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DAN A4-SFX: The smallest gaming case in the world

Have you considered adding a hole to to the motherboard mounting plate to allow access to most CPU backplates? I don't think it would affect the strength that much and you have the plastic shield...
 
EVGA 1080ti FTW3 specs were leaked... same clock and boost speeds as the FE Card, My step up request from 1080 to 1080ti FE is feeling more justified :D
 
dondan said:
Yes I think the same. I don't see a real reason to add it but some customer mention it. So I try to improve as much as possible. I think it will not increase the price.
Click to expand...
I think everyone knows it doesn't add much functionality but it's just a finishing touch. If the cost is negligible, just add it.
 
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dondan said:
What do you think about this for V2?

cover01xvo.jpg
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.... please add 4 mounts for 92mm or 100mm fans. two above the case and two bellow it.....forget about your little blue plate above gpu....seriously?
some taller stickier feets would be nice.
 
I'm going to piggy back on some of the suggestions:

1. Motherboard cutout for easy cooler mounting would be great.
2. Optional screw holes to lower PSU bracket down, so one could install a fan in that spot. For instance if you're not using that SSD tray, and you have short cables (me) you have a bunch of empty space there. Or in general just increasing options to install more fans.
3. More premium feeling power button maybe?
4. More grippy case feet.

That's all I can think of. Honestly if this thing stayed exactly as is, it would still be an amazing case. It's been raised before that increasing the CPU cooler compatibility by even 1.5cm would increase the cooling options by a huge amount, but I don't know if that's too drastic a change for a "v.2." I personally could live with a tiny increase in volume but I can understand why dondan may not want to do it.
 
Finally got my case yesterday Dan. It took awhile, but I'm sure it was worth the wait. Thanks for making it.

My one and only suggestion for V2 is to make it 10mm wider so it can accommodate a much larger array of cooling solutions on the CPU.
 
dondan, you can keep the frame size the same, but do consider perhaps offering 'extended' side panels which stick out much more from the sides. The case will widen laterally but with the additional space many interesting things are possible, for example we can mount 240/280 radiators to the inside of the side panel on the CPU side or hybrid AIO style GPUs on the inside panel on the GPU side. As an optional add on, you give your customers much more choice at minimal additonal cost/trouble to you
 
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tviceman said:
Finally got my case yesterday Dan. It took awhile, but I'm sure it was worth the wait. Thanks for making it.
Click to expand...

I have been loving the case since I got it a week ago. Having full desktop power in a camera bag (Tenba BYOB 13) is fantastic on the go. A photo shoot always already has nice IPS monitors. I bet the "pro" photographer would love to have a full-speed Photoshop computer, with 3+ drives, that fit into his camera bag system. Where do they post?

tviceman said:
My one and only suggestion for V2 is to make it 10mm wider so it can accommodate a much larger array of cooling solutions on the CPU.
Click to expand...

I strongly disagree. I think that taller side panels can accommodate every desire in one thin case. Dan showed some pictures of a taller windowed side panel. Someone also made a picture showing an elevated side panel with an RGB-LED-lit acrylic spacer.

Perhaps some hidden top corner screws would help thicker side panels stay on?
 
JackGLemmon said:
Someone also made a picture showing an elevated side panel with an RGB-LED-lit acrylic spacer.
Click to expand...

that someone would be me lol ;)

anyways for anyone having problemes with ddr4 memory running at the XMP profile on the striz z270i, I did testing for maybe a week and finally got a stable settings after undervolting the ram from 1.35v to 1.275v. it was running too hot and crashing as soon as the cpu went above 70C. the board is really tight. so yeah now 3000mhz runs no problem. hope that helps someone :)
 
mcheddadi said:
that someone would be me lol ;)

anyways for anyone having problemes with ddr4 memory running at the XMP profile on the striz z270i, I did testing for maybe a week and finally got a stable settings after undervolting the ram from 1.35v to 1.275v. it was running too hot and crashing as soon as the cpu went above 70C. the board is really tight. so yeah now 3000mhz runs no problem. hope that helps someone :)
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Are you planning on doing an acrylic spacer? or know how to get one done? I really liked your idea but no idea where to start.
 
nope, Philfreeze and Pantera_666 are each racing to make the first rendition on their pc. I'm here waiting to see :)

if it's good, it might convince someone to produce a kit .
 
