RackChoice 2U Server Chassis Short Depth 14.17" Front I/O with 2 x 3.5“ (int.) mATX M/B,Support ATX PSU with Either top or Side Cooling

Worked well for building a Mini-ATX router out of old parts. The case is sturdy and it fit the power supply and drive fine. The fit of the io shield, motherboard and expansion card area is not great but it fit a half height NIC with a bit more force than should be needed. It seems like the lower tabs for the expansion card brackets are too high and press on the rear of the motherboard. Given the price and that it seated with some force I consider it ok for my use. The fans flow plenty of air but do make a bit of noise. All buttons and led worked as designed. No instructions included but was boxed well and comes with screws. The cables are all labeled on the ends.

Purchased with the intention to build a nice OPNsense appliance. The rear IO is in the front making this perfect for a homelab.Some rack cases are built pretty cheaply. This is not one of them. The metal is thick and doesn't flex. It feels substantial in the hands, which is nice to see these days.I did not test the stock 80mm fans, but I typically don't expect much of them. The stock fans have daisy-chainable 4-pin Molex connectors.This is a negative pressure design so be prepared to dust it. I had intended to put in PWM Noctuas from the getgo and they go in nicely. There is enough space to route the cables under the fan frames if you finagle it right.Hard drive cage is dampened and removable.I have only one tiny nitpick: the PCI slots for not have retention slots in the bottom to hold down the bracket plates. Consequently the placeholders bend inward when poked. This is pretty trivial in my mind, certainly not enough to drop a star.All in all a nice, well-made rattle-free 2U case that should last many years.

This 2U rack mount chassis is a compact and efficient solution for server setups. Its short depth makes it ideal for space-constrained environments. The front I/O design provides easy access to the server’s interfaces, enhancing usability.The chassis supports 2 internal 3.5" drives, providing ample storage options. It is compatible with most micro ATX (mATX) motherboards, offering flexibility in choosing the server’s main components.Its support for standard ATX power supplies (PSUs) with either top or rear cooling is a welcome feature. This flexibility allows for better thermal management, ensuring the server components operate within their optimal temperature range.

I was super excited to find this case; a front-IO rackmount with good features for this price should have been a steal and an easy 4.5-star. Unboxing, the build quality seemed good overall as well, but...Installing the motherboard, it doesn't fit. Not only is the IO shield opening slightly too low, but the PCIe card retention tabs at the bottom protrude too far to fasten the motherboard. I took some measurements, and this case does not meet the Micro ATX or Mini ITX specifications for at least a few dimensions. See the bottom of this review if you want specific measurements.My options are basically either try to modify the case by cutting out the PCIe card retention tabs and nibbling the IO bracket opening to be able to push it up further, or just reinstall the old fans and return it. I'm just going to suck it up and pay 2.5x as much for a similar Supermicro case (523L-505B).Assuming that a motherboard fit properly (I tried a few that were known good fits in other cases), here is what I would have had to say:Pros:- Difficult to find case layout for a great price.- Well-finished on the outside.- Power and reset switches feel good.- Three fans is unique and very welcome for better airflow; all the others like this only have two.- The ventilation holes on the top panel for PSU flexibility are very nice.- Can fit a pretty long PSU if you don't need the HDD bracket.Cons:- There are some sharp edges in the interior. The front-panel USB cable had some insulation chewed up a bit just from shipping and rubbing against the drive cage. You'd want to break the edges yourself or cover them in Kapton tape or something.- Two of the fan screws have other screws partially or mostly blocking them, so you have to back out a couple structural screws to remove two fans. Just a bit of an avoidable annoyance.- It would have been nice to have the same top panel PSU ventilation holes on the bottom too, to let you orient either way for dust or adjacent rack equipement.Other:- As another reviewer stated, having a bracket for SFX or 1u power supplies would have been a nice bonus.- The fans aren't amazing, but they're also very quiet as far as server fans go. They were basically the same volume as the Noctua replacements, but moved slightly less air.- The height of the standoffs won't allow for some heatsink mounting hardware. The NH-L9I screws barely fit, and only if you were willing to have them pushing against the bottom of the case.- If your ATX PSU has a fan grille that protrudes even *slightly* (i.e., some Corsair units), it will be too thick to fit with the lid closed properly. This isn't the case's fault, but just beware.Out of Specification Measurements:- The bottom of the IO shield opening is supposed to be 0.88" below the top of the standoffs per the spec. This case has it ~0.105" below. If your IO shield doesn't lean to being off-center vertically in a favorable direction, this is enough to cause some rear-panel connectors to be blocked.- The distance from the mounting hole to the IO wall of the case is supposed to be 0.483" +- 0.010" per the spec. This case has it as ~0.45". However, even being out of tolerance this *would* accomodate the ATX/ITX distance of 0.4" from hole to board edge, except for:- The retention tabs sticking out in the same plane as the board make this only ~0.34".- The standoffs are supposed to be 0.25" or more above the bottom of the case per the spec.; they measured only 0.192" tall in this case. This is somewhat understandable trying to cram as much vertical space into a 2u case as possible, and it very nearly meets the 0.2" required minimum motherboard clearance.Additionally, the bracket for my NIC had about 0.1" space between the screw slot and the attaching surface of the case, so something is wrong with the height of the PCIe card attachment as well. This is not a cheap random brand card, so something seems up with the case in that regard too.

I am using this for a firewall using a leftover mITX motherboard and a 20 Gbps network card. I have a low profile Noctua cooler which barely fills half the height of the case. Furthermore, I also like that I have the room to accommodate tall RAM heat spreaders. Front to back airflow is impressive when the side vents are blocked (like with a rack rail). Access to the back panel is really nice because I want all the ports in the front to hook to my other networking equipment. Taking ATX power supplies is convenient for recycled builds.Some thoughts I would like to share with RackChoice.1. reversible design. The case design could be made more flexible, so that the PSU could be mounted on front or back. The AIC RMC-2E can do that, but at 1.5x price.2. The ThermalTake Sx VC7001SNS could handle a full ATX in a slightly larger depth. It did have some thermal issues because of the closed front. If I still had that case, I would reverse and mod it and do a build. I don't need or want to buy full system to get the SuperLogics SL-2U-MCX-C621ASPL-DT or Gigabyte E252 for the case.3. Provide support for low power 1U, SFX and TFX power supplies. Make some adapters that I can order along with the case.4. Make the drive cage orientable, a square hole pattern would allow the drive cage to take better advantage of space or airflow.4. instead of using fans with the large 4-pin molex, provide the ability to connect to the SYSFAN motherboard connector.