ATX Case 15.5"

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Any one know of an ATX case that is 15.5" high or shorter? I have a very specific area I need to put one in in my son's room. I want to give him my motherboard, CPU, and RAM but my board is ATX.

I'm stuck because his case and board is micro-atx. His board only has 2 RAM slots so to get him to 8gb I'd have to have 2 x 4gb DDR2. And we all know how expensive 4gb DDR2 sticks are. I want to upgrade my own system, but if I can't give him my current system then I have to buy 2 new systems.
 
I don't think the width and depth matters (much).

Current case is 7" W and 15" D. Looks like I could go as wide as 10" and 20" D.

My other option would be to keep his current case and get a m-atx motherboard that supports a 955BE and has 4 DDR2 slots.
 
Personally, I wouldn't be ok with the idea of buying an old AM2+ mATX motherboard. Especially considering that there weren't that many good ones in the first place IIRC.

You could get the Lian Li PC A05 which has a max height of 15.15":
http://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/con...SuKZ5tMwAGY-a_BoCbQHw_wcB&is=REG&A=details&Q=

Alternatively, do a custom enclosure out of cardboard box with a layout similar to the PC A05?

EDIT: There is technically another route but it's honestly worse than getting the AM2+ maTX route:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811144231&ignorebbr=1

Stand that case up on its side and it'll have a max height of 14.3" and width of 5.3". However, it comes with a really really shitty PSU that's more than capable of harming the PC so I would not advise you to use the included PSU. It's also going to be noisier and of significantly lesser quality than the well built Lian Li A05B. At its price of $81 shipped with the forced purchase of a shitty PSU, it's just not cheap enough to justify getting over the Lian Li A05B.

With that said, if the A05B sales falls through, the Apevia route is an option.
 
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I'd recommend you the case I use, Jonsbo W2, as it fits full ATX and is only 15.16" tall. I'm sure it costs more than you're looking to spend to house your old parts though.

25s1w94.jpg


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http://www.jonsbo.com/en/index.html
 
Dangman said:
Personally, I wouldn't be ok with the idea of buying an old AM2+ mATX motherboard. Especially considering that there weren't that many good ones in the first place IIRC.

You could get the Lian Li PC A05 which has a max height of 15.15":
http://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/con...SuKZ5tMwAGY-a_BoCbQHw_wcB&is=REG&A=details&Q=

Alternatively, do a custom enclosure out of cardboard box with a layout similar to the PC A05?

EDIT: There is technically another route but it's honestly worse than getting the AM2+ maTX route:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811144231&ignorebbr=1

Stand that case up on its side and it'll have a max height of 14.3" and width of 5.3". However, it comes with a really really shitty PSU that's more than capable of harming the PC so I would not advise you to use the included PSU. It's also going to be noisier and of significantly lesser quality than the well built Lian Li A05B. At its price of $81 shipped with the forced purchase of a shitty PSU, it's just not cheap enough to justify getting over the Lian Li A05B.

With that said, if the A05B sales falls through, the Apevia route is an option.
Click to expand...

As far as the motherboard goes, he's using a basic Gigabyte board now, and the ATX board I want to pass to him is an ECS A780GM-A. There isn't anything special about the board other than it's been incredibly stable for me. I don't do any overclocking (normally), and one x16 slot for video is good enough.
 
Dangman said:
EDIT: There is technically another route but it's honestly worse than getting the AM2+ maTX route:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811144231&ignorebbr=1

Stand that case up on its side and it'll have a max height of 14.3" and width of 5.3". However, it comes with a really really shitty PSU that's more than capable of harming the PC so I would not advise you to use the included PSU. It's also going to be noisier and of significantly lesser quality than the well built Lian Li A05B. At its price of $81 shipped with the forced purchase of a shitty PSU, it's just not cheap enough to justify getting over the Lian Li A05B.
Click to expand...
I have used that case before with my HTPC, only mine was the Cooler Master Elite 360. It is nearly the EXACT same case and same layout, only different front.

It's cheap. However, it comes with some significant drawbacks.
1. It is cramped. Hard to manage wiring. A modular PSU will help. Get ready to use a lot of zip ties, the main ATX 24pin cable is the biggest bitch of them all to route, especially if you put an optical drive in there.
2. Limited 3.5" drive space. It holds 2 drives by default, but really only one of those slots is viable due to cabling concerns (the one outermost of the case). You could fit more if you used adapters to put them in the 5.25" bays, but they will get zero airflow.
3. You will not be able to fit any decent sized graphics card in there. The cables from your PSU will literally hang off the edge of an ATX board. We are talking low end cards only.
4. Cooling by default is horrid. However, if you fill the fan slots you can cool a hot Phenom chip (125w). I used it as my HTPC, see sig for specs. I filled the 2 120mm intake fan slots, 1 of the 80 mm exhausts, and put a PCI slot fan in mine. The PSU sucked in fresh air from the side and spit it out the front. My Phenom 9850BE black edition stays under 60C at stock clocks only with the stock heatsink fan.
 
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