Got my case yesterday. I'm supposed to be the second to last to have shipped.
For anyone interested, the lowepro messenger 250 is almost impossible to use unless the inside padding (seperating main compartment and tablet/laptop area) is cut out - But without that, the case fit perfectly inside, maybe too perfect, its tight.
Pictures will be tonight
 
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oh, and i didnt buy any components yet; waiting forGigabyte B250N, with support for USB Gen2!
im still rocking a H55 in an SG05
 
Removed the Strix IO heatsink tonight and tried a Scythe 120mm 12mm fan. Conclusion: stick with the Noctua A9x14, and remove the heatsink if you're using the LP53 with the fins running perpendicular to your RAM. Removing the mosfet heatsink provided a 10c or so improvement in Prime95 temps for me.

The Scythe looks bad ass and really cools the rest of the mobo, RAM, and SSD well. My RAM was about 15c cooler, in fact. But it is pretty loud and offers no increase in CPU cooling performance over the Noctua. It sits about 42mm tall once installed, but it has to rest on the wifi card module of the z270i and the RAM, or just the wifi module depending on how you want it, since it is so large. I.e. even once secured to the heatsink it sits about 1 or 2mm above it. The version you can buy separately is also not PWM, sadly. (Do they sell a slim 120mm 12mm fan with any of their CPU coolers?)
 
My findings agree with yours, and indicate there is no benefit to CPU temps with a 120mm fan, but the motherboard components do benefit. Not having the VRM heatsinks really help let the hot air out of the back of the IO area when the IO shield is not installed.
 
Out of curiosity (If I ever feel experimental with my z170i) how do you safely remove the heatsinks? Just pure force?
 
Cherry Dude said:
Out of curiosity (If I ever feel experimental with my z170i) how do you safely remove the heatsinks? Just pure force?
Click to expand...
There are some screws on the backside of the motherboard. That is the case of my Asus z97i-plus, and from what I can see on photos, they are the exact same location.
 
Did a couple hours of overwatch last night maxed out everything, 1080ti was about 75-82c the entire time. Are these similar temps other 1080ti owners are getting with this case?

Case also got extremely hot lol.

Also was wondering why my 7700k idle was in the 40's turned out I may have accidently OC'd it with ASUS software so I brought that down to normal now get about 32-38c idle temps rocking the noctua. So if your temps are high just make sure you didnt toggle anything in the bios or software like I did.
 
Yesterday all parts arrived (except the liquid metal for delid) so I built my system:
i5-7600k
Asus z270i
32GB Corsair Vengeance LPX 3000
Noctua NH-L9i with NF-A9x14 fan
EVGA GTX 1080 FTW ACX 3.0
Two Samsung EVO 960 m.2 (265GB + 1TB)
Corsair SF450

First of all, those parts are small! (except the GTX) It's my first ITX build and I am realy amazed.
Building the system was not as easy as in a big case, but it was no big deal. Needed to remove the PSU cage to install the mainboard. The advantage is, that there are not many cables (as I dont have SSDs).
I installed the mainboard io shield, but I am going to remove it as soon as I delid my CPU. Undervolting is also on the todo list.
I run ARK survival evolved for a few minutes as the pc will mostly be used for gaming and there are my first impressions (closed sidepannels, io shield on, no delid, no undervolting, NH-L9i fins parallel to ram):

- in windows (2d) the SF450 fan runs most of the time, not only while/after gaming. The air blowing out of the PSU feels like having the same temperature as the room. I don't realy know why the fan is spinning, but it is silent and I can only hear it very close. I had a look if it is the problem with the GPU backplate heating the PSU. My GPU looks like beinig a little bent, it almost touches the PSU. I put some spacers (small piece of PSU package foam, not covering the PSU/GPU back much) and let the GPU fan spin. The PSU fan was still most of the time spinning. I might try to do a better job with the spacers and see if it makes a difference
- in games this case is much loader than my old big tower. The GPU is by far the loadest part and spinns about 20% faster than in my old case. Using a power target of 70% helped a bit, but not very much. But the noise it produces is not realy annoying.
I would recommand for those who only use the pc for gaming without OC, just use the Noctua or C7 with the Noctua fan. Disabling turbo boost didn't make any noise difference, but I did not run a stress test.
- The Asus boad looks great and has many features (like the 2 m.2), but the mosfet heatsinks cover most of the heatsink. There is not much space for air to get through. If you dont mind having only one m.2 I would recommend a mainboard with much space (or as much as possible) around the CPU.
- To the case ventilation itself: While gaming it gets hot on the back top and buttom (I think the GPU heat heats those parts). It could use as much space as possible to blow air out, I think that's why removing the io shield will benefit. I think an additional fan at the top blowing out doesn't make any difference. Maybe a bigger mesh on the top would help with that a little, but maybe won't look that good
- I replaced the feet with the hifi feet suggested pages back. Putting the case on a mousepad or something similar would also reduce sliding.
- I still need to figure out where to turn off Asus auto OC, but the OC is very minimal (about 20 MHz for each core). Did not have the time to take a closer look.

