0-65062000-1435224980_thumb.

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Posted

Nice :D

Here is one in the same size style, but he spent a lot more money on it and he uses a smaller psu

http://linustechtips.com/main/topic/260501-nova-haswell-e-and-sli-gtx-980s-in-170l/

 

How did you get those curves to be so perfect ?

Recommend what is best, not what you preffer.

"Like" comments to show your support of them or the idea they express.

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Posted

Nice!

CPU: Ryzen 2700x Cooler: NZXT x52 Kraken Motherboard: ASUS Crosshair Vii RAM: Team Darkgroup 3600 16GB DDR4 GPU: Palit GTX 1080 Gamerock SSD: Samsung 840 EVO 256 GB, 500gb 870 Evo, 250gb 970 Evo m.2 HDD: 2TB Seagate Barracude Case: Meshify C PSU: Corsair AX860i OS: Windows 10 Pro

 

Laptop: MSI GS70 2QE

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Posted

431f49e1f3.gif

 

This looks excellent, like properly excellent

"The of and to a in is I that it for you was with on as have but be they"

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Posted

you should do something for the rear gpu bracket it's look unfinished

anyways good job man!

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Posted
- snip -

Wellcome to the forum!

 

It looks really nice.

Does a company (laser)cut the pieces for you? Also there are people (me included) who spend more than 500 euro for a case or custom water cooling.

Mineral oil and 40 kg aluminium heat sinks are a perfect combination: 73 cores and a Titan X, Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Oil

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Posted

Nice build! I think I'd prefer low profile cap screws on the outside but that's just me ;)

I gotta say nice job on the video too I enjoyed the humour :D

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Posted

This is awesome! Someone should start selling these.

 

This is exactly what I thought the Raijintek Metis would be. Instead it can't fit a decent GPU or PSU and has no vents on top.

PC: CPU: Intel i7-4790 MB: Gigabyte B85N RAM: Adata 4GB + Kingston 8GB SSD: Samsung 850 EVO 500GB GPU: XFX GTR RX 480 8GB Case: Advantech IPC-510 PSU: Corsair RM1000i KB: Idobao x YMDK ID75 with Outemu Silent Grey Mouse: Logitech G305 Mousepad: LTT Deskpad Headphones: AKG K240 Sextett
Phone: Sony Xperia 5 II
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Posted
  • Author

Thanks for the positive replies! The secret to the nice look and bending is to pay a professional to do the hard work.  :)  As long as I stick to the design and assembly and nothing more, it may work out well... :)

 

I should've used stainless bolts, flatter ones would have been a bit nicer. The top fans are mounted with harddisk screws, as the coarse thread grips well in the Be Quiet fan rubber mounts. Ideally all the bolts are the same look, and I would use cap nuts on the front fan grill.

 

Should temps be your thing, at full speed the cooling is very good, I don't think there is a drawback having a small case, as long as there are enough fans in it. But I don't want noise and a 60c CPU if I can get peace and quiet at 80c. :)  Most of the time its near or at idle, where even with the fans at 300RPM temps are silly low of course.

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Posted

Nice. And I usually don't like the look of small form factor stuff, but you pulled it off. +10

Ketchup is better than mustard.

GUI is better than Command Line Interface.

Dubs are better than subs

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  • 2 months later...
Posted

I found this case via your youtube video and it's very similar to what I've had in mind for a MicroATX build. There are some ideas from this build that I'd definitely like to borrow from (the motherboard mounting method in particular!!).

 

Great build, I'd really like to know just how quiet you've managed to make this.

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Everything I've ever wanted from an ITX case

but if you could decrease the thickness it'll be perfect :D

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  • 2 weeks later...
Posted
  • Author

Hey Cano, thanks! Its hard to measure without really proper equipment, and then you'd have to measure a few baseline 'normal systems'... I'm super picky about noise, and when gaming it does become audible, and under high CPU load as well. But for stable 4.7ghz you can't expect it to be inaudible. During normal time wasting usage (youtube, surfin.. or even a bit of Office or CAD) when I come back upstairs after dinner, I have to look if the pc is on, because its not audible.

 

Here is a size comparison I made between a Corsair Carbide 300R and Coolermaster N200.

 

 

I did some numbers and if I was to make a batch I might be able to sell it for about €300 / $350 ex shipping / VAT as a build yourself kit.

 

I think the lack of snazzy colours and RGB leds means I didn't get the mega response here (or elsewhere) that I hoped though so its a bit unlikely I'll make a batch.. but at that price (which does include a profit for me as well) its not too bad I'd think.

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- snip -

Well I do like the clean look and I'm glad you haven't turned the case into a rainbow. But I just finished my build (more or less) so I'm not interested in a new case.

 

About the response: An actual build log gets much more attention than just showing off a finished build. I experinced that by myself.

Poeple just like to interact with you during the build and give tips.

 

Also most people build a case by themself or buy a "cheap" one of the shelf. And a lot of people just looks at the pictures, when going through build logs....

Mineral oil and 40 kg aluminium heat sinks are a perfect combination: 73 cores and a Titan X, Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Oil

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  • 4 months later...
Posted

Sorry for the late post, but I just got to see the first video on YouTube as it showed up on my recommended vids lol. And then found this thread. This case is amazing. Love the brushed finish and smart craftsmanship. It's like the Raijintek Metis but with better cooling options! Makes me wish I can buy this case instead.

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Thanks!

 

Its been going strong for a few months now and I even use its power now and then playing some Far Cry. I don't really see it as its underneath my desk, but hey I know its there being all pretty.. :P

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Posted

Hello!

