On the back side there’s nothing much, you will not be doing much cable tidying back here, though there is a little scope at the front of the chassis.
Everything else is very neat and tidy. The chassis uses locking cover plates for the front storage and graphics card fittings.
The thick black cable between the PSU and graphics is the USB 3.0 front panel connector. We slightly lucked out with the EVGA Z170 Stinger, the USB head is near the back of the motherboard relative to the chassis, so it created a nice half loop which doesn’t foul the side panel when in place.
We completed the test build and installed Windows 10, battlefield 4 and some other games. 4K UHD was a little jumpy but 1080p gaming was a reality. There was enough horsepower here to allow good gaming, surfing, office and other activities without too much of a headache.
Conclusion
In the back of our minds we knew we would be hard pushed to get a 4K UHD gaming rig out of this due to the lack of graphics at this size. The Sapphire Radeon R9 Nano is a card to consider, but PSU options will then be limited. However if you are looking for an ultra smart, clean and high end looking 1080p gaming rig, and maybe a replacement for your xBox or PS4, this chassis will certainly help in that quest.
Lian Li PC-Q21 Mini Tower Chassis
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.
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.