** LAZER3D AVAILABLE EXCLUSIVELY AT OVERCLOCKERS - BEHOLD THE LZ7 **

[ChugNorris]

After a significant amount of work and preparation, we are very happy to introduce our newest case brand - Lazer3D. Lazer3D was conceived out of the desire to build a truly customisable, small form factor system that can still take high level hardware. From the various concepts and ideas that the founder of Lazer3D - Kevin Dolan aka 'K888D' worked with, the LZ7 was created, and has gone through several iterations and improvements on the way to the case we have available today. Standing at a mere 7.07 litres volume, the LZ7 is one of the smallest gaming chassis on the market, yet can pack in some serious hardware. There is space for an ITX dual slot VGA card such as a Gigabyte 1070 ITX OC, 67mm CPU coolers, Modular & Non-Modular SFX power supplies and a pair of 2.5" HDD's or SSD's. This means you can build a system with a 1070 and an i7 if you wish, putting a hell of a lot of performance into a tiny footprint. Thermal performance is extremely well thought out with oversized GPU intake vents, 360 degree GPU exhaust ventilation, a dedicated PSU intake + exhaust vent and a mount for a high performance 140mm chassis fan, which makes for thermally efficient operation throughout.

One of the greatest features though is the level of customisation that we are able to offer as standard. Using the LZ7 configurator we have created, you can literally customise and choose every single aspect of the case, including all 4 corner column colours, colours of the main shell of the case, along with the colour & type of vents on both the GPU side & fan side. For example, for the left panel alone, there is Open, Radial, Cyclone, Aero & Slotted vent configurations, each with their own benefits, available in Black, White, Frosted, Clear, Grey Tint, Blue, Red, Green & Orange colours. This allows an unprecedented level of customisability to each LZ7 chassis, and is available on a next day delivery providing the parts are all available.

Material wise, there is a combination of 3mm & 5mm acrylic panels, along with high strength 3D printed polyamide SLS corner columns with hand fitted metal screw threads on each LZ7 case. This creates a feel of build quality and sturdiness that is reassuring for a product that arrives flat packed ready for assembly, with full instructions and screw packs included with every configuration. As the LZ7 is designed and manufactured in the UK, we can not only regularly expand the range with different colours & options (feel free to suggest anything you'd like to see) but we can also look at customisation orders on a relatively short lead-time, dependant on the complexity. In addition, we have a suite of optional cooling options available within the configurator, which are all compatible with the LZ7 chassis as standard. We also have each part available separately, meaning you can change and upgrade your chassis in the future as new options become available.

Having initially met with Lazer3D back in February, it's brilliant to finally introduce the LZ7 to the market. It's down to hard work from Kevin and the OcUK team, and I hope you can appreciate that when checking it out, as I believe this is the first time that someone has been able to offer such a customisable chassis design on such a short lead-time! Everything is in stock and available today!

Lazer3D LZ7 Mini-ITX Case Configurator @ £179.99 inc VAT



Completely configure your Lazer3D LZ7 chassis from scratch using our complete system configurator which allows thousands of colour & panel combinations to create your perfect case!



Only £179.99 inc VAT.

ORDER NOW


It's hard to explain how nice the cases from Lazer3D are just from specs & images, so you will be able to check out a special edition that Lazer3D has made for our systems at Insomnia 61 this weekend - The Kube. This is a slightly large unit that houses the recently released Zotac 1080Ti Mini, along an i7-7700 & 16GB DDR4 memory for an absolute powerhouse of a system! This is available now.

OcUK Gaming KUBE - Custom Small Form Factor Gaming PC @ £1,899.95 inc VAT



This customisable, configurable small form factor PC uses a custom designed chassis and enthusiast level components to re-define the limits of small form factor gaming PCs!



Only £1,899.95 inc VAT.

ORDER NOW

 

[rawuk]

Damn that looks superb. Whats the noise / temps like?

 

[ChugNorris]

Pretty good actually, I'll point K888D aka Kevin who created the chassis and owns the brand over this way and he can explain it in more detail.

 

[K888D]

I can only comment on what the noise and temps are like in the LZ7 case as the Kube systems are built by the guys at Overclockers UK, I've not seen them in action yet, hoping to tomorrow though at Insomnia 61. The Kube does however have slightly more cooling potential than the LZ7 so the temps and noise should be comparable.

