SilverStone PS08: A Decent, Ultra Low-Cost Micro-ATX Case

[phoronix]

Phoronix: SilverStone PS08: A Decent, Ultra Low-Cost Micro-ATX Case

With being in the process of assembling a new automated test farm for Phoronix Test Suite / OpenBenchmarking.org / Phoromatic test purposes, when it came to finding new computer cases I ended up finding a decent choice with SilverStone. While SilverStone is known for their very expensive and high-end cases, the Precision PS08 is less luxurious but sells at a very nice price.

http://www.phoronix.com/vr.php?view=19799

[molecule-eye]

The "Trinity" system is actually a Richland system. For the same price you can get a Fractal Design Core 1000 which is more compact and has better aesthetics, in my opinion. Decent case though, even though I'm sort of no longer interested in anything bigger than ITX these days.

[Sonadow]

The "Trinity" system is actually a Richland system. For the same price you can get a Fractal Design Core 1000 which is more compact and has better aesthetics, in my opinion. Decent case though, even though I'm sort of no longer interested in anything bigger than ITX these days.

Definitely does look rather decent for a tower design. Would have been better if they could have done a horizontal chassis instead so that one can simply put the monitor on top of it.

That said, my itch is more in the NUCs and the various x86 mini PCs nowadays. ridiculously tiny, but still bare bones enough and supports standard (but expensive) components for DIY-ing. Buy a barebones NUC, dump in a 256GB mSATA SSD, an mPCIe WiFi card (or get a USB hub + USB wifi adapter), duct tape it behind a monitor and you've got an AIO ready for use.

[GraysonPeddie]

The "Trinity" system is actually a Richland system. For the same price you can get a Fractal Design Core 1000 which is more compact and has better aesthetics, in my opinion. Decent case though, even though I'm sort of no longer interested in anything bigger than ITX these days.

Glad I'm not the only one who catch that. 6x00 is a Richland-based APU. 5x00 is Trinity, which I'm using A10-5700.

Back to reading the article.

[GraysonPeddie]

(I'm not fast enough to add anything to my previous post... That is, after I read the article. (sigh) )

That's a good case for doing benchmarks in, but I'd prefer to go with a case with SATA/power ports in the right side of the case. You won't have any problems with the CPU cooler obstructing the adding and removal of hard drives.

My favorite case that I'd love to buy is NZXT H440 Computer Case. I loved the look, but I don't care for the window in the side. I like the fact that the front of the case is so plain and I didn't see a need to have an optical drive except for ripping CDs which I'll prefer to have an external slot-loading DVD drive (Ah, an Apple SuperDrive!).

[schmidtbag]

haha I can imagine that at some point, Michael will have maybe 8 of these towers stacked on top of each other. I'm sure it'd be stable enough, and a real room saver. Makes me wonder if he uses any of these computers for anything other than benchmarks. I also wonder if he uses some sort of NAS and does a PXE boot - that would probably save him a ton of time on tests that don't rely on I/O.


Personally, I think full towers are going to be phased out somewhat soon, and mid towers will probably follow shortly after. Computer parts are shrinking and more features are being crammed into smaller places. Most modern computers don't need more than 1 storage device or GPU. Most modern computers don't need a separate NIC, SATA/RAID controller, or sound card. Hell, some systems these days don't even need integrated audio, due to HDMI audio. With things like Thunderbolt around, in a worst case scenario, you could use it as a PCIe substitute.

Whenever I intend to build a new rig, its probably going to be Micro ATX. I'd like to get a board that supports 2 GPUs, and if I happen to need one of the 2 spare non-16x slots but they're covered up by a GPU, I'll use this riser cable I own and re-route the device somewhere else. But, hopefully by then I can get a pair of GPUs as powerful as the 780Ti or R9 290X that only take up 1 slot.

[GraysonPeddie]

Whenever I intend to build a new rig, its probably going to be Micro ATX. I'd like to get a board that supports 2 GPUs, and if I happen to need one of the 2 spare non-16x slots but they're covered up by a GPU, I'll use this riser cable I own and re-route the device somewhere else. But, hopefully by then I can get a pair of GPUs as powerful as the 780Ti or R9 290X that only take up 1 slot.

Yeah, I don't like GPUs that take up two slots.

I looked over my server and desktop and found that I only need four expansion slots. Maybe I'm thinking about not getting an ATX case (NZXT H440) and get a Micro ATX case instead.

[GreatEmerald]

haha I can imagine that at some point, Michael will have maybe 8 of these towers stacked on top of each other. I'm sure it'd be stable enough, and a real room saver. Makes me wonder if he uses any of these computers for anything other than benchmarks. I also wonder if he uses some sort of NAS and does a PXE boot - that would probably save him a ton of time on tests that don't rely on I/O.


Personally, I think full towers are going to be phased out somewhat soon, and mid towers will probably follow shortly after. Computer parts are shrinking and more features are being crammed into smaller places. Most modern computers don't need more than 1 storage device or GPU. Most modern computers don't need a separate NIC, SATA/RAID controller, or sound card. Hell, some systems these days don't even need integrated audio, due to HDMI audio. With things like Thunderbolt around, in a worst case scenario, you could use it as a PCIe substitute.

Whenever I intend to build a new rig, its probably going to be Micro ATX. I'd like to get a board that supports 2 GPUs, and if I happen to need one of the 2 spare non-16x slots but they're covered up by a GPU, I'll use this riser cable I own and re-route the device somewhere else. But, hopefully by then I can get a pair of GPUs as powerful as the 780Ti or R9 290X that only take up 1 slot.

Yea. Whenever I get to assemble a home server, I'll probably reuse the case I have for my current HTPC, and replace that case with a Micro ATX (it's full ATX, but a compact version of it, at the moment), since it does need two PCI slots for the TV card and the CI reader.

I'm still annoyed at how the vast majority of tower cases still have the entire front dedicated solely to ODDs that are hardly ever used any more. The cages for them are bulky and interfere with both cable management and air flow... Meanwhile there could simply be a single HDD slot (or two if 2.5", which most are these days, or even more if using slim ones) next to the PSU, and you would have a very compact setup that still has all the needed functionality.

[Tgui]

haha I can imagine that at some point, Michael will have maybe 8 of these towers stacked on top of each other. I'm sure it'd be stable enough, and a real room saver. Makes me wonder if he uses any of these computers for anything other than benchmarks. I also wonder if he uses some sort of NAS and does a PXE boot - that would probably save him a ton of time on tests that don't rely on I/O.


Personally, I think full towers are going to be phased out somewhat soon, and mid towers will probably follow shortly after. Computer parts are shrinking and more features are being crammed into smaller places. Most modern computers don't need more than 1 storage device or GPU. Most modern computers don't need a separate NIC, SATA/RAID controller, or sound card. Hell, some systems these days don't even need integrated audio, due to HDMI audio. With things like Thunderbolt around, in a worst case scenario, you could use it as a PCIe substitute.

Whenever I intend to build a new rig, its probably going to be Micro ATX. I'd like to get a board that supports 2 GPUs, and if I happen to need one of the 2 spare non-16x slots but they're covered up by a GPU, I'll use this riser cable I own and re-route the device somewhere else. But, hopefully by then I can get a pair of GPUs as powerful as the 780Ti or R9 290X that only take up 1 slot.

Family and friends think I'm insane when they see my full tower. I remember back in the day when bigger was better. Thats also when biege was the only color choice.

[tehehe]

Anyone can recommend any decent MiniITX case? No expensive cases please.