If you want to pack serious hardware into it though, The Lian Li PC-TU200 is pretty damn decent. Downside is it needs a SFX power supply.
It's also bigger than the Elite 130 (24L vs 19L), with slightly less room for the GPU (300mm vs 343mm). For comparison the RVZ01 is 14L, the M1 is 12.6L, and Dondon's A4 is currently 7.25L (though not quite finalised), all accommodating full-length GPUs.
This made me look at volume of the Alienware Gaming Amplifier... it's 13.17L!!! It's nearly too good to be true. It can't be beyond the wit of case companies to create a 7L mini-itx case that can hold a full length GPU, Mobo, an SSD(or just M4), an SFX PSU and nothing else. I don't even need it to be pretty.
That A4 looks awesome, I bet it's not going to be cheap though even though there's not a lot of material in it so to speak.
Its dinky, but inflexible. You get your single 2.5" SSD and you'll like it! I also completely forgot the Node 202, which is a bit over 10L
Wait... no one suggested the Parvum X1? http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/2015/02/04/parvum-systems-x1-0-review/1 Seems to be pretty tiny... what do you guys think?
The Parvum X1 that I own is lovely, but at 17L it isn't that small, and I do worry about the acrylic if it is being transported regularly. I'd go for something more metallic. The Silverstone SG07/08 is still 17L but a good option like the Elite 130. I used to have a mobile rig with a short card in a Silverstone SG05, which is pretty tiny at 11L or so. You can pack a lot of Horsepower in there.
The reason for the higher price of my A4-SFX is the included 3M high performance risercable (best risercable on the market retail price 90$) and the problem that I don't build 5000+ of them, so the production cost are higher.
This sounds super steep for a cable. Is there any noticeable performance drop with cheaper pcie riser cables? Would you consider building the case without the riser so we can choose our own?
If you use a unshielded cable it could be, that the system shutsdown while gaming or the screen doesn't show any picture. There are some shielded cards but the most of them are too short, have a bad bendradius or a conductive outer layer. A conductive outer layer is e.g a alu layer if these alu layer have contact with the backside of your motherbosrd it could be damaged. Furthermore the mountpoints for the riser are made for the 3M one, so other riser couldn't be screwed. And other riser are mostly able to do only PCIe 2.0 or 1.0. Futhermore I need a cable with a good quality because I am responsible for warranty. -The 3M one is heaviely bendable -ready for PCIe faster as Gen3.0 -has a non conductive outer material -the cable itself is very thin -the build quality is extremely high -you can bend it millions of time without destroying the cable. The case would be arround 55$ cheaper, if I don't include the cable I get a mutch more better price for it, because I order hundrets of it.