Here is the spec of my own personal system built into an LZ7:

​

• Case: LZ7 with Cyclone Vents
• MSI B250i Mini-ITX motherboard
• Intel Core i7-7700
• Noctua NH-L12 (bottom fan only) CPU Cooler
• Gigabyte GTX 1070 ITX Graphics Card
• 256Gb M.2 NVMe SSD + 500Gb 2.5" HDD
• 16Gb 2400Mhz DDR4 Corsair Vengeance LPX
• Prolimatech Ultra Sleek Vortex 140mm Slim Case Fan
• Corsair SF450 SFX Power Supply

Personally I prioritise a quiet system over absolute maximum performance, so I tune my systems with low noise fan curves and the GPU is set to it 'silent' fan profile. The important thing to focus on is how well the GPU can maintain its (above) boost clocks even with this silent fan profile.

Below are some temp/noise/boost clock results of the system running a few popular games:

The system is practically silent during idle, this is mainly thanks to the ability of the MSI B250i fan controllers, it is one of the best Mini-ITX motherboards I've come across for fan control, CPU and system fan power can be dialed right down to extremely low RPM's.

When gaming the system does become audible, but not to the level you would expect considering the hardware packed inside, I would definitely say this particular setup runs quiet whilst gaming. As you would expect the GPU can be heard the most, but its by no means loud with its fan RPM peaking at around 1600 RPM with the silent profile activated.

Please note: The noise and temperatures of your own system will be completely dependent on the hardware you pick, every GPU, CPU cooler and case fan perform differently.

Here are some further results including CPU stress testing with Prime95:

For more detail on this testing there is full article on the Lazer3D website HERE.

 

[K888D]

In its standard configuration the LZ7 uses SFX power supplies and has 67mm of CPU cooler clearance, enough space to fit compact coolers such as the Noctua NH-L12 or Scythe Big Shuriken 2, allowing you to comfortably and quietly cool a 65w TDP CPU.

For those who want more CPU cooling potential the LZ7 is now compatible with DC-DC type power supplies through the release of some new panel options:



Replacing the SFX power supply with a DC-DC power supply opens up the full height of the case above the CPU socket, giving you a variety of different cooling options. Including increased CPU cooler clearance of up to 130mm height, allowing for compact tower cooler setups with direct rear exhaust. Alternatively the new XL-Vent Top panel can be used to mount a 120mm AIO watercooler, or an extra 140mm case fan.

HDPLEX are the recommended DC-DC power supplies, their 400w HiFi DC-ATX model can be used in combination with a Dell 19V 330w AC Adapter, giving you enough juice to power an Intel Core i7 or AMD Ryzen 7 in combination with an NVidia GTX 1070 with a bit of headroom for some light overclocking.



THERMAL TESTING
Below are some CPU temperature results for various cooling setups with an Intel i7-7700 and Gigabyte GTX 1070 ITX, the testing was done using Prime95 running 2 threads and Unigine Valley highest settings @ 1080p at the same time, for a realistic and consistent system wide stress:



Grey Panels
The main panels and some side panel options will be available in matte finish Mineral Grey.

 

[mistersprinkles]

I LOVE it. Excellent layout. Now make one that isn't hideous and I'll buy it
Seriously though that thing is ugly.

 

[Hotwired]

Hmm?

You can't have small and lots of power without it also basically being riddled with holes.

 

[K888D]

I LOVE it. Excellent layout. Now make one that isn't hideous and I'll buy it
Seriously though that thing is ugly.

Aesthetics are subjective and you can't please everyone! There are plenty of people who love the way the case looks though. If its any consolation you can configure the look of the case with different vent patterns and panel colours.

 

[SirJinks]

Loving the design, it seems a bit weird as it looks like the orientation means the leads into the io panel will be coming out to the side as opposed to the back. Is there already a V2 being planned? I see although it fits the Noctua NH-L12 cooler this has now been replaced by the L12s which has a min height of 70mm.

 

[K888D]

it looks like the orientation means the leads into the io panel will be coming out to the side as opposed to the back.

I see what you mean from the photo, don't worry though don't exit to the side of the IO PCB, the cables were bent round for the purpose of taking the photo so you could see the insides of the system without the cables blocking the view.

Is there already a V2 being planned?

