Mini ITX Case v Mid-Tower Case
- Thread starter HarveyDG
- Start date
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vmem
Splendid
- Feb 17, 2012
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Advantage:
Mainly one: AIR-FLOW. you will get much more air-flow, components can run cooler, and hopefully quieter
two?: more room for HDDs, if you are someone who wants 2+ HDDs connected to your mobo, even it is mITX, you will want something bigger than a minimalistic mITX case to hold them all.
disadvantage:
Size: this is obvious, you got an mITX case and you're using a larger case so one can say you're not taking full advantage of what you bought
cost: since you're putting it in a mid-tower case, most of which are big enough to fit mATX boards, you're basically paying more for the same thing. most microATX mobos are cheaper than mITX boards because it is easier to fit the chipset on the slightly bigger boards. in addition, many people using an mITX want "no compromise minimalistic" builds, so mITX boards tend to bundle in more stuff such as wifi, better onboard audio, etc. and it is easier to get a basic mATX board
Mainly one: AIR-FLOW. you will get much more air-flow, components can run cooler, and hopefully quieter
two?: more room for HDDs, if you are someone who wants 2+ HDDs connected to your mobo, even it is mITX, you will want something bigger than a minimalistic mITX case to hold them all.
disadvantage:
Size: this is obvious, you got an mITX case and you're using a larger case so one can say you're not taking full advantage of what you bought
cost: since you're putting it in a mid-tower case, most of which are big enough to fit mATX boards, you're basically paying more for the same thing. most microATX mobos are cheaper than mITX boards because it is easier to fit the chipset on the slightly bigger boards. in addition, many people using an mITX want "no compromise minimalistic" builds, so mITX boards tend to bundle in more stuff such as wifi, better onboard audio, etc. and it is easier to get a basic mATX board
- Nov 18, 2008
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Rammy
Honorable
- Sep 3, 2012
- 2,492
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The two main disadvantages of an ITX build over a mATX/ATX build are that you only have one PCIe slot and two ram slots. This means you are going to be limited to one graphics card and usually half the memory capacity of a similarly specced larger build.
The size/space/expansion/airflow issues are very case-dependant rather than being linked to the size of the motherboard itself. There's plenty of ITX cases which offer comparable (and in some cases superior) airflow/cooling to larger cases and they do this by exploiting the advantages of the format.
The one thing I would say about ITX, and smaller builds in general, is that they are harder to select parts for and harder to physically build. Many ITX cases will impose (often severe) limitations on how long a power supply can be, how long a graphics card can be and how large a CPU cooler can be. They can also use non-ATX PSUs, only support slim optical drives or remove optical drive provision entirely. None of these are significant in themselves but each can have an effect on another component with far greater regularity than a standard ATX mid-tower so you do really need to plan things out and buy parts which support each other.
The size/space/expansion/airflow issues are very case-dependant rather than being linked to the size of the motherboard itself. There's plenty of ITX cases which offer comparable (and in some cases superior) airflow/cooling to larger cases and they do this by exploiting the advantages of the format.
The one thing I would say about ITX, and smaller builds in general, is that they are harder to select parts for and harder to physically build. Many ITX cases will impose (often severe) limitations on how long a power supply can be, how long a graphics card can be and how large a CPU cooler can be. They can also use non-ATX PSUs, only support slim optical drives or remove optical drive provision entirely. None of these are significant in themselves but each can have an effect on another component with far greater regularity than a standard ATX mid-tower so you do really need to plan things out and buy parts which support each other.
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