Fractal Design Define Mini C Review
Category : Cases
Published by Luca Rocchi on 02.11.16
About one year ago the Swedish company Fractal Design presented the Define Nano S, which until to day, used to be their latest small tower case. Now they launched the Define Mini C which should be the next step in the evolution of their Define series cases. Like the previous model, the new Mini C is a case capable of housing custom watercooling builds and micro-ATX motherboard. There is a lot of space available for radiators and there are mounts for reservoir and pump.
Rating |
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Cooling |
Features |
Layout |
Build Quality |
Value for Money |
| Pros |
+ Good
compatibility for watercooling and aircooling |
+ Water cooling
+ Dust filters |
+ Interior
space
+ Good space for cable routing |
+ High quality materials
+ Rubber groomets
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+ Well priced |
| Cons |
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- No Type-C |
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Preview
Specifications
| Model: |
Define Mini C |
| Case Type: |
Mid tower |
| Dimensions: |
210 mm (W) x 399 mm (H) x 399 mm (D) |
| Material: |
Steel, ABS |
| Color: |
Black |
| Drive Bay: |
5.25": |
0 |
| 3.5": |
2 |
| 2.5": |
3 |
| Expansion
slots: |
5 |
| Form factors: |
mATX, mini-ITX |
| Cooling: |
Front: |
3x 120mm / 2x 140mm (1x 120mm included) |
| Rear: |
1x 120mm (1x 120mm included) |
| Top: |
2x 120mm / 2x 140mm |
| Bottom: |
1x 120mm |
| Side: |
/ |
| Watercooling |
Front: |
240mm / 280mm |
| Rear: |
120mm |
| Top: |
240mm |
| Link to the product: |
Define Mini C |
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Features
PSU Cover
In order to hide all the cables connected to your power supply, there is cover hiding away the unit. This helps creating a neat and clean looking system. |
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Dust filters
There are washable dust filters covering all big openings of the Fractal Design Define Mini C. Thanks to a quick release system they are very easy and convenient to remove. |
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Watercooling ready
The Fractal Design Define Mini C prepared this case to be equipped with watercooling gear. If you wish to create a custom loop, there is the possibility to place two radiators in this case. One of them can be a 280mm and the other a 240mm one. In addition you can put another small 120mm radiator in the rear part. |
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Product overview
Overview |
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The Define Mini C features a simple and
neat design, and is made of black metal and plastic of excellent quality. The front part is without any opening or slots, so you will be no able to install any 5.25" drives, card readers or fan controllers. The part features the I/O panel with two USB 3.0, power and reset button as well as the standard audio jacks. On both sides of the front panel there are small openings, which allow the front fans to
pull in fresh air. The side panels, even if they look quite simple, are actually the most important piece, since noise dampening material has been added for additional soundproofing. Once again Fractal Design is doing a great job here, since the noise dampening is pretty effective.
The back panel is simple as simple as it gets, while there are five PCI expansion slots, the opening for the
motherboard I/O panel, a 120mm fan slot and the opening for the standard ATX power supply. The bottom of the case has been equipped with four plastic feet with an alumium finish. There is also an air-inlet for the PSU to breath if the fan is facing downwards. |
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Installation
Overview |
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The inside of the Define Mini C is clean and simple, and it features a most classic design with some noticeable features. The Define Mini C is a case for water cooling enthusiasts and standard users alike. Nevertheless Fractal Design doesn't offer a huge number of HDDs or SSDs mounts, yet you can still equip this case with up to two 3.5" HDD or two 2.5" SSD. Both can be installed using tool-less sledges behind the tray. In addition behind the motherboard tray there is enough space for install two additional SSDs. The motherboard tray is made out of solid steel, and it features a big cut-out, where the motherboards's CPU socket is, which allows the installation of aftermarket CPU coolers without having to remove the motherboard. The tray features four openings with rubber grommets allowing you to create good looking cable management. Between the motherboard tray and the side right panel there is enough space to hide plenty of cables. The whole interior, except the back and bottom, has been padded with soundproofing material to reduce the system noise.
For our test, we used two different systems based on mATX and mini-ITX motherboards. The first system uses a mATX X99 motherboard paired with a huge twin tower cooler from Phanteks while the second one features a mini-ITX motherboard with a Fractal Design Kelvin S24 radiator. Both system are paired with a MSI GTX 970 Gaming and a Seasonic PSU. As you can see from the pictures there are plenty of slots for the fans and radiators. The Define Mini C is able to accommodate a CPU cooler with a maximum height of 170mm and graphics cards can measure up to 315mm in length. |
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Ventilation options
Overview |
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| The Define Mini C offers plenty of places for fans. Included in the delivery you will find two 120mm fans with white blades and black frame. Overall, the case is able to accommodate three 120 or two 140mm fans at the front, one 120mm fan at the back and another couple of fans in the top part. If you are fan of liquid cooling systems you will be happy to know that the Define Mini C is also perfect for that type of cooling. Thanks to the fact, that there is a lot of space available on the inside, you will be able to mount a 280mm radiator at the front, a 240mm at the top and a 120mm on the back. |
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Temperatures
Overview |
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For testing purposes we're using an MSI Z170I Gaming Pro AC motherboard, an Intel Core i5-6600K CPU, which receives cooling through a SilentiumPC Fortis 3 HE1425 MCE cooler as well as a MSI GTX 970 Gaming 4G graphics card. To put the CPU under full load, we're running prime95 for 10 min and in the case of the GPU we use Furmark also for 10 minutes. After these ten minutes, we're going to write down the temperatures. The ambient temperature is close to 24°C. |
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All noise dampening panels installed |
Idle (°C) |
Full (°C) |
|
Intel Core i5-6600K |
28 / 28 / 27 / 28 |
52 / 55 / 54 / 54 |
| MSI GTX 970 Gaming 4G |
47 |
68 |
|
Less is better |
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Conclusion
The Fractal Design Define Mini C is a mid-tower PC case designed for those who are looking for a silent rig, which is offering plenty of space even for high-end hardware as well as custom liquid cooling. Fractal Design decided to use the classic design of the Define series but without the front door and the 5.25" slots as well. The materials and build quality are on very good level, which is something we certainly expected from Fractal Design.
On the inside there is quite a lot of space available. If you fit an mATX motherboard you can easily install a radiator in the front and one in the upper part. Apart from that all drives bays have been move to the lower part of the case, which means that you will not see them. Since silence is also a the key point of this case, Fractal Design also added a sound-absorbing material on each side panel. Testing the case as delivered with two 120mms fan in the front and one in the back, we found temperatures to be on a reasonable level, while the noise level was very low.
The amount of features available with the Define Mini C are very interesting and we appreciate the good amount of solutions for water cooling setups; inside this case you can put the pump and the res without thinking too much about the space and the management of the component inside. When you have to built a custom loop you have always to figure out if there will be enough space for radiator, for fans and for every kind of support, inside this Define you have only to push inside all the components. In other words, you don't have to think about how to fix the res or if you need some extra supports because inside the bundle there are already few useful supports and on bottom of the chassis there are pre-drilled holes for your needs.
The Define Mini C from Fractal Design is a PC case which we can definitely recommend. If you are looking for a mid-tower PC case with pre-installed acoustic insulation material as well as silent fans and on top of that it's fully compatible with custom watercooling gear, this is a great choice. With this case it is really easy to build a high-end rig. The Fractal Design Define Mini C is available on Geizhals for 79.99 Euro excluding shipping costs and it is also available with side window for 84.90 euro. The Fractal Design Define Mini C earns
5 out of 5 stars.
