News Fractal Design introduces Era ITX chassis

All the reviews of this agree on two things, it's overpriced and it runs too hot. I wonder how a company as consistent as Fractal could get this so wrong, but collabarating with Intel explains everything.

 

A missed opportunity, a lot of work has gone into creating a high end alu shell, which looks great with all 3 sorts of top plates.
Then to starve it of GPU ventilation makes no sense. Lovely for a stylish office PC or HTPC. Anything else is going to cook.

The mesh top will help, but there's precious little open for incoming air, and a single 80mm fan at the rear.

I was quite excited when I first saw info earlier this week, but it'll need modding if you want to put high performance kit in it.

At 16L it is pretty small for a mass market case from mainstream manufacturer, but that space has not been well used.

As I have said elsewhere, it makes the 12.6L NCase M1 with its 3 slot capacity and excellent cooling all the more impressive.

 

I find the layout doubly strange when Silverstone basically solved bottom to top airflow a decade ago. Some tall case feet, a couple of big fans in the bottom and spin the motherboard through 90 degrees, job done.

I wonder if's something weird like Silverstone holding a patent on sideways motherboard mountings that stops anyone else from doing it.

 

Not what I've come to expect from Fractal Design.

That said, it can't possibly run hotter than a Raijintek Metis (non-Plus), which is a 13.4L case.

I'd be interested, but I can almost guarantee that it'll be far too expensive here.

edit: Looking at their site, seems you can swap the wood top for a mesh/filter setup. Perhaps that will help with temperatures?

 

It helps with CPU temps [though not by much iirc], does sweet **** all for the gpu temps.

 

There are quite a few reviews out there; a fair selection on youtube. Just watched Jayz2cents, which was somewhat inconclusive.

I like Josh from NFC, who is thoughtful and knowledgeable and not out for sensation.

He seems to think it works better with the top fans as inlets. I will revise my opinion upwards based on his findings. Still not for super high power fire breathing components tho'
I look forward to seeing what he comes up with for a higher airflow mod.

 

It's a total hot box. Watch the HardwareCanucks one mate.

It would need some modding, but at this price that kinda defies the purpose. There are better cases around (like your one) for not much more or the same.

They really needed to get this right, and they just haven't.

 

According to CraftComputing's review there might also be clearance issues with ATX PSUs and long(er) graphic cards. Namely, you won't be able to connect power cables to the PSU.

 

My view is just go buy a box if you want something unimaginative that does the job, which is literally every other Fractal case. You all just want what already exists out there, regardless of thermal performance, I'm just glad it exists for the sake of not being yet another boring box with less personality than egg and cress sandwich.

 

Is Craft Computing and HardwareCanucks actually doing reviews again, last time I watched either every video was a thinly veiled sponsored advertisement. Jaz2cents is of course going to be inconclusive, he practically works for Fractal. But lets be realistic people, look at a nearly solid panel case and do something stupid like plop a gaming pc in it, how's it going to do?

Probably not so well, you don't need 1000 reviews to make an educated guess

 

It looks very interesting, the thermal performance looks meh.

Watch his video on the Fractal, it seems to be genuine.

 

Thanks for the comments folks.

I usually try to find text reviews, rather than videos - I can read faster than most of those videos talk, skip around with a lot less hassle and avoid the potential fun of an accent or voice which drives me to distraction.

If I can find one at a reasonable price in Japan, I might buy it just for giggles. I'd like to upgrade my current desktop, but... eh, I dunno. It'll get expensive quickly because beastly ITX rigs always do.