There is no V2 planned currently. New panel options are always in development. We are working on some other case designs which I'm hoping will be available at some point in 2018.

I see although it fits the Noctua NH-L12 cooler this has now been replaced by the L12s which has a min height of 70mm.

The quoted 68mm of CPU clearance does have an extra couple mm of play above it, so it is possible that the new NH-L12S will fit. I have one on order for testing and will post the results here, hopefully next week.

 

[SirJinks]

I see what you mean from the photo, don't worry though don't exit to the side of the IO PCB, the cables were bent round for the purpose of taking the photo so you could see the insides of the system without the cables blocking the view.

My bad, I didn't explain clearly. Assuming the panel with the power button is the front then the cables going into / out of the motherboard io shield (vga, rj45, usb's etc) look to be coming out the right hand side.

 

[K888D]

My bad, I didn't explain clearly. Assuming the panel with the power button is the front then the cables going into / out of the motherboard io shield (vga, rj45, usb's etc) look to be coming out the right hand side.

Ah, I see what your saying. Personally I would consider the power button + I/O panel the side of the case, but that's just me.

Below are a couple of photos that may help clear things up, first shows the IO panel and rear panel:

​

This is what I tend to consider the front of the case:

​

You can also have the case stood up like a mini tower as the GPU side panel includes feet mounting holes, here is an example from a previous version of the case:

​

 

[K888D]

Also will be testing the new Noctua NH-L12S in the case with SFX PSU shortly. Hopefully the increased ehight of this cooler up to 70mm will still fit:

​

 

[JediFragger]

Thanks for updating this thread with new info @K888D We appreciate it!

If it does fit the L12s with a SFX PSU then that would be great news

I'm planning on either building one of these at some point or get the guys at OcUK to do it with a lovely mini Ti (Volta will probably be released by then though, which would offer a performance boost no doubt, and pair it with an Intel 8600/8700)

Noise is one of my primary concerns, but as long as it can be very quiet at idle then I'm fine with that

I used to absolutely love Shuttle XPC's and used to get a new one pretty much every year, and would love to go back to the mini format.

 

[K888D]

NOCTUA NH-L12S

​

Noctua recently released an updated version of the NH-L12, replacing the dual fans (92x25mm + 120x25mm) with a single 120x15mm fan. Other changes include an increase in height of the heatsink up to 70mm (was 66mm) to allow fan clearance above standard height RAM.

I ordered one for 2 reasons, firstly to see if it would fit inside the LZ7 when using an SFX PSU, and secondly how well it performs against its predecessor and other popular coolers such as the Scythe Big Shuriken 2 (SBS2).

Let's take a look at the cooler fitted to the MSI B250i Gaming Pro:

​

First point to make about the NH-L12S is the included fan clears standard height RAM, this allows it to be fitted in any orientation so long as the heatpipes don't interfere with other components. For instance the heatpipes interfere with the RAM on this motherboard, but it can be fitted in any of the other 3 orientations. I selected this setup so the heatsink fins were parallel with the airflow from the case fan.

Here you can see the heatpipes which clear the motherboard rear IO:

​

With the Corsair Vengeance LPX RAM the rubber pads on the included Noctua NF A12x15 PWM fan rest on top of the RAM module heatsink, there is no distortion of the heatsink, it is literally the perfect fit:

​

The next interesting point is that the Noctua fan comes installed as standard to push the air up through the heatsink rather than pull down through the heatsink like its predecessor. This is an important point with motherboard airflow which I will talk about more in a bit:

​

So onto the first important question, does it fit in the LZ7 when using an SFX PSU? Yes it does!

​

It fits with 0mm to spare, the SFX power supply rests on top of the heatsink, which in turn rests on top of the RAM, perfect. In this particular cooler orientation the PSU sits over around 40% of the heatsink:

​

Moving onto performance, has replacing the 92x25mm fan with a 120x15mm fan made any difference to temperatures and noise? Can it compete with the Scythe Big Shuriken 2?


TEST SYSTEM

• Intel i7-7700
• MSI B250i
• Corsair Vengeance LPX RAM
• Corsair SF450 SFX PSU
• Gigabyte GTX 1070 ITX
• 140x15mm Prolimatech Ultra Sleek Vortex Case Fan
• Open Fan Vent with Fan Guard
• GPU Slotted Vents

TEST SETUP
The system was put through exactly the same tests the previous coolers were tested with for a direct comparison. This included setting the CPU fan curve for 0% @ 0C straight line up to 100% @ 80C. The System fan was tested at a set 50% and 100% speed.

