Final Thoughts
While most case manufacturers have been trying to come up with unique and different designs for their mini-ITX cases, Fractal Design with their Define Nano S has mad a case that looks and feels like a normal ATX case, but is just smaller. This biggest thing with this case is that it is extremely functional and compatible with the latest components. During installation no one wants to find out that a certain components won’t fit or just have a hard time with installation in general. With the Define Nano S installation is extremely simple.
Talking about what all you can fit in this case you have room for quite a lot of water cooling components. In the front of the case you can fit a 280 mm radiator and up top you can fit a 240 mm radiator. On top of that Fractal Design has equipped this case with mounting options for pumps and reservoirs. That is pretty impressive for a mini-ITX case. On top of that there is room for long graphics cards, tall CPU coolers and full-size power supplies.
Fractal Design’s Define Series is made to be silent and with the Define Nano S they sure to try and make that possible. You have sound dampening material on the side panels, top, and front of the case. There is also anti-vibration material on the power supply mounting. The two included fans are made by Fractal Design and are part of their Dynamic Series. They are very quiet during operation.
At the end of the day this is case has been one of my favorite mini-ITX cases to build in. It gives me the simplicity and functionality of an ATX mid-tower in a smaller mini-ITX version and I’m all for that. Right now you can pick up the Define Nano S for $76.95 at our favorite online retailer. Overall ThinkComputers gives the Fractal Design Define Nano S a 10 out of 10 score and our Recommended Award!
Pros:
– Plenty of water cooling support
– Easy installation
– Supports long graphics cards
– More than enough room behind the motherboard tray to hide and route cables
– Sound dampening properties
– 2 cooling fans included
Cons:
– None that I found
I have been keeping an eye on reviews of this case even after I already bought one to see if someone calls out on its shortcomings. While it looks utilitarian as Fractal’s cases always have (which I love) and seems to have good set of features, I think there is a number of small but significant misses with the case that Fractal overlooked.
For air cooling and silence, ITX has never been a good fit and despite being quite large for an ITX case Nano is unfortunately not an exception. GPU cooling is the main issue here. Only GPUs using reference coolers will work well in this case. There simply is not enough space in these 2 slots between the PCI-E x16 slot and PSU. Anything even slightly over 2 slots will not fit and air coolers at 2 slots will get starved of air extremely easily. Using less power hungry and thus smaller GPUs will not help as they get more easily covered by PSU.
OK, so air cooling is not a perfect match, how about water?
When you look at the specs, pay attention to the possibility of mounting a radiator to the top of the case. Why is there few if any reviewers who try that? Closer look at the specs reveals that you can have components with height up to 34mm on motherboard. Notably, this includes RAM which in its standard positioning is about 35mm from the top of case (so chance of fitting a radiator and fans between top of the case and RAMs is basically nonexistent). I have DDR4 with minimal heatsink on them (that specs say and measuring tape shows fit in the standard 34mm). A large 45mm thick 240mm radiator I have will not fit there. With the target audience of the case (and water cooling crows) I would expect tall RAM sticks a rule rather than exception.
OK, so the radiator will not fit up there. Will it fit in front? Sure, easily. the same 45mm thick 240mm radiator with 25mm fans on it fits there just fine. Having a standard 10.5″ GPU (like GTX 980Ti or GTX1080) will also work. Only a few millimeters to spare but it does fit which is honestly awesome!
What is less awesome is how restrictive both the front fascia and the air filter in front are to air flow. I have that same 240mm radiator cooling 980ti and an i7 (~350W TDP shoved into that poor radiator). Radiator attached to the front of the case and pulling air in from outside gave me around 50C temperatures in NZXT S340 (which also has a somewhat restrictive but different front fascia). The exact same setup moved to Nano S gave me 60C temperatures at higher fan speeds. Ripping the fascia off took temperatures down 4-5C and lowered the fan speed a little. Removing the air filter as well gave me almost the same 50C result I got in S340. All this with sides open for both cases (and top off for Nano S). Closed case results are predictably worse for Nano S due to smaller volume (again until I remove the fascia and air filter).
With all that, noise dampening is quite useless for high-end components as you will almost definitely want to take the top cover off the case to keep the noise down.
tl;dr:
– GPU is very close to PSU and this hampers open-air coolers on GPUs.
– Radiator at the top requires no high components on motherboard, nothing over 34mm including RAM.
– Front fascia and air filter are quite restrictive, at least when it comes to watercooling radiators.
I happen to own one and here is the list of what can be done better:
1. USB ports on front panel should be rotated 180 as one would expect to see the “front” of USB device. Some times they have indicator LEDs.
2. I’d really like to have an optional top cover similar to the front panel. I don’t want to see the fans when moduvent removed, I don’t want the dust get into the case when system is powered off and the sound dampening would be great. Though this might require optional (taller) front panel.