Spring regularly attracts people to furniture stores and hardware stores to find ideas and products that will spice up their homes a little. And gamers also want a visual change from time to time when it comes to their own PC – a new PC case is a simple measure. But even if you don't care about the outside of your PC and need a new case anyway, you will find many helpful tips about choosing a PC case in our feature.
We will explain a few things to you that are important so that you don't end up having problems with hardware installation or ventilation. This involves the topics of formats, connections, fans, graphics card length, CPU cooler height and space for water cooling. And of course we have also prepared a market overview, although we have to severely limit the number of cases due to the huge selection. Nevertheless, you will find a total of 50 cases in one overview.
Case size and form factors
The older ones among our readers may still remember the times when a case couldn't be big enough for the cooling of gaming hardware to work reliably. These days are long gone – problems only arise with extremely small sizes. In order to make a pre-selection, it is best to decide on a so-called form factor in advance. These include, above all, and we list them from small to large: Mini-ITX, µATX, ATX and E-ATX. These are standard sizes for cases and mainboards that ensure compatibility with one another. Power supplies also come in sizes such as ATX or the smaller SFX format, although only very small cases use formats other than ATX. When it comes to cases, it is important to know that all motherboards that have the same or a smaller format fit into them. In addition to ATX mainboards, motherboards in Mini-ITX and µATX format also fit into an ATX case, but not mainboards in the larger E-ATX format. The ATX format is ideal for a gaming PC. Although many ATX models are hardly larger than µATX cases, they easily offer space for large graphics cards and powerful coolers as well as three fans or more starting from around 30 to 40 euros. The compactness of ATX cases also has to do with the fact that only a few cases now offer a space-consuming external installation slot for DVD drives and can therefore be produced with a lower height.
Source: Biostar mainboards in Mini-ITX format (here a Biostar B550T-Silver) are barely wider than their back panel connection area. If you want a particularly small PC, first look at µATX cases. Of course, a µATX mainboard is mandatory here. Mini-ITX mainboards also fit, but they don't make sense because they are much more expensive compared to similarly good µATX models. In the µATX range there are some cases in which the power supply is placed at the front or on the side, so that the case height can be lower again. For example, our author has the Asus Prime P201, which is only 35 centimeters high because the power supply is placed at the front. Visually, the case appears extremely compact, even though its depth of 46 centimeters is one of the 10 percent of the deepest µATX cases. Of course, these space-saving power supply installation options are also available in the ATX or even E-ATX range. If you want a really extremely small case, you have to take a Mini-IXT case – but here you have to be extremely careful not to fall into any trap that prevents you from installing the hardware. In any case, Mini-ITX requires good planning, and unproblematic Mini-ITX cases with plenty of space for gaming hardware often end up being hardly smaller than many µATX cases.