I'm not sure how I feel about the drive brackets, but since Fractal Design is targeting small home servers with this case I can understand the need to cram as much storage in as possible and the intakes probably serve more to keep the drives from overheating than actually circulating air through the chassis. Sitting below the drives, the power supply is isolated, pulling air in from the floor and exhausting it out the side. This isn't a super-compact chassis, measuring in at 307mm x 344mm x 389mm with an internal volume of 40 liters. The white power LED underneath the bezel shines brightly downward like a spotlight and is blinding when viewed directly.

Fractal Design Node 304 mITX Case Review: Paving the Way to

Drives bottom-mount to the sides of the brackets (which took our Corsair Link box out of the equation), and then the brackets go in. The Hyper 212 is a very good cooler for the money, but if you're going to be spending that much money on fans alone you might as well get an NH-D14 or NH-D15, although I'm not sure if they'll fit, it depends on your motherboard. As far as small cases go, assembly in the Node 304 was tight but not impossible and if anything might've stood to be a little more involved. Peoples' views of how big of a PSU they need has been skewed by the noname-brand garbage that floods the market.

Note that the folks that state that temperature is not an issue only report the temperature of the CPU and those reported have active (fan) cooling.

Fractal Design Node 304 White Mini ITX Case - Scan Fractal Design Node 304 White Mini ITX Case - Scan

Thermaltake's Core V21 is another fine cube case that would also make for a good NAS box or gaming PC case, but it doesn't support as many 3. Before installing anything you need to remove the three drive brackets, all of which are secured by two thumbscrews and a single small Phillips head screw. Where the Fractal Node 304 lacks in terms of cable management or other niceties, it makes up for by just getting out of the way—both internally and in external style. Moving to the interior, we recommend utilizing a thin tower heatsink like the Scythe Ashura, Phanteks PH-TC12DX, Noctua NH-U12S/ U14S, or SilverStone Argon series. Much like its packaging, the Node 804 is designed with a minimalist brief, resulting in a sleek black cube PC case.

Since my goal was to build a gaming PC, I needed to make room for a big graphics card that extends nearly the full length of the case. Overall, the Node 304’s dimensions are sufficient for what’s inside though we wish feet were raised as the stubby rubber pads it sits on creates only 1 cm of clearance underneath the power supply intake vent. The vents in the side panels allow for the PSU and graphics card (located either side) to draw in (graphics card) or vent (PSU) air through the side panels. Case manufacturers have been quick to capitalise on this expanding market, and we've seen some interesting cases in the form of BitFenix's Prodigy and Cooler Master's Elite 120.

Node 304 — Fractal Design Node 304 — Fractal Design

Almost all the cables are routed to the left side of the case and while there are positions there to tie them down to the floor, if you exercise the option of using a full sized graphics card, things get very tight.Despite its diminutive size, the Node 304 can cater for full-size ATX PSUs, and has enough clearance for graphics cards up to 310mm in length and CPU coolers up to 165mm in height.