Dan A4-SFX - 7.2L of Excellence!

 this is a case that I've had my eyes on for quite some time and the requests to review this case have far exceeded any other case out there at the moment this is the den a for SFX v3 and it's a seven-point two-liter Mini ITX enclosure that optimizes for hardware compatibility in a small footprint and volume, in fact, this is the smallest case that I've reviewed on the channel it's three liters below the fractal design note 202 five below the MKS m1 and twelve below the Cougar qbx but despite being the smallest in the lineup it is in fact the most expensive at 225 US dollars something that we'll talk about towards the end now the structure and the build quality of the a4 sfx truly is up there with the best and that's largely due to using lien ly as their manufacturer who as we know make very premium enclosures the design is a sandwich based layer where we've got the motherboard and power supply on one side and the graphics card on the other they're separated by a frame in the middle which is also covered by an insulating sheet on the GPU side so there are no shorts now that this compartmentalize design is made possible by a high quality leanly riser cable that is now thankfully black with version 3 of the a4 and this thing feels super durable and lack will last the decades to come I've got the black model here but you can also pick it up in silver and the aluminum panels have a nice brushed finish the entire case is breathable from these sides top and bottom so there's plenty of airflow for all components and the general airflow design here is that each piece of hardware will be facing the outside of the case and will have access to fresh air through those ventilated panels the panels themselves lock in with the same push pin mechanism that we've seen with the N case m1 and have further security with some small screws on the bottom and top which is also countersunk and fit perfectly flush with the rest of the case the front i/o is fairly minimal with just a single USB 3.0 port and for someone who doesn't really use for an i/o at all I think this is sufficient for a small case especially when you are restricted with space on the other side of the panel the power button has also been improved v3 and is now a bit more tactile repress and the power plug is positioned thankfully towards the bottom of the case, the top and front panel are also a single sheet which has been precisely cut and bent again showing the attention to detail and build quality standing next to the m1 you can tell that they're both manufactured by the same company and in terms of size the den a4 is definitely smaller but it's probably not a significant amount to a lot of people for those that need their desktop system to be as portable as possible though which is arguably a minority the day an a4 can comfortably fit in a backpack which is pretty insane even for those who don't need a portable system at all though and are fine with a laptop when it comes to portability me including I really do appreciate that the a4 sfx doesn't claim half of your desk space when it meets the rest of your setup like a typical mid-tower case what truly makes this case unique and ahead of the pack though is compatibility as you really can comfortably fit some powerful hardware in this enclosure graphics cards up to 295 millimeters in length 144 mil in height and 45 mils in width are good to go allowing for all founders editions and reference cards to fit with no issues and the larger cards like the 1080 TI for the win 3 from EVGA can be squeezed in there as well

you are limited to two slots though so the larger 1080 TR models won't fit but two slot options from EVGA like my SC 2 will have no issue in terms of blower style cards versus open-air cards you're going to be fine with both here since the fans will be drawing air in from a ventilated panel and exhausting the air for the open air cards shouldn't be an issue either with those top and bottom panels having that ventilation there's no room for three and a half-inch drives here but that's ok seeing as two and a half inch SSDs have become an increasingly more popular option due to falling prices over the years so here we have support for up to 320 - tchh drives one in the front similar to what we've seen with the nkm one and two below the power supply but you could also mount 892-millimeter fan here or a 92 mil liquid an IO but more on that in just a second for power supplies were limited to SFX here as you could probably guess there's no point trying to support anything large giving the constraints of the case and also given that there are plenty of

high-powered s effect options out there now let's get to the most important part when it comes to hardware compatibility and that's CPU cooling so let's start off with air coolers and here you limited to just 48 millimeters which may be a bit of a concern for those running

i7 8700 KS or risin 7 processors or is it in the community spreadsheet where users can log their thermal data it does seem to be a few people running 8700 KS and risin 7 CPUs on low profile coolers such as the knocked wet online eye and hitting some okay temps while stressing

testing in prime95 you've also got a couple of options when it comes to water cooling as well and you can fit an ASA tech 545 LC a 92 millimeter liquid an IO at the front of the case underneath the power supply and this is what Linus did to cool an 18 core 79 80 X E a 120 mm you can also fit with the included side

 with the included side bracket with version 3 but here you'll need to drop your SFX power supply for the HD Plex 400 this is a 400 watt DC to DC power supply which can be mounted at the front of the case using the included standoffs and using this instead of an SFX unit will allow for a 120mm AIO to be mounted on the side bracket, you will also need an AC external power brick if you are going to go down this route this is a bit of a paradox though because if you do need to go down the route of a 120mm AIO you probably have a power-hungry CPU but at the same time you probably won't be able to power it off a 400 watt power supply nevertheless we will be looking at this in a follow-up video where we compare several CPU cores that are compatible with the den a for SFX and see how they run with something like an i7 8700 k and ideally we'll see if we can overclock it as well today though we're just gonna see how we can run an i-5 8400 with something like a knock to an l 9i and see what temperature's you can expect there now speaking of building in the case this thing was an absolute breeze since the case is so small and the mounting positions are so close to you, you feel like you're working with an open test bench arguably easier than typical mid-tower case what I was most surprised with though after the building was how much room was left inside the case even finding some spare room for the stock cables were quite easy the corsair dominator platinum memory modules that I initially installed were just a hair too tall though the side panel still closed, it certainly wasn't a clean fit another consideration is that if possible to choose a mini ITX port with an m2 slot not on the back of the motherboard 

I found thermals here to be pretty unreasonable since the drive will be trapped between the board and the tray my 960 IVA nvme drive was idling at a toasty 72 degrees C and was throttling at 90 °c during sequential writes this isn't a fault of the case though I'm also an in consideration from motherboard manufacturers now on the note of thermals let's take a quick look at what you can expect so I did some quick testing with the i-5 8400 here within October online I and unfortunately, my films weren't too impressive my main discrepancy here against the other results that I saw in the community spreadsheet is that my vehicle was running a bit higher than others and if I had under vaulted the CPU things probably would have been fine below ATC for the GPU you can also run either blower or open-air cards as both have sample ventilation thanks to those sides panel so no issues there alright so what about that price two hundred and twenty-five US dollars is insane it's at that enthusiast-level and seems unreasonable but at the end of the day 

this is an enthusiast case I look at this case no different than I would look at the $200 plus mint hours out there now just because it's a small case doesn't mean that it should be cheaper compared to a bigger option or that you're getting less fuel money in fact the aluminum side panels and the aluminum frame has been purpose-made for this case so they're not being recycled from other previous models because there aren't any now having said that I wouldn't say that I'm happy with the price I definitely like it to be driven down at least a little bit, after all, I did purchase this one myself but having said that I don't have even a a little bit of buyer's remorse because I really do think you are getting your money's worth here so overall I am really impressed with the DNA for SFX even after researching the case for several months I was still really impressed when I got it here on a review table and to the build inside it so much so that in fact after I complete my NZXT h100 I build which I'm currently in the middle of I am planning on transferring my current editing system inside this thing or at least I'm going to try to we'll have a look at CPU cooling in another episode