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It does. In fact, a 120mm fan on the forward mount overhangs the motherboard by about 15mm, and that's with the fan mounted as far forward as possible (there's 8mm of travel). So you have the choice of 1.) using only the cooler's 140mm fan, 2.) not using a 140mm fan at all, but two 120mm fans mounted to the bracket instead.
There's only about 2mm between the motherboard and the back of the chassis, so it would be very close if it fits that way.
No doubt, word of mouth is easily the number one factor for us up to now.Don't forget the army of M1 users, that recommend the M1 as soon as someone is asking for a small case
We actually still have top panels and panel kits still in stock and available on the website.
Nothing significant. It's the same design, just made from 0.8mm SECC instead of 1.5mm aluminum.
No change.
If you look at the pic I linked, it's actually a piece of metal mesh for the filter, and attached to that are magnetic strips. So instead of the magnetic tape being on the bracket like the Demciflex filters, it's attached to the filter, and the fan bracket is now ferrous so the magnets will stick to it.
It's backward-compatible by default. We could probably run some extras off and offer them as an accessory for current M1 owners if there's interest in it.
I'm not sure I see the value of offering two versions of the bracket going forward. There's not a lot of material in it compared to the rest of the case, so any weight difference will be negligible. It's basically all upside, as far as I can see. Can you give me a reason why you or anyone else might prefer the aluminum bracket?
Lol... well, it's far from the world's first full aluminum case. Lian Li has been doing all-aluminum cases for years. I will admit the aluminum has a very nice feel to it, especially with the matte black paint - lightweight, almost like plastic, but cold and solid to the touch. It feels premium and pretty novel when you first handle it.
I understand that you are looking to get confirmation of how the new 700 watt psu will fit, and will consider a steel based side fan mounting plate as part of the factors to be considered for the next run?
We'll still include two of the original-style filters so people can decide for themselves. It may be more restrictive, but I think people are willing to sacrifice a bit of cooling performance for the convenience of easily removable filters. If people are really after the best performance, they'll want to skip filters altogether, anyway.
That's correct.Looks like round 3 is sold out!
Round 4, here we go
Sorry about that, but honestly that's a normal amount of variation. The way these cases are made doesn't produce identical results every time - there will always be some minor differences in how the panels fit etc. This is true for all cases, though on larger cases you won't notice so much.
CPU cooler depends somewhat on your other parts. If the cooler is bigger than the socket, you'll want to make sure to pick a motherboard where the socket is located close to the middle of the board. Certain coolers won't fit with the 3.5" HDD cage (e.g., the Noctua NH-C14). The Scythe Kabuto II is a pretty good choice for a top-down cooler that maximises use of space, while still allowing for the 3.5" HDD cage. The NH-U9S or pretty much any Asetek-style slim-rad AIO (Corsair etc.) are good choices if you don't want to worry about motherboard socket location or HDD cage compatibility.
See my earlier post.
Yes. And just in case anyone missed it:
That board specifically is a low-end ECS motherboard I used during prototype testing. The first slot is x1 PCIe, second is the x16 PCIe, allowing for a soundcard and dual-slot GPU. There's a thread for these types of "in-between" mATX/mDTX motherboards here.
Yeah, the stud+clip method isn't totally ideal. The way sliding hooks are typically done involves bending the edge over though, which would create a visual inconsistency with the front panel. I'm picky about things like that
Alternatively, sliding studs could be used, but there's still the problem of how to secure the panels. There isn't enough room on the back of the case to have flanged panels that screw in to the back, like most cases do it. On a bigger case you could probably adjust things to make it work, but on a case this small where everything affects everything else and there's not much room to make adjustments, it really needs to be designed from the start with a specific method in mind.
Yeah, the stud+clip method isn't totally ideal. The way sliding hooks are typically done involves bending the edge over though, which would create a visual inconsistency with the front panel. I'm picky about things like that
