Introduction
Now for something a little different, and the pun was intended. We have had the pleasure of a Lian Li chassis before, the PC-V1000 and it was amazing. This was in the day when you still had beige boxes and desktop chassis, where are they now? There has been a significant increase in mITX chassis and Lian Li have designed and released several examples in their usual style, and very much like the Lian Li PC-V1000.
These days, PC components are reaching a certain maturity and whereas in yesteryear only office grade mITX motherboards were manufactured, so if you wanted something a bit special, and maybe run some games on a small system, you could only manage Solitaire.
Now with the fantastic range of mITX gaming focused little motherboards, small builds are a very viable proposition, and they will not make you blush at a LAN party. Today we are reviewing the Lian Li PC-Q21, a small and very good looking mITX chassis, and with the gaming focused mITX components out there, let’s review this little mITX contender and see if we can’t get a gaming rig out of it too.
| Chassis Type | Mini Tower Chassis |
| Manufacturer Number | PC-Q21 A/B |
| Material | Aluminium, plastic |
| Motherboards | Mini-ITX |
| Chassis Dimensions | 149mm/257mm/224mm (W x H x D) |
| 5.25” Drive Bays | 0 |
| 3.5” Drive Bays | 2 |
| 2.5” Drive Bays | 3 |
| Case Fan | NA |
| System Fan (Base) | 120mm x1(Optional) |
| 5.25" drive bay (External) | 1 Slim ODD (Slot-In) or 2.5" HDD x1 |
| Expansion Slot | 2 |
| PSU Type | SFX or SFX-L |
| Maximum Compatibility | VGA Card length: 170mm CPU cooler height: 60mm PSU length: 170mm |
Product Gallery
If you follow Lian Li, this is all very familiar and welcome, just reminds us of the excellent PC-V1000. It is a very clean and light chassis, you also get this in black, but the aluminium suits us just fine.
Lian Li PC-Q21 Mini-ITX Tower Chassis Review
Packaging - 9.5
Features - 9.5
Build - 9
Component Compatibility - 8
Price - 9
Consumer Experience - 9.5
9.1
Overall we cannot fault this chassis, the Lian Li PC-Q21 is pretty much a perfect mITX chassis at the size limitations of the form factor. The only problem with the chassis is the component availability, though that is slowly fixing itself, and not the little Lian Li PC-Q21's fault. If you want to buy the smallest chassis with the biggest potential, this is it.