PROJECT VERTICAL: Small footprint - Huge airflow - Touchdisplay - 19.9 L mATX

Philairflow

Philairflow

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Sep 12, 2017
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15
Update:
project_vertical_0602jnuas.png


Introduction:

I started to design my dream case. Project Vertical is a 19.9L mATX case with a small footprint, optimized for high-end hardware, excellent cooling and silent operation. An optional 15.6 inch touch-display makes the case more useful when standing on the desk.

Mainboard and graphics card are built-in vertical up. This setup reduces the load onto the mainboard and allows me to reduce the space required on the desk.

Cooling and silent operation is a very important point. The goal was to have a cooling design that can offer a high performance in both air- and liquid-cooling while emitting as less noise as possible and not requiring much space on the desk. Therefore the panels offer space for 5 x 140 mm fans or 2 x 240 mm radiators and a water pump. Fan grills are only optional so the airflow is maximized and the rpm of the 140 mm fans can be as low as possible.

Project Vertical is the smallest case that can carry dual-tower air coolers up to 170 mm height and a full-length 3-slot GPU. It is also prepared for an ATX PSU with up to 170 mm length. This ensures enough power for high-end hardware and silent operation. The ability to mount 5 x 140 mm fans is also unique for a sub 20L chassis.

project_vertical_060200ug0.png


project_vertical_0902kxj6c.png


project_vertical_0902opj7w.png


Specifications:

Dimensions: (H x W x D) 380 X 250 X 210 mm

Volume: 19.9 liter

Material: Aluminium and steel

Display: 15.6 inch IPS touchdisplay with full hd resolution (Built in ready notebook solution)

Glass: Tempered glass optional instead of the display

Color: black / silver

Mainboard: mATX

Graphics card: 4 slots and 330 mm length

Power supply: ATX up to 170 mm length

Hard drives: 4 x 2.5 inch (additional hard drives optional)

Optical drive: Slim size slot-in

Front ports: 2 x USB 3.0, 1 x USB Type C, 1 x HDMI

Cooling air:

- CPU Coolers: Up to dual-tower coolers with 170 mm height

- Case fans: 5 x 140 mm fans

Cooling water:

- 2 x 240 mm radiator on the side panels

- Mounting-frame for custom waterpumps


Currently I am working on the third revision of the case when I have some free time. I want to design it as simple as possible for manufacturing. I hope you like it so far. I will post more information and pictures soon. At the latest when the next revision is ready.
 
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Philairflow said:
2u4uce.png


Nothing is final here.

Volume: 23.6 liter
Click to expand...

Gotta get that volume down to 20 liters or less for true SFF...!

I would love to see a version of this that was mITX / SFX...

I really like the touch panel; I could see using it for touch screen control of overclocking software & fan control and such, or set up to monitor security cameras, or just to watch and get in that last minute Ebay bid...

Maybe flip the PSU so the cable connections are facing the back of the chassis & have some cable management area behind the motherboard tray...?
 
I like the vertical orientation. I wish more cases did that. I like that you can put full size tower coolers and over-sized graphics cards in it. I don't really like the idea of buying a monitor as part of a case. It would be good to have some kind of cable management so that when you plug in a bunch of stuff to the rear I/O it doesn't look like a sea anemone with all the cables sticking out at the top.

Those are my opinions. Good job with this case. (y)
 
It looks like the 15.6" touchscreen will be mounted straight up and down (perpendicular to the ground) and will cover the entire height of the case. Considering that you intend for the case to sit on a user's desk, how do you intend to deal with the likely scenario that the centerpoint of the screen is not level with the user's eyes? To me, this is the equivalent of trying to sit at a desk and use a monitor that's bottom bezel is mounted directly to the tabletop. The simple solution would be to tilt the monitor backward on an angle (like a laptop display on a hinge) but that's not possible here with the display face-mounted directly to the case, right?
 
I don't think that putting the touch screen on the case is really that great idea/selling point. This will increase price significantly while it's not something that will sell the case.

I know however that few people did ask about possibility of putting one in Sentry so there may be some niche for this.

I'd rather leave simple window made from tempered glass or acrylic one to show-off how the internals are laid off like in the last render with watercooling. This would be appealing to more users especially with some RGB.

Apart from that, it looks really rough because of the screws and screw holes everywhere.
 
Cool overall design, the whole vertical concept is neat. Don't care for the touch screen either, its a gimmick. You play with it for a little while during setup/config and then pretty much have no use for it. I guess *some* people would use it as their only screen for stuff, but that's what tablets are for.
 
