Raijintek Pan Slim mini-ITX HTPC Case Review




/ 3 years ago

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Raijintek Pan Slim mini-ITX HTPC Case Review

There’s been a drastic shift in the PC market over the last ten years, a few of them actually. Once upon a time, mini-ITX was king, with everyone trying to build more compact and portable battle stations, then things got big again, really big. Now it’s all tempered glass and RGB. However, the trend I miss the most is HTPC. When I first started reviewing cases, they were pretty common. SilverStone, Lian Li, Fractal Design, and many more offered slim and wide cases suitable to go under a monitor or TV cabinet. Thankfully, Raijintek is here to save the day for the dozens of us who still desire this unique form factor. Gaming in the living room, an all-in-one multimedia build, and beyond.

Raijintek Pan Slim

While this is a mini-ITX case, don’t be fooled, it’s still fairly large. It opts for a wider design, though, meaning it’s about as tall and deep as a decent AV receiver, but about 50% wider. This means it has room for larger graphics cards, some liquid cooling, a decent number of hard drives and an SFX PSU. Rather than just being a novelty form factor, it really looks like Raijintek has given us room to build a pretty serious system inside this. Rather than just a low-end HTPC, you could fit a competent gaming system or workstation build in here.

Features

  • Aluminium sandblasted appearance
  • Fully-black interior coating
  • Supports 120/240mm AIO coolers
  • Supports SFX Power Supply
  • GPU max length 340mm
  • USB Type-C, USB 3.0 x 2 + HD Audio outputs
  • 4 x 2.5″ HDD + 2 x 3.5″ HDD
  • Well ventilated design
  • Available in black, white and silver

What Raijintek Had to Say

“The Raijintek Pan Slim combines simplicity, elegance, and functionality into one package. The Pan Slim has a unique form factor that is somewhere between an HTPC (home theatre PC) and traditional horizontal desktop PCs. Not only is this an eye-catching aesthetic but it can save desk space: the monitor can be placed on top while the keyboard can be hidden underneath when not in use.” – Raijintek

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Exterior

My first impression of this case was simple. It’s a lot bigger than I expected! It’s a seriously beastly thing and quite heavy. It feels like a quality product, too, with gorgeously finished surfaces, and the quality of the tooling is premium from front to back. While it is available in three different colours, I must admit I’m happy I got this black and silver version; it looks stunning!

The aluminium body is lightly textured, and it looks excellent as the light catches the finer detail of the paint. There’s a simple yet competent front I/O too, offering USB-C and USB 3.0 ports, as well as a nice large power button.

On the left side, a simple Raijintek logo, no silly RGB lights or tempered glass here, this thing is just minimal and stylish all over, so it should blend into almost any environment with relative ease.

Down the left side, you’ll find some fairly chunky ventilation. The PSU and some storage mount near this side, so it’ll provide some passive airflow in that area.

There’s a matching set of vents on the right side too. This case doesn’t feature any fans, so it’ll rely on the fans of your hardware mostly. You can install an AIO cooler, but we’ll get to that later.

Around the back, you get an idea of just how this case works, with all the hardware laid out parallel to each other throughout. There’s a ventilation section on the side, which is the area that supports an AIO radiator.

A cut out for the mini-ITX rear I/O.

There are three expansion slots, so even with mini-ITX, you can still have 2.5 or 3 slot thick GPUs, giving you some very high-end options to pick from.

Finally, there’s also a cut-out for an SFX PSU. Keep that in mind, it’s not ATX. You will need one of the more compact SFX units.

Airflow isn’t just located on the sides either, with two large banks of ventilation on the top. One for the radiator mounting area, and more for where the GPU will be installed.

It features thick magnetic dust filters on the top too, which you can excess on the interior.

However, there’s even more ventilation on the bottom of the case, so really, you shouldn’t have any build-up of heat in this case; it’ll always have somewhere to go!

I love these feet too. They provide a lot of clearance under the case, so you’ll be able to store a full-size mechanical keyboard under here very easily.

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Interior

Getting inside is pretty straightforward. Remove the two screws on each side of the top panel, and you’re good to go. You will need a screwdriver as the case doesn’t use thumbscrews to keep a cleaner look on the exterior.

There’s a fantastic amount of space in here and much more than I would typically find in a mini-ITX case. If you want a huge graphics card, then I don’t think you’re going to have any trouble here.

Down this side, you’ll find room for the PSU, as well as a small bracket for a few SSDs.

Further along, there’s room for the graphics card, and plenty of room indeed! There’s also some elongated holes, so you could mount a fan or radiator here instead I suppose!

This handy little support arm will also help with drooping on the most extremely long GPUs.