So far I like the case because its so small and has much power. I think Dan did the best he could for the small format! I don't want to go back to my tower! Good work Dan, thank you for the case!
I hope there will be improved parts in the future those wo already have the case (and thereby help improving it) will also have the possibility to benefit.

Dan, maybe you can make a collection of tipps and tricks on your homepage?
 
Fhe
Frazhna said:
I'm curious about this. My Ncase M1 gets quite hot on top and by the motherboard, but it is cool where the intake fans are. Is your case cool where the intake fans are?
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The only intake is the CPU cooler. On mine, yes you can feel cooler air immediately surrounding the CPU cooler intake area on the side panel.
 
illram said:
Removed the Strix IO heatsink tonight and tried a Scythe 120mm 12mm fan. Conclusion: stick with the Noctua A9x14, and remove the heatsink if you're using the LP53 with the fins running perpendicular to your RAM. Removing the mosfet heatsink provided a 10c or so improvement in Prime95 temps for me.

The Scythe looks bad ass and really cools the rest of the mobo, RAM, and SSD well. My RAM was about 15c cooler, in fact. But it is pretty loud and offers no increase in CPU cooling performance over the Noctua. It sits about 42mm tall once installed, but it has to rest on the wifi card module of the z270i and the RAM, or just the wifi module depending on how you want it, since it is so large. I.e. even once secured to the heatsink it sits about 1 or 2mm above it. The version you can buy separately is also not PWM, sadly. (Do they sell a slim 120mm 12mm fan with any of their CPU coolers?)
Click to expand...
What were the temps without the Mosfet?? At what's oc?
 
In your awesome cooler overview Meccabolix i seem to have missed the orientation of your fans. I have just installed the LP53 with Noctua a9x14, vertical orientation and used your YouTube video as reference - this have left me with the fan pushing air towards the CPU. Is this the correct "optimal" setup? You other lovely guys are also welcome to tune in on this.

Oh, and if anyone is interested I also removed the I/O shield, and used Thermal Grizzly Kryonaut. Overall a 10c reduction in idle and on load from my Cryorig C7. However, noise feels like 80 000 dB reduction.
 
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Yeah! That's great!

Has anyone used a pico PSU to power your Dan A4 SFX?
And maybe use the space left to put AIO cooler or more fans?
 
mcheddadi said:
What were the temps without the Mosfet?? At what's oc?
Click to expand...

I am using a laser thermometer to check the mosfet temps, but none of them went higher than 115F during prime95. They are naked right now too, I have not received my replacement low profile heatsinks. I may not even put them on... FYI my laser thermometer has a pretty big error window of about 10f just in testing around the house, but even with that they are well within their thermal limit. This is all at stock.

By the way I noticed that once in the case and with the heatpipe bends of the LP53 at the bottom of the case, fins facing out the IO panel, I am noticing a decent improvement in temperature. About 10c lower at idle vs open air and Max temp of Prime95 went down to 86c in the case, from 91c in open air! I added all of this to the spreadsheet. (What happened to that, it looks like a ton of measurements got cut?)
 
Also, I can confirm 300mm for the PCIE and CPU cables (if you're using the Asus Z270I) is plenty long. 150mm for the ATX cable is also perfect for this motherboard. You could probably get away with 250mm for the CPU power on the Strix motherboard actually. And, don't be a moron like me and only order one PCIE cable if you're using the 1080ti....:(
 
Cherry Dude said:
In your awesome cooler overview Meccabolix i seem to have missed the orientation of your fans. I have just installed the LP53 with Noctua a9x14, vertical orientation and used your YouTube video as reference - this have left me with the fan pushing air towards the CPU. Is this the correct "optimal" setup? You other lovely guys are also welcome to tune in on this.

Oh, and if anyone is interested I also removed the I/O shield, and used Thermal Grizzly Kryonaut. Overall a 10c reduction in idle and on load from my Cryorig C7. However, noise feels like 80 000 dB reduction.
Click to expand...

Yup i put mine so it blows towards the cpu.
 
the vcore on the strix board. if I put manual at 1.26v it doesn't stay like that and goes all the way to 1.386v when the cpu is at 4400mhz. I was wondering if I could use it to lower my temps... anybody with a strix board has insight on this?
 
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