The Smallest ITX Gaming Case Ever (3.1L)

not long ago I reviewed the j-hat pure an ultra compact case with an internal brick that could handle very light components is great for productivity just an all-around good case if you're looking for something that didn't need a dedicated GPU now jae-hak has come out with an MK 2 version a slightly larger case that has support for a dedicated GPU in the same compact form factor so today we're going to do a build in the smallest I TX gaming case in the world [Music] so here we have the jae-hak pur MK 2 version now we looked at its smaller brother not too long ago the biggest difference here is that it's a bit longer and it can now house a low profile GPU to up front very simple all you have is a simple cutout here for your 16 millimeter power plug or power switch vandal switch both sides are pretty much the same ventilation pattern there which matches the ventilation on the top the top is pretty much entirely ventilation so you should be able to get decent amount of air into the case to cool whatever you need it to underneath things get a little more interesting you now instead of having an all flat metal bottom you have the addition of this ventilation here that sits underneath you GPU so in addition to having a GP you could also mount a power supply there there too in July meanwhile unit or some SSDs or additional fans if you want to add some more cooling to the system there on back you can see simply cut out for your il you have two different ports here for power plugs depending on what kind of DC DC AC DC internal or external power supply unit you go with and then dual slots for that low profile GPU so there is a decent amount of room for flexibility as much as pop would be possible in a case like this the design and layout is very simple matte-black like I like it nice and simple you can blend it into pretty much any decor I think it's really attractive overall and understated and simple in its layout so let's open it up now and see how the internals look getting into the case is simple there are four screws at the top and then two two on each side so six total you have your four mounting posts for your motherboard as well as this bit here which can either be ventilation for GPU your case or spot to mount fans and additionally you have these two mounting points here these two screw holes that's where you can mount your internal Meanwell jae-hak power supply the 200 watt version that we use for the original jae-hak pure if you want but for our purposes we're gonna definitely put the GPU in here and make a nice compact gaming rig accessorized there's not much that comes with the case you will get the included vandal switch or power button this riser cable for graphics card is optional because the believe was only like 25 bucks though as an add-on piece and additionally you'll get some feet there for the bottom you don't need really high feet since there is some space in between the GPU and the bottom of the case we'll talk about that later and mounting screws which you'll need just for mounting your motherboard GPU and just general things inside the case so everything you would need to get started can be ordered directly from the jae-hak site may be difficult on camera for you to realize how small this case actually is so four scales put up next to some of the more popular eye takes cases right now you can see it's a baby it's a tiny tiny case in comparison it really is impressive that you can fit a dedicated GPU into something that small alright so let's jump into the actual build four components going inside here you have to be pretty purposeful about what you pick but I went for a nice mid-range system that should be able to handle gaming editing pretty much whatever you want to do as long as you're not going crazy so for the CPU I have the Rison 530 600 X a great all-around performer great for games and also can handle some rendering or editing duties if that's what you wanted to do I'm gonna cool that with the Noctua NHL 9 I the chrome axon so that's a nice all matte black version that should look amazing inside this case my motherboard is the Auris X 570 I this is probably a bit overkill for this build but it's a great motherboard that should be able to handle what we have in here and also more if we want to add something else down the line for RAM I have 16 gigs of Corsair Vengeance ddr4 3200 great Ram that I pretty much use in every bill that I do storage not gonna go on MVM me and to keep the cost down I have a one terabyte Samsung 860 Evo so it should be able to hold games give you typical SSD satis feeds should be fine for this system and lastly the GPU the star of this show will be the low profile gtx 1650 so you should be able to handle 1080p gaming across pretty much anything at 60 frames for most games especially eSports titles if you want to play you know high-end triple-a titles some of those might not run as well obviously but if you are a board gamer or someone that plays first-person shooters a lot of those games should run just fine on this system but let's assemble it and see how it works before you start I just wanted to touch quickly on the power supply options you have using one of these will be your best option so on the right we have a Pico 160 XT this is very popular and one of the cheaper options as well again all these rely on external power bricks then we have the HD Plex 160 this is an older model the new one has a silver faceplate but this is a great option as well if you're looking to just do a 19 bolt brick this is fantastic on the Left we have a custom GPU this is a GU neke power supply I've done a video on this and also this one and this one this is a custom GPU that you can order through a small phone for a factor that neck I'll link to that form thread there but these can go upwards of 400 plus watts definitely overkill for a build like this but I'm gonna use it anyway just to make sure we have the Headroom the AC Plex 160 is probably my general recommendation if you're looking for an ultra compact power supply that works with a variety of bricks you can pick up a bunch of bricks most of them want Amazon can be found for as little as 30 bucks so it's a pretty good package but if you have the money to swing it and you need more power G unique is a great option as well one more quick note before we get started the NHL 9i the core that was designed for Intel motherboards this will fit onto AMD motherboards but the elma and a version does not fit on to Intel motherboards so you can use this cooler I'm using this because it's nice and black but you will need the conversion kit that not to provide so you can see the bottom the feet pattern or the actual mounting point pattern is basically a square and on AMD motherboards it is a rectangle so you have to get the mounting kit or the additional bracket kit and that will let you put these feet onto this cooler I'm just gonna swap these out since obviously I have both coolers but there is also a chromatic version of the NHL 9 a the AMD version it just wasn't out when I purchased this so just keep that in mind don't buy this cooler thinking you're just going to throw it onto an AMD motherboard and it will work perfectly make sure you either get the AMD version or you get the conversion kit [Music] [Music] [Music] okay so we have everything assembled this was pretty easy to build and obviously not a ton of components there are some interesting things that haven't known for one my actual archdemon power supply is kind of bumping into the power switch up for it you can see that there it's very tight so you might want to be careful about which power supplies you do or don't use if I had gone with an HD Plex this probably would be an even bigger problem because it has a heatsink some other boards move the 24 pin down a bit that would probably make for a much better fit so that's something that you normally wouldn't even be thinking about but in a tight case like this it can really be helpful the power supply cables this one specifically has more cables than I need the HD Plex is modular you can add and remove cables that you don't need so it would be a lot easier to route this would be a lot cleaner for sure but you can see underneath the power supply there are the or underneath the graphics card there are the power supply cables sitting in there or you can see them even better underneath the bottom there so that's kind of where they live this riser here is interesting so you can see there's a decent piece sticking out there I suppose you could flip that either way I figured it made more sense to pop it out this direction but it would be nice if there's just a fixed riser honestly instead of this flexible cable that you have to really kind of bend a lot to get it to fit into that take compact space so let's get the top on see how that works out you [Music] [Music] so after a pretty straightforward and simple build I now have everything set up and assembled to get all my games and testing software installed on it and I slid into doing some tests the first stuff I took a listen to the acoustics both at idle and gaming I thought this was gonna be crazy loud but the results actually surprised me so as you heard this system under gaming load is not really loud at all which was really impressive and what most of you will probably be using a case like this for I was truly impressed by the acoustics I thought that 1650 would be crazy loud and it wasn't so that's something good to know and obviously the CPU while gaming isn't stressed super crazy hard so you should be able to keep acoustics in check as well as temps speaking of temps the case does an adequate job of dealing with heat my CPU is sitting at around 45 degrees C idle which is definitely higher than you would normally expect but keep in mind this is a six core 12 third CPU at 4.3 gigahertz in an ultra-compact system with 192 millimeter fan coming down on that tightening heatsink so that's totally fine but more importantly when gaming it was only touching the 65 to 70 CE mark so it was never going above that really and it was totally under control in terms of temperatures while doing an actual active task just that idle temp is gonna be a little higher than you'd normally expected the GPU seemed to have a much easier time at idle it was sitting at around 49 degrees C very comfortable for a typical GPU and under load it was touching the 75 to 80 degree mark what you typically see from a compact desktop card obviously not super super low in terms of temps but certainly reasonable I wasn't seeing any throttling even with super intensive games pushing it to its max so the case can cool itself it does get a bit heat soaked at time so you will feel the temperature on the outside physically of the case rising but it didn't seem like that was actually affecting the performance those temperatures never spike to a point that was dangerous or at risk of fire on for the GPU or of hitting its thermal peak for the CPU so the temperatures are fine the acoustics are really good what about actual performance so far I've tested about 6 games on this system and every game that I've tested has been able to hit 60 frames per second at 1080p with either medium high or ultra settings some games like overwatch were even able to go 2560 by 1080 apex as well and still maintain that 60 frame protectant threshold so it's pretty powerful in terms of what you can do is a very capable gaming machine unless you're looking to do 4k obviously this isn't gonna even come close to touching that before you 1080p esports gamers people that play League of Legends games like that lighter games this is gonna be a fantastic system and it's gonna stay quiet that's the big difference if you want to dive into a little more detail on the benchmarks I threw all of that data onto the article on the website so you can check that stuff out there if you're interested when I originally got this case I thought oh that's cute it's compact it'll be fun do a nice productivity build but now that I've actually built in it tested it and used it I'm starting to think that it's more than that it's definitely more than that it can handle an actual gaming load it can handle productivity really whatever you need to do as long as you're not looking for crazy powerful components at 3.1 liters it is easily the most compact I take it's a gaming case on the market and if you're looking for that compact size this is a great option it's such a simple design that there really weren't any issues there everything was very well thought out particularly the power of plug options that's something that a lot of case manufacturers overlook especially when you're doing with these ultra compact systems with custom DC DC or AC DC power supply this case is priced at around 90 bucks with the power button I think that that is right in line with where it should be all-metal nice powder finish made in the USA that's a pretty healthy and reasonable price for what you get if you want to pick one up for yourself or any of the other components you saw in the video today I will drop links in the description along with a link to the article where you can see more benchmarks full benchmarks and performance data if that will help you make a buying decision so as always guys thanks for watching please like comment and subscribe if you liked the video I'm Jay I'll see you next time you

