Thermaltake The Tower 100 Mini PC Chassis

Product Information

Examples: Corsair 2000D RGB Airflow , Phanteks Evolv Shift X , SilverStone Lucid LD03 , Hyte Revolt 3 Style 3: The Shoebox Style

For example, Fractal Design’s curvy Era ITX can hold ATX PSUs and standard-height graphics cards. It also has options for adding small AIO liquid coolers. And the Phanteks referenced below is essentially a scaled-down little tower. A system built into Thermaltake’s The Tower 100 case has potential to be a real eye-catcher. The Tower 100, however, leaves a lot of that work to you. The price is attractive enough, but Thermaltake doesn't give you a whole lot outside the glass (aesthetically speaking, and in terms of accessories in the box) to make it an attractive option for someone looking to build a flashy PC case. It's something of a blank-slate box. To make looking over Mini-ITX cases more manageable, we’ve opted to organize them into five rough design types. Not all Mini-ITX cases will fit into one, but most do, and this scheme gives you a solid idea of the options out there. Style 1: The Horizontal Console Style

The Rear I/O Panel: Twists and Turns

The easy answer: It comes down to the components you intend to install. For some shoppers, the look of the case tops everything, and that is fine. Just make sure to factor in some practical considerations, especially if you already own some of the parts. Examples: Fractal Design Era ITX , Phanteks Eclipse P200A DRGB Style 5: The Cube (or Near-Cube) Style Mini-ITX motherboards measure 6.7 by 6.7 inches, with mounting holes in prescribed locations; Mini-ITX cases, then, are built around accommodating these board dimensions. That said, some Mini-ITX cases are much bigger than others in terms of height or volume. But by definition, a “true” Mini-ITX case won’t accommodate any board bigger than a Mini-ITX one, with the exception of a few that also support the slightly larger (and uncommon) Mini-DTX form factor. Mini-DTX boards are slightly taller than Mini-ITX boards, at 8 by 6.7 inches. (The next biggest size class for motherboards, MicroATX, is 9.6 inches square and defines the next-largest class of PC cases.) Building a system in the Tower 100 chassis led me to believe that Thermaltake was really trying to do some good things here with regards to visual flair and system thermal management. Some of their other past accessories don’t always work out the way they hoped. However, with the Tower 100 chassis, the pieces are well made (even if numerous) solid (except the perforated pieces obviously), and fit together very well. I am personally a fan of the ITX tower design idea, but do realize this is not a small ITX enclosure by any means. People may have concern about the cooling performance of a mini-ITX chassis. However, the cold air intakes and hot air exhausts are well-developled, ensuring the interior temperature stays low at all times.

Externally, that’s about all there is to the The Tower 100 case, but the building experience is considerably different than any other case I’ve worked with so far. The third is power-supply compatibility. If you are bringing a PSU you already own to the build, make sure it matches the type (ATX, SFX, or SFX-L) that the case supports and that it isn’t longer than the maximum rated length. While on the subject of measurements, make sure your CPU cooler and GPU will fit, as well; case makers supply those maximum heights and lengths.

The Limits of Power: Cooling Fans, PSUs, and More 

For one: The case doesn’t have any LED illumination built in, nor does it ship with RGB or aRGB LED fans. (The two included spinners are, curiously, unlit.) The case will do a good job showing off the parts you install into it, but as you can seee here, our finished build looks rather dull without some LED flair. Two 3.0 USB and one USB 3.1 (Gen 2) Type C ports are placed on the top panel to grant direct access when needed. The motherboard gets mounted vertically in this case, positioned so that the board is on full view through the front glass panel. With all of the glass panels removed, getting access to all of the various headers to get them connected up is made fairly easy; you have easy access from three directions. The same goes for the RAM slots on your board, and the PCI Express slot for your graphics card. Beside the motherboard mounting tray and the PSU compartment, Thermaltake left a large space for the video card. The cavity can accommodate a dual-slot card up to 330mm long.

You may also see support in a given case for a variant of the SFX form factor, the SFX-L. This is an offshoot, a slightly larger version of an SFX power supply with a longer body. (An ordinary SFX PSU measures 3.9 inches long, versus 5.5 inches for SFX-L.) The extra body size on an SFX-L supply allows for more and larger components and cooling hardware inside, in turn allowing for higher wattages. Don’t assume, however, that you can cram an SFX-L power supply into a case that only supports SFX PSUs. Look for that specific support. There’s a cut-out in the SSD mounting tray right at the connector that (finally) allows for a real actual unconstrained use of a right angle SATA connector (middle picture below). How about that. Also, I cannot recall right now having an easier time getting power to an SSD. Or a GPU for that matter. At this point, the wide range of differences that can exist among a pool of Mini-ITX cases may seem daunting. You are probably starting to wonder how this can even be a single form factor at all. A form factor implies that it should be standardized, but in the case of Mini-ITX PC chassis, it’s mostly the motherboard size and shape that keeps this family a family. Now, what if you were to lay your pillar down? This third style uses a design that more closely matches a long, thin box. SilverStone Sugo 14: Shoebox dimensionsThe Tower 100 is a vertically designed case constructed with solid steel all around, the vertical design allows the chassis to have a smaller footprint, and helps to minimize obstruction to your gaming and workspace area. The vertical design also helps extract heat from the chassis by using a chimney effect, taking cold air from the base and dispelling the heat via the top. The second should be the number and kind of drives you intend to install. Most Mini-ITX cases support at least two 2.5- or 3.5-inch SATA drives, but factor in room for what you have. This won't matter if you go all-in on motherboard-mounted M.2 drives, but cramped Mini-ITX boards have room for just one or two of those.