Over this side, you’ll find a cage that can handle even more SSDs and HDDs, room for the mini-ITX motherboard, and another large space that’ll house up to a 240mm radiator.

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Complete System

I intend to throw an AIO here, but since I had an air cooler installed on the motherboard already, I did a test fit with that to see how it would look.

Depending on your motherboard, there’s actually some pretty decent clearance here, so some fairly large low-profile coolers will fit easily enough. There’s a decent amount of space around the motherboard too, so passing cables throughout the system should be straight forward.

Of course, the GPU won’t install straight into the motherboard here. Thankfully, Raijintek included a riser cable so you can mount it parallel to the motherboard.

The riser cable is quite long for what’s needed, but it tucked down and out of the way easily enough.

Much to my own amusement, I grabbed the GTX 1080 Ti, a fairly long card in its own right. However, it’s not quite long enough to reach the support arm. Admittedly, I didn’t feel it was needed either, but your results may vary.

Still, you’re never far from alternative solutions; Dr. Lego in the house!

There’s a fantastic amount of space in here for the PSU and excess cables. My unit didn’t need that much space, but it’s still really nice to have more room to work with.

The SSD cage is located on this side too, and it’s fully removable, making it nice and easy to install your drives.

My PSU cables are quite short, so they had to go over the motherboard. This isn’t very presentable, but since the case has no windows… who cares, basically.

If you need even more storage bays, there’s a big cage next to the motherboard tray. It’ll support 3.5″ or 2.5″ drives, but honestly, I’d rather focus on more silent equipment like SSD for a desktop build myself.

Overall, it’s been a straightforward build, and there’s plenty of space for everything! So, let’s go one step further!

The EOS 240 RGB from Raijintek, which should be a perfect fit for this case.

It drops right into the right side of the case easily enough. However, those bars running front-to-back on the case got in the way, but I removed one easily with two screws.

The tubing isn’t going to get trapped between it and the top panel cover with the bar removed.

For those not wanting to be limited by a low-profile cooler, having an AIO in here will let you go for something with a much higher TDP.

With all the panels back in place, the Raijintek Pan Slim mini-ITX HTPC Case looks just as good as it did when we took it out of the box.

It’s so nice to see a case that makes its own statement without the need for RGB LED strips or tempered glass. This is old-school cool, and I absolutely love it.

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How Much Does it Cost?

The Raijintek Pan Slim Mini-ITX HTPC Case is available now from a few major retailers for around £180-220, depending on where you shop, stock levels and the choice of colour. If you’re getting a little change from £200 though, then you’re on the right track.

That is a lot of money, but quite honestly, this is a LOT of PC case. Don’t be fooled by the mini-ITX aspect, this is a big case, with lots of expensive aluminium and exquisite engineering throughout; in short, you get what you pay for.

Overview

Raijintek has always been one of my favourite case makers, as they tend to do things a little bit differently. I’m not saying all their design ideas are the right ones, but they have always stood out from the crowd. They’ve always pushed for premium quality that’s easily been competition for the likes of Silverstone and Lian Li’s best, yet often at a much more competitive price point.

Competition

While Raijintek doesn’t have much competition in this form factor, the only one that really springs to mind is the Cryorig Taku, which suffered from some ergonomics and supply issues, cost just as much and is no longer available… so that’s out of the running. Even going further back, we’re getting to old-school Fractal cases that are not in production anymore.

Bigger is Better

However, Raijintek has gone bigger, literally, with this case. It’s a bit of a beast and will dominate the desktop space. However, that provides you with a lot of freedom on the interior and a lot of room for good airflow. I was amused that the 1080 Ti seemed a bit small in this case. I can’t think of any GPU on the market that wouldn’t fit with ease as it has the ability to house a triple slot super-long card. Of course, you should still check measurements before you order; I’m not all-knowing.

Stand

While you could stand a monitor on top of it, I personally wouldn’t. However, a wall or arm mounted monitor would look fantastic floating above it; that’s subjective, I know. It feels robust enough. It would likely withstand a CRT monitor on top of it; strength isn’t an issue here.

Should I Buy One?

When it comes to premium, Raijintek is top of their game here. The Pan Slim Mini-ITX HTPC Case is absolutely stunning, and it manages to achieve this without the use of ARGB lighting, crazy fans, tempered glass or anything else. It’s almost ironic that this case is something of a gimmick, yet it doesn’t feel like one at all. Its design should blend in with most furniture in your living room, home office, gaming room, etc. I’d be honoured to have one of these on my desk, and I bet I’m not the only one.

Now, I wonder if Raijintek will make an even smaller version? Now that would be cool to see.

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