For testing Prime95 was used with 2 threads (maximum heat test) and Unigine Valley @ 1080p max settings resulting in a steady 55% CPU usage.


RESULTS
Here are the max temp and average noise results with the case fan set to 50%:



Here are the results with the case fan set to 100%:



The full test data can be seen below, comparing fan speeds, system/CPU/GPU temps, noise, gpu clocks, etc:




CONCLUSION
With the case fan set to 50% the NH-L12S matched the NH-L12 with a noise level of 32 dB but at 6C cooler under the same test conditions.

The NH-L12S also matched the temperature of the Big Shuriken 2 when using the same fan (Noctua A12x15 PWM), but not quite when compared against Scythe's own fan, although it should be noted that Scythe's fan achieves this at much louder noise levels.

It was mentioned earlier in this post that the fan pushes air up through the cooler, my initial concern with this was that the exhaust heat from the CPU could heat up the PSU and cause the fan to start spinning up, but this did not happen with the PSU fan remaining off during all tests.

The second point about the fan pushing air upwards is the affect it has on motherboard/system cooling. The VRM's on some motherboards benefit from airflow across their heatsinks, with the downdraft coolers such as the NH-L12 and Big Shuriken 2 they help to keep VRM temperatures nice and low. However with the NH-L12S the air is blown upwards away from the motherboard and this is reflected in higher system temperatures with the NH-L12 recording 46C, the SBS2 recording 42C and the NH-L12S recording 49C for the same test.


SILENCE TUNED
You may have noticed in the full results table was a "Silence Tuned" section for the NH-L12S, for this I decided to see what was the quietest I could get the system to run the Prime 2 threads + Unigine Valley test whilst maintaining a CPU temp of 70C.

Tweaking the fan curves resulted in a CPU fan speed of 917 rpm and case fan speed of 540 rpm, at these speeds the fans were very quiet, resulting in 27 dB sound level.

With the silence tuned fan curves, at idle the CPU fan completely stopped, GPU fan completely stopped, SFX fan completely stopped, the only fan spinning being the case fan at 393 rpm which was pretty much silent at this speed. The recorded sound was 22 dB which was the same sounds level recorded as the system turned off.

Testing this out with an actual game I played a few rounds of PUBG at 4K resolution with low settings for a resulting frame rate of about 50 fps, when paired with my G-Sync monitor it gives a really nice smooth and crisp experience, for this game I prefer detail over frame-rate. The CPU temp topped out at 61C during gaming, at this point the GPU was the loudest component resulting in a sound level of 25dB, i would describe it as a quiet low level hum coming from the GPU side of the case. Not bad at all for a heavy 4K gaming session.


CLOSING THOUGHTS
The extra cooling performance over its predecessor whilst maintaining the same quiet operation makes the Noctua NH-L12S the complete package and in my opinion the top choice CPU cooler for the LZ7 when using an SFX PSU.

 

[JediFragger]

Thanks so much for this info @K888D it's great news! I've decided I'm gonna do a build with one of these soon with an Intel 8400 as the base and maybe a 1080Ti Mini

 

[K888D]

Thanks so much for this info @K888D it's great news! I've decided I'm gonna do a build with one of these soon with an Intel 8400 as the base and maybe a 1080Ti Mini

The Zotac GTX 1080 Ti Mini does not fit unfortunately, the case can fit an ITX card up to 186mm in length whereas this card is 211mm long.

The top card that the case can currently fit is the Gigabyte GTX 1080 ITX.

 

[JediFragger]

The Zotac GTX 1080 Ti Mini does not fit unfortunately, the case can fit an ITX card up to 186mm in length whereas this card is 211mm long.

The top card that the case can currently fit is the Gigabyte GTX 1080 ITX.

No problem, I'll wait for Volta ITX cards to come then

Thanks for that info.

 

[JediFragger]

Your new wood panel option looks great @K888D , really

 

[K888D]

Your new wood panel option looks great @K888D , really

Thanks! It took a while to source the right material and tune the laser cutting process, but I'm really pleased with the end result and I'm glad you like them too