Boil said:
Gotta get that volume down to 20 liters or less for true SFF...!

I would love to see a version of this that was mITX / SFX...

I really like the touch panel; I could see using it for touch screen control of overclocking software & fan control and such, or set up to monitor security cameras, or just to watch and get in that last minute Ebay bid...

Maybe flip the PSU so the cable connections are facing the back of the chassis & have some cable management area behind the motherboard tray...?
Click to expand...

I tried to make it ITX size but then I need to restrict the cooling. Either the fans on the left side have to be removed or a full size CPU Cooler doesn't fit anymore. Cooling is a very important point for me, so I found it hard to go ITX with that build-up. I think compromises have to be made to reach 20L.
 
Thanks for all the feedback!

So about the Touchscreen: It is fixed in it's position, so it is true that this is not ideal.

I also had the idea to have the screen in an tablet like case which can be tilted in two axes. Then behind the display could be a glas window that allows to look insight.

In my opinion this would be super cool but also super expensive. Regardless I am already making a 3D model for that :)
 
i rly like that conzept which display you wanna use ? What i dont like is that all the cables come out of the top of your case if you want stay it on desk i think it look better if the cable come out at bottom.
 
It's extremely common to have VRMs along backplate. The current configuration is better for thermal management.

The sealed bottom and mostly sealed top seem like it limits potential compared to whats seen in Corsair ONE. And personal experience with mini-ITX builds, 5x140mm fans is just not necessary if you design case for good thermals.

Nice idea!
 
Have your sourced the side panel display yet?

I'm also looking into turning my side panel into a display (not as a screen, but for displaying analytics).
 
I actually think it's a really unique and cool idea including the screen on the front of the case....

Might even try re-purposing one of my old screens to incorporate into my case
 
Looks like a cool design but I don't get why there are windows at the top that... let you see into the cable compartment? I feel like this should be enclosed just like the Silverstone FT-03 with only a slot in the back for the cables to come out, no windows.

I'm also not sure if those are screws on top or what, but having to remove 4 or 8(?!) screws just to plug in a cable really sucks, that panel should snap on or at the very worst involve no more than a couple of thumbscrews. Again, look at Silverstone, they are famous for cases with this orientation and they do the top panels perfectly on all their vertically oriented cases.
 
All mounting holes for fans will disappear. Only 4 thumb screws on top will remain outside. I like the screws on top.


For the panel: I would use a build in ready solution fabricated for a notebook. This would be the cheapest option because they are already bonded and have a glas applied. Like this one:

15_6_touch_paneltlobb.jpg


In addition only a controller like this one is needed inside the case:

PrismaMINI-HDMI-DP_TFT_Controller.jpg



I am working on an ITX version now. I am especially motivated after seeing the Asrock X299 ITX.

After some brainstorming I think I can bring the dimensions down to (HxWxD): 380 X 235 X 210 mm = 18,75 liters.

The only compromises that will have to be made are:

- 14 inch IPS screen
- Radiator on left side will be hard to fit in. Maybe with slim fans and one slot water cooler on gpu. I don't know now.
- Dual-Tower cpu cooler with 140 mm fans only with slim fans on the right side.

I think that are some ok restrictions for reducing the size by 5 liters.
 
Boil said:
Gotta get that volume down to 20 liters or less for true SFF...!

I would love to see a version of this that was mITX / SFX...
Click to expand...

Philairflow said:
I tried to make it ITX size but then I need to restrict the cooling. Either the fans on the left side have to be removed or a full size CPU Cooler doesn't fit anymore. Cooling is a very important point for me, so I found it hard to go ITX with that build-up. I think compromises have to be made to reach 20L.
Click to expand...

Philairflow said:
I am working on an ITX version now. I am especially motivated after seeing the Asrock X299 ITX.

After some brainstorming I think I can bring the dimensions down to (HxWxD): 380 X 235 X 210 mm = 18,75 liters.

The only compromises that will have to be made are:

- 14 inch IPS screen
- Radiator on left side will be hard to fit in. Maybe with slim fans and one slot water cooler on gpu. I don't know now.
- Dual-Tower cpu cooler with 140 mm fans only with slim fans on the right side.

I think that are some ok restrictions for reducing the size by 5 liters.
Click to expand...

For me, ITX is the preferred mobo format for SFF...!
 
Boil said:
For me, ITX is the preferred mobo format for SFF...!
Click to expand...

