Reasonably priced Mini-ITX case that takes a full size DVD-RW?

[broona]

Thought I was set on the Noah case, but it only accepts slimline optical drives, which is no use, as I really need a Pioneer drive in there.

There's always the Venus 669, but the 2 tiny fans put me off that a little, as I'd like at least some HDD cooling, and I'd need to rip those whiny things out!

Any other cases out there? Looking for it to be as small as possible to stick on my desk, 200W maximum PSU as it'll only have an Atom 330 CPU, can take a 3.5" HDD, preferably has at least an 80mm fan, and doesn't cost the earth, hopefully similarly priced to the other 2 cases I mentioned. Cheers.

 

[broona]

Could I use a micro-atx case with a mini-itx board? I assume that I can, and that would greatly improve my options, but probably mean it would be too big to fit on my desk, not the end of the world.

If I can do this, any recommendations please?

 

[broona]

yes you can fit a mini-itx board in a m-atx case. One m-atx case you could look at would be the Antec minuet 350 piano though the power supply that comes with it is 350W.

You are limiting yourself a lot by not using slim optical drives. I've just had a look around most of the mini-itx cases I know of and apart from the venus none of them would fit your needs. Could you not get an external optical or just not have a pioneer? They aren't expensive unless you going for a slot loading one which generally costs a little more.

another case to look into would be: Silverstone ML01B,

Thanks for that, thought I might be able to, but not sure. I could probably fit it in my PC7 too I suppose, but might be a bit strange!

Main reason for the Pioneer requirement is that it's the most compatible for Dual Layer burning in the format I require, and adding an external drive would defeat the purpose of getting a smaller case unfortunately.

I'll look into those cases too, cheers.

SNIP

That looks perfect, time to put my Googling skills to the test, cheers!

hey if you guys are looking at atom's and haven't already you should probably have a look for the dual core atoms which are now around and the price isn't much more than the normal single cores.

That's exactly what I want, looking at the 330, the dual core variant of the 230, thanks.

 

[broona]

...

Must be a decent 120w PSU, following spec taken from a pre-built machine using that case :-

'Brand New High End Multimedia System - Intel DG45FC mini-ITX Motherboard with DVI and HDMI + Intel E8500 3.16GHz Core 2 Duo CPU + In-Win mini-ITX Case with 120W Power Supply + LG Blu-Ray / HD DVD SATA Drive + Kingston 2GB DDR2 667MHz Memory + Western Digital 80GB SATA 7200rpm Hard Drive + WiFi USB Adapter'

Think that'll be ideal if I can find one, thanks again.

 

[broona]

Change of plans for the time being, I'm just gonna swap my mobo for an Nvidia 730i/9300 MATX board with onboard graphics, and probably swap my PSU for a lower powered/more efficient one, but keep it all in my Lian Li.