Fairly priced m-atx case options and opinions..

[YoskiBruhski]

Hope everyone is well. Recently updated my kid's PC, and I'd like to throw his old hardware into a "smaller" form factor case. The MB is a m-atx with a i7 8700 non-k. I have began the search for m-atx cases that will house an atx PSU as well. Here images of 2 cases that are fairly cheap. Any opinions or experiences with a m-atx case would be great. Just talking shop before I purchase, out of curiosity.

[Pixelfie]

I would get that first one,that second one looks like it doesn't have good airflow.

A great option would be a Masterbox Q300L

[Alvin853]

"Smaller" and "fairly priced" are very vague terms, and the variety of cases is huge, so some more details to narrow it down a bit?
What length of GPU needs to be supported? Height of CPU cooler? Does exterior color matter? Glass sidepanel?

A good low budget case that still looks good and has plenty of space for a big GPU and CPU cooler is the Cooler Master Masterbox Q300L that @Pixelfie just mentioned. The smallest possible case that still fits mATX board and ATX PSU is the Sama IM-01 I believe, but that one is a little bit more, and you're somewhat limited in terms of GPU size and CPU coolers.

[YoskiBruhski]

26 minutes ago, Pixelfie said:

I would get that first one,that second one looks like it doesn't have good airflow.

A great option would be a Masterbox Q300L

I was leaning towards that one as well.. It looks a little more discreet too. Since this will be a tertiary system, no glass side panels, or rgb would be fine. Thanks!

[8tg]

14 minutes ago, YoskiBruhski said:

I was leaning towards that one as well.. It looks a little more discreet too. Since this will be a tertiary system, no glass side panels, or rgb would be fine. Thanks!

I personally wouldn’t go with the Q300L, it’s good because it’s cheap, but if airflow is ever a concern, despite that it’s entirely holes it’s got terrible airflow.

The reason being that it’s entirely holes, there’s no directional airflow, air from a front intake fan setup just goes out the top, the rear exhaust just sort of pulls from anywhere, it’s good if you have a really low temperature system where airflow isn’t really a concern anyway, but not much else.

The fractal design core 1000 is a very clean case, well designed and function over form oriented.

But this all comes down to what components this pc will have, because if we’re talking just the igpu or a 1050ti or something, you wouldn’t need to worry too much about having a case designed well for modern components, and could comfortably use any of the cheap 30$ Roseville towers out there.

[8tg]

It’s bland, it’s glossy, it’s straight out of 2005, it’s the rose will FBM-01

the front intake pulls from a cutout on the bottom of the front panel and it actually works a lot better than you’d think, side ventilation is also standard from the mid 2000’s but sometimes useful today.

 

and it costs pocket change because there’s mountains of these building up in Newegg’s warehouses every day 

[YoskiBruhski]

3 minutes ago, 8tg said:

I personally wouldn’t go with the Q300L, it’s good because it’s cheap, but if airflow is ever a concern, despite that it’s entirely holes it’s got terrible airflow.

The reason being that it’s entirely holes, there’s no directional airflow, air from a front intake fan setup just goes out the top, the rear exhaust just sort of pulls from anywhere, it’s good if you have a really low temperature system where airflow isn’t really a concern anyway, but not much else.

The fractal design core 1000 is a very clean case, well designed and function over form oriented.

But this all comes down to what components this pc will have, because if we’re talking just the igpu or a 1050ti or something, you wouldn’t need to worry too much about having a case designed well for modern components, and could comfortably use any of the cheap 30$ Roseville towers out 

For now it will be igpu, or a 980 that's currently in an old Dell T3600 workstation. It will eventually be used to run "Home Assistant" and/or for an outdoor camera setup (3 cameras). It will probably never see heavy loads of any sort. I'll look at Rosewill options again, but the Fractal 1000 looks like it's ticked all the boxes so far. Thanks! We're about 3 to 4 months away from our remodel. I'll definitely be posting about it in hopes of some additional input from the LTT Forum community. My wife thinks I'm crazy, but I plan to "smartify" everything I possibly can, and run ethernet everywhere I can when the drywall is demo'd.

[FruitOfTheLum]

38 minutes ago, 8tg said:

I personally wouldn’t go with the Q300L, it’s good because it’s cheap, but if airflow is ever a concern, despite that it’s entirely holes it’s got terrible airflow.

The reason being that it’s entirely holes, there’s no directional airflow, air from a front intake fan setup just goes out the top, the rear exhaust just sort of pulls from anywhere, it’s good if you have a really low temperature system where airflow isn’t really a concern anyway, but not much else.

The fractal design core 1000 is a very clean case, well designed and function over form oriented.

But this all comes down to what components this pc will have, because if we’re talking just the igpu or a 1050ti or something, you wouldn’t need to worry too much about having a case designed well for modern components, and could comfortably use any of the cheap 30$ Roseville towers out there.

I'm a huge Fractal fan, and second this recommendation!

[YoskiBruhski]

19 hours ago, Alvin853 said:

"Smaller" and "fairly priced" are very vague terms, and the variety of cases is huge, so some more details to narrow it down a bit?
What length of GPU needs to be supported? Height of CPU cooler? Does exterior color matter? Glass sidepanel?

A good low budget case that still looks good and has plenty of space for a big GPU and CPU cooler is the Cooler Master Masterbox Q300L that @Pixelfie just mentioned. The smallest possible case that still fits mATX board and ATX PSU is the Sama IM-01 I believe, but that one is a little bit more, and you're somewhat limited in terms of GPU size and CPU coolers.

Good point. Appearance doesn't matter really. Side panels don't need to display the goods. Enough room for a 3 fan gpu would be nice, 285mm, just in case.. A small air cooler has been plenty for this 8700 non k so far. Trying to keep the price around $40 - $60. No real reason, but just keeping it low since this isn't a main rig.. I'm really leaning towards that 10 year old Fractal 1000.