Channel: Tek Everything

Views: 232,513

Rating: 4.9172997 out of 5

Keywords:

Id: GqJFyaAT81E

Length: 15min 17sec (917 seconds)

Published: Sun Jun 21 2020

Reddit Comments

[u/riaqn0]

spoiler: External AC-DC unit.

​

waiting for a sub-1L gaming case with everything outside except all the cables, at which point the case is just cable management.

[u/The-Ephus]

Yes, ever

[u/lowspeccrt]

Needs Power brick. Entry invalid.

;p

Edit - that’s just the reality. I mean why not just make a case with external brick and external gpu? Then that would be the smallest until they figure out how to make the ram and cpu external.

[u/Kekeripo]

With the brick accounted, it's bigger than a Velka 3 or K39 probably.

[u/petabytepaper]

Good case, just the GPU fans should be pointing upwards. I have trouble believing temps won't skyrocket in the summer with so little breathing room underneath the GPU. Also there should be an option to remove the original noisy Gigabyte fans and being able to use aftermarket 2 x 80 mm fans but I know it is hard to achieve compatibility with all vendors (different heatsink width between them).

[u/bestdyxjtu]

too many compromises, pass

[u/loader963]

Peeps never played emulators on NUC’s?

[u/cavortingwebeasties]

Does vengeance RAM reach full advertised speeds with Ryzen yet? As far as I know it's capped at 2800 or lower

[u/bLitzkreEp]

Vat name case this is?