Best MATX Compatible Tower

Voltage

Voltage

Voltage

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5 Jul 2006
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Whats the best case for MATX motherboards and that is a tower?

Gonna get a new high spec mini rig with Conroe, 2gig ram, Raptor X and Nvidia 7950.
 
Lian-li V600 is technically full ATX, but it's deep rather than tall. The Silverstone TJ-08 is also extremely nice to look at - but they spent all the money on the front panel so it's basicaly a standard steel case with a fabulous aluminium front.
 
could you say fit in an Nvidia 7950 GX2 and a full atx psu?

the description for that Lian Li says its a standard atx case.
 
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Yes to the graphics card and PSU. The V600 is an ATX case, but the design is very unusual in that it's the height of an mATX case, but deep. It's genuine class.
 
I have the Silvestone TJ-08, it's a good case but the HD cage/mounting/removal is the worst design aspect of it, fitting/removing hard drives is bit hassle. You need to remove the cage- to do so you need to slightly lift out motheboard tray to access the cage mounting screw. In fact I would use thumb screw on the three HD cage mounting holes.

htpcc.jpg


The internals are steel which is a bonus (better noise damping) It's a much better case than "cube" designs as it#s basically a full tower minituarized .

Course you can fit a MATX into a midi tower
 
how big is that card? id like to see what interference a large gfx card has on the memory slots on a matx mobo.

otherwise that looks like a fairly decent case.
 
The X300 edge of PCB is in-line with the first memory slot, the PCB it's roughly .5cm below the white memory clip. So as long as nothing is above the PCB on the upper edge it should fit, however if you want a southbridge cooler added it might hit larger video cards on the bottom side of the card. oh that PCI card is a M-Audio Revolution 5.1
 
Confusion said:
how big is that card? id like to see what interference a large gfx card has on the memory slots on a matx mobo.

otherwise that looks like a fairly decent case.
Click to expand...

Even if you saw a photograph of a particular motherboard in that case, there is no guarantee that another would fit the same. Surpringly enough, these things are designed to a proper specification and it's actually very unusual for something not to fit. As for expecting big clearances, you probably won't get any. It will be very tight in there, but you've got 2 decent 120mm fans to stop the heat and enough height clearance to fit pretty much anything short of a Scythe cooler.
 
The noise is made by the components in a case, not the case itself.

So the Silverstone is Silent, but at the same time a jet engine. You decide. :)
 
At 12v, they're not totally silent, there is wind noise- I have removed all finger guards as well (one on each side) At 7v it's silent, but airflow is basically non-existant, not enough to expel air from several hot components in the case. The HD mountings are solid so vibrations/noise isn't dampened. I've used window sealent strip between the HD cage and case, and strips of bicycle inner tube between HD and cage. Helped reduce noise. The problem with this case is HD cooling, the one at the bottom (pic) is suitably cooled but I placed another drive above that in the cage and that got considerbly hotter, hot enough to move it elseware. At the moment it's on the case floor ontop of more rubber strips. It's much cooler as it has direct airflow over it from the front case fan.

I've used the Antec NSK 2400 (desktop style MATX) and that was a lot better in cable managment and general fit/tidyness (the holes on the side and front panel really do help) however I haven't compared HD temps as the HD bays have no airflow, except natural air convetion. I've used a Qpack and that was horrible, much worse than the Silverstone (cannot fit large VGA cards or CPU fans, everything is squidged close together)

Would I buy this case again if I needed a MATX micro tower? Yes. It's not perfect though and some things can be improved (but so can my stacker, HD fitting/removing requires HD modules & faceplates to be removed) Silverstone should have included HD mountings/cage on the case floor, and used HD isolation. The case could do with being 1" deeper to reduced any PSU-Optical drive issues. I guess you could thread tap some holes on the front for a additional HD cage bay, or you could use Lian Li MF-20/30 HD side plates to lower HD placement.

Since this'll be a gaming machine I would just buy a full tower setup installing stuff into my stacker is a joy compared to MATX...and temps are lower in every regard.
 
im going matx for quietness and size, i want a small computer but still quite powerful for the occasional gaming i will do. My 360 is my main game machine nowadays.
 
Coolermaster have the Centurion mBTX case thats similar to Silverstone. Aluminimum front and steel chassis.

Maybe not as nice looking as the Silverstone, and might retail for less. There's a picture of one in the Desk and room gallery thread.
 
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