I couldn't find the ideal case for my new build. So I designed my own! Its been a long and expensive project, but I'm super pleased with the results! Read on if you want to find out more. And I've also made a video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=POce5Gp1myU

What I wanted and why I wanted what I wanted:

2008 is the last time I made a new pc for myself. Yes I'm still going on a 4ghz Core 2 Duo! Most of the time I am the weak link in the productivity chain, not the computer... :) My objective with computer cases / modding is always to reduce noise as much as possible. I am not a fan of windowed cases and the maximum number of LEDs I tolerate is 1. I also like products that take up no more space than needed. This is my list of requirements for the case:

- Small, very small!

- Quiet, very quiet!

- Dual slot long graphics card

- Big tower cooler

- Slightly long powersupply (up to 160mm)

- Enough 3.5 and 2.5 inch soft mounted drives

- (slim) Optical drive

The parts:

The parts itself are really nothing special, just a solid gaming build:

- Coolermaster G550M power

- Asus Z97i plus

- I5 4690K (@4.7ghz)

- Noctua NH D15

- Kingston 16Gb DDR3 2400

- Gigabyte GTX970 G1 GAMING 4GD

- Crucial M550 512Gb SSD

- Samsung Slim DVD SN 208 FB

- Be Quiet Silent Wings fans (3x 140mm, 2x 120mm)

The Case:

Considering it fits all these large components, it is really really small:

- 20cm wide, 32cm deep, 28cm high (32cm with feet)

- 7.9in wide, 12.6in deep, 11in high (12.6in with feet)

- 18 liters volume, 0.64 cubic foot

To give you some idea, the Coolermaster N200 which is one of the smaller 'normal' micro ATX cases that I sometimes use, is 34 liters in volume, almost twice the size!

Personally I quite like the brushed stainless steel look with chrome fan grills. It has a nice industrial / minimalistic type of look about it! I've attached some pics.

In order to make things workable, the fans are all mounted from the outside. This way I can just about get to all the mainboard connectors without going all "Go Go Gadget Arms" to get to impossible to reach places. :) Its been surprisingly 'easy to get to' and no blood was spilled during the build.

The cooling:

The top fans are intake, 2x 140mm fans blowing onto the graphics card and down into the case. The bottom and rear fans, close to the cpu cooler, are exhaust fans. The powersupply has the intake on the front and exhaust on the bottom as well. This goes against natural convection and I am an idiot! :) Actually I think any sort of forced airflow will be many times more potent than the natural tendency for hot air to rise. The fan direction can be changed, and I might do that at some point to compare the two situations. Top intake, bottom exhaust has the benefit of attracting a lot less dust into the case.

At idle the fans all run at about 350RPM. At full load it was about 650RPM to give you some idea. That is really not very high speed, nice and quiet. The GTX970 does have a bit of coil whine, though its not as high frequency as I feared.

The Temps:

Temps? Do we care about temps? :) If you're building a silent computer, low temps mean your fans need to be slowed down! I've been quite conservative with the fan profiles so GPU and CPU top out at about 75c. Most likely I will change the profiles to get 80 .. 85c maximum temps, in return for even less noise. Remember we're talking a few high quality 500RPM soft mounted fans, this thing is really quiet!

Hey if you've seen any Linus videos, you know hardware can take quite a beating, it will be fine for years! :)

The conclu$ion

Making a 'one off' is expensive. This case cost about 500 Euro or 550 USD! Gulp! Sometimes you just have to do a crazy thing. :)

I could make more, and it would cost less because of the production volume benefits, but lets not get ahead of things for now, I'm happy this one is done! :)

Hey man I see your CPU running at 4.7ghz, I have the same one and I take it you over clocked it l, and I was wondering how well it ran at those speeds because I plan to overclock when I get a better cooler.
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Well any overclocking guide you read points to one thing: Luck! To some extend you need to be lucky with the chip. More speed needs more voltage. More voltage is much more heat. The more luck you have with your chip, the more speed it will do with relatively little extra voltage.

 

I'm at about 1.3 Volt to get a video encoding stress test to be stable.. You may get the same, better or worse results.. I can't tell!

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props for making a case that suits you but i feel like you skipped the design part of it.. i mean it isn't very pretty imo but i don't know if that is the style you wanted or if functionality is above esthetic in your book? 
either way it's a neat project and i like that you went for air cooling :) 

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Looks are mega subjective of course. I always like minimalistic things that do the job efficiently and quietly. And of course I didn't design and made a case that wouldn't be pretty in my eyes! That would be a bad way to spend 500 euro. :-)

 

Small and quiet were the objectives, and I like how it turned out, but of course half the fun is making it and a sense of pride makes my views not so objective.. :-)

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  • 1 year later...
Posted

Hopefully you see this, as it's been a while but...where did you get your power button? I have seen it (or something similar) used in several custom case builds, but I can't seem to find it out there in the internets. Thanks!

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On 8/22/2017 at 10:27 AM, tyfoo said:

Hopefully you see this, as it's been a while but...where did you get your power button? I have seen it (or something similar) used in several custom case builds, but I can't seem to find it out there in the internets. Thanks!

That is called a Vandel switch.

 

Preformance PC sells some for Case mods

http://www.performance-pcs.com/switches

 

and someone here is designing a RGB one.

https://linustechtips.com/main/topic/687201-iris-16-building-an-rgb-power-button/#comment-8821876

 

if you want to annoy me, then join my teamspeak server ts.benja.cc

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