I also would like to see this smaller. I really like the concept. But ITX would be nice.

Philairflow said:
I am working on an ITX version now. I am especially motivated after seeing the Asrock X299 ITX.

After some brainstorming I think I can bring the dimensions down to (HxWxD): 380 X 235 X 210 mm = 18,75 liters.

The only compromises that will have to be made are:

- 14 inch IPS screen
- Radiator on left side will be hard to fit in. Maybe with slim fans and one slot water cooler on gpu. I don't know now.
- Dual-Tower cpu cooler with 140 mm fans only with slim fans on the right side.

I think that are some ok restrictions for reducing the size by 5 liters.
Click to expand...

Sounds nice. As already mentioned smaller would be nice. Any updates here?
 
Hi, sry I had a lot of work to do in the last time. Regardless I worked on the project a little bit. I will post more details about the changes tomorrow. It is very late now here. In short: It is sub 20 liters now :).
 
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Not a big fan of having a touchscreen, but I do like that 2nd render.
 
This case has two things going for it. 1. mATX support which is under-represented for smaller cases IMO. Also, its vertical orientation. Just eyeballing it here but it looks shorter than the Phanteks Shift (which to me is good) at the expense of a larger footprint.

With that said, I also think trying to sell it with a touch screen is far too niche. At least make it an add-on option and have a glass panel be the default. Case modders would also add a screen themselves if they'd want to.
 
CC Ricers said:
This case has two things going for it. 1. mATX support which is under-represented for smaller cases IMO. Also, its vertical orientation. Just eyeballing it here but it looks shorter than the Phanteks Shift (which to me is good) at the expense of a larger footprint.

With that said, I also think trying to sell it with a touch screen is far too niche. At least make it an add-on option and have a glass panel be the default. Case modders would also add a screen themselves if they'd want to.
Click to expand...

This already happened :) In the current version a glass can be easily mounted instead of the display. The only problem for now is that the case loses 2 SSD Slots and the optical drive because they are attached on the backsite of the display mounting-plate.

I will work in all changes into the first post later today.
 
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The new version looks insane. It is really classy now. I like the glass version. Should be cheaper.

But if it stands on the desk the display makes a lot of sense for me. Especially if it is an IPS panel.

Does the case still fit a custom loop?

What are the dimensions now?
 
I posted an update. I had a lot of work to do in the past months. So there was not much free time for this project. But regardless here is my second revision now. Working on number three already. My goal for the next revision are some minor changes and to make manufacturing easier.
 
Happy to see your still working on this one. This vertical concept is amazing. What I really like about it is the small footprint. You can have it carry much more powerful hardware than other popular SFF cases while the required space on the desk is about the same.
 
I say make the frame with mounting hardware and let ppl order their own TG and screens (maybe have adapters for smaller screens; I have a retina IPad mod'd which is about 10inches using displayport and microusb for power)
 
FISCHER said:
I say make the frame with mounting hardware and let ppl order their own TG and screens (maybe have adapters for smaller screens; I have a retina IPad mod'd which is about 10inches using displayport and microusb for power)
Click to expand...

That is not far from my plan. Basic case with tempered glass front. Display as an option.
 
I just added more pictures. The first shows the top of the case with the tempered glass corner and the hidden I/O shield. This trick allows me to plug cables into the mainboard without removing the top cover and also hide the cables so i keep the clean look while they are plugged in:

project_vertical_0902kxj6c.png


The second picture shows the planned airflow. It should pretty high. I want to get the most performance out of minimum rpm. Something like 5 x 140 mm @ 800 rpm:

project_vertical_0902opj7w.png
 
I am already testing the airflow in a Lian Li case that allows similar configuration:

airflow_testsfu0u.jpg


I can only use 5 x 120 mm fans and the fans on the left side have to be on the outside. The hardware in this system is:

i7 6700k @ 4.6 GHz
MSI Z270I Pro AC
MSI GTX 980 Ti
Prolimatech Megahalems Red CPU cooler

I get really good temps with this setup so far. One reason is the fact that the second fan on the right side doesn't fit anymore when the cooler blows out on top. So only this configuration allows 5 x 120 mm fans.

This composition also results in good GPU temps.
 
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Yes FT03 has a similar build-up. But it is bigger and has less airflow.

Here is a picture of the case with possible fan grills / dust collectors:

project_vertical_1502lgjaz.png


I am working on revision three when i have time. I will post pictures as soon as it is ready.
 
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