Project "Panther" mITX (Cougar QBX)

Associate
Joined
25 Apr 2011
Posts
2,377
Location
Crawley/Gatwick
Evening
Finally had sometime to put together another mITX rig.
After my order was delayed by a week, finally it arrived!
Out of the box I loved the case. Wasn't to keen on plastic shields all over and decided to mod it a little bit
Here is how it went..

Case: Cougar QBX
PSU: CoolerMaster v650 Hybrid-Modular 80+ Gold
GPU: EVGA GTX 970 SSC ACX 2.0+
CPU: Intel Core i5 4570
MOBO: AsRock B85M-ITX
SSD: Kingston HyperX 3K 240GB
Cooler: MSI Dragon AIO
RAM: HyperX Fury 16GB

MISC items
Akasa Apache FN058 120mm x 3
Akasa Slim FN078 120mm x 2
Phobya Pwm 1to3 Splitter x 2
Akasa 15cm Slim SATA cable
80mm filters x 2
120mm fan guard

1. Top shield removed


2. Front shield also removed


3. I hate extra cables and so I had to cut one of the modular psu cables


4. Mobo used was AsRock B85M-ITX. IO was silver, 3 layers of black matt spray paint


5. Let the assembly begin


6. Cougar states that only happy face PSU's are compatible. Well, I have a sad face psu and its fine!


7. Main components in


8. Everything else removed from the side panel. MSI Dragon AIO and Akasa apache FN-058


9. Time to connect everything and use the support panel


10. Clearance inside with AIO


11. 2 Akasa Fn-058 going on the top panel. Only one has grill as the other isn't necessary


12. More stuff arrived today. 15cm sata cable. 2 - 1 to 3PWM splitters



13. Fans had to be 15mm thick, also they were touchin the bottom panel, used plastic washers


14. Good clearance, enough for grills but will leave as is


15. Cable tidy!


16. Front filter installed


17. Top panel as is


18. Power led and hdd led swapped around. Now big led on all the time and small blinker on the power button is hdd activity


19. Not sure how to secure filter at the back.


And that's pretty much it
My only concern is side panels, they don't have filters, I need to make something just not sure how. Perpahs someone can point me in the right direction

Overall, I love the case. All the plastic shields went into the bin. Only keeping the bottom as it lifts the case and holds the slot filter in. And you cant really see it anyway :)

Don't be too harsh ;)
 
Last edited:
Looks a bit like ncase m1, a LOT cheaper as well.
Run into another headache. Fans wont start spinnin on custom fan settings, however set the full speed and its fine
Can the magnet react to steel frame and stop them?
 
Back
Top Bottom