Raijintek Metis Plus

[testman78]

Introduction

The compact chassis market has always been an interesting one. There's always a competition of sorts to see who can cram the most high-end hardware into the smallest chassis. The Metis Plus from Raijintek is a strong contender. With its small footprint, it still offers room for a dual-slot GPU with clearance as long as 17 cm, and CPU coolers as tall as 16 cm. As well as a mini-ITX motherboard, ATX PSU, and a few 2.5″ SSDs. Best of all, it promises to do it in style. Raijintek offer the Metis Plus in seven colors.



Specifications.




Packaging & Contents

Raijintek packs the Metis Plus into a compact cardboard package with black print on it. You will find an image of the chassis on the front and rear.



While both smaller sides hold information consisting of promotional texts, you will also find info on one of these sides to let you know what color is within.



Along with the case itself, the bundle also includes an instruction manual, which is always helpful, as well as a few other things including a plastic bag with screws needed for assembly and some zip-ties.




A Closer Look-Outside

Just looking at the exterior shows the calibre of product and the Metis Plus is absolutely stunning by all accounts. The solid and pretty seamless aluminium panelling covers the entirety of the chassis throughout and coming in at a tiny size. It's surely perfect for a HTPC or a small pocket rocket desktop build. It measuring 190 mm x 277 mm x 254 mm (WxDxH), and weighing in at 2.12 kg.



The curvy edges of the chassis look great, but I especially like the angled and polished edge of the front panel.



The right hand panel having a small clear window through which to view the goodies inside. The window is also secured with screws, having nuts to the rear making it the work of seconds to remove it.



The left hand window is left blank but does benefit from extensive ventilation holes which have been drilled neatly into the Aluminum panel.



There is a metal-mesh opening on top, which allows for one 120 mm fan to be installed. Unfortunately, there is no dust filter, so it is up to you to keep things clean within.



A nice clean look on the front of the chassis, with just a small Raijintek logo at the front and the nicely designed power button at the top.



On the top, we have the I/O which includes the usual suspects such as 2 x USB 3.0 ports and of course 2 x 3.5mm front panel audio jacks (mic and headphone). Very stylish looking which fits in nice with the general look of the case.



On the back side, there is a pre-installed 120mm fan. You?ll find two expansion slots, each fitted with reusable ventilated covers. There's obviously the motherboard I/O mount too. However, you'll notice a simple PSU power connector, as the PSU mounts towards the front it requires the built-in pass-through cable.



The base of the case is also finished in the same hairline brushed Aluminum as the majority of the exterior. A large cut out at the front is provided for the PSU, while the other holes that can be seen are utilized in mounting storage devices.




A Closer Look-Inside

After removing the side panel, this gives us access to the interior. Simply remove the screws holding each aluminum panel in place to access the interior. The interior is black to go with the rest of the chassis.



The motherboard stand-offs are pre-installed and there’s a good size CPU cooler mounting cut-out, so installation should be a quick and easy process. All the usual cables are featured such as front panel USB 3.0, front panel audio to motherboard header, power and reset switch cables. The case comes with a pre-installed 120 mm exhaust fan with LED lighting to match the case color.



Looking at the front of the floor, why the motherboard has been flipped upside down becomes apparent. The Raijintek Metis Plus can fit a traditional ATX power supply and has enough room for a decent GPU, which it achieves by placing the PCIe slot higher than the very top of the power supply—thus the flip.



The rest of the floor is for either a single 3.5" or two 2.5" drives.



You will find another hard-drive tray for a 3.5" drive above it, but there are also two holes for a 2.5" drive, although securing it might prove challenging.




Assembly & Finished Looks

The main debate with ITX cases in the past, is the trade-off between size and footprint versus ease of use and compatibility. It is clear now that the Raijintek Metis Plus has tried balance compatibility with size and footprint, but there is still to see how easy it is to build within the surprisingly small enclosure.



Space inside has been well managed and although we believe this to be one of the smartest mini ITX towers currently available, with powerful hardware inside it is bound to get a little tight and could potentially choke high end components of air. 1 x 120mm fan is hardly enough for a massive array of components.



The Metis Plus can accommodate CPU coolers as tall as 6.3" (or 16 cm). For reference, the popular Raijintek Ereboss Core Edition measures that exact height. Buyers with large graphics cards need to be a little careful, since maximum card length is restricted to 6.7" (17 cm). If you want to install a GPU that is longer than 200 mm, you will need to make sure the PSU is less than 155 mm long with its cables and plugs. Installing a PSU is done by traditional means.



The case can either hold four 2.5-inch + one 3.5-inch drives at a time, or two each of 2.5-inch and 3.5-inch drives. Unlike with traditional cases, you should really install the drives onto the floor first. I chose to go with a 2.5" drive for good measure.



Installing a 3.5″ drive requires that you remove the bracket located at the top of the case.



In the rear, all the plugs are were you would expect them to be.



There was no major setback in terms of ease of us, cable management can be easily handled by bundling all the cables on the top of the case. If you are using a modular power supply, this process could be a lot easier if you get a set of short cables.



With everything in place, the chassis looks pretty much like it did right out of the box. Once turned on, a LED at its face lights up to let you know the system has been powered on.




Test System & Methology

Due to the fact this is a mini-ITX case, we haven't been able to use out usual test hardware and as such, our results, and therefore cooling scores aren't directly comparable to any of the micro-ATX or full-size cases we've reviewed.

Our test kit includes:

CPU: Intel Core i5-2500K overclocked to 4.4GHz using a vcore of 1.3V.
Graphics card: Zotac GTX 570 1.3GB
Motherboard: Asus P8Z77-I Deluxe
RAM: 4GB Kingston DDR3 1600MHz memory
PSU: Enermax Eco 82+ 620W PSU
CPU cooler: Zalman CNPS 8900 low-profile cooler



While some cases can house larger coolers, for the results to be comparable, we needed to pick a cooler than was going to fit in as many cases as possible. We therefore opted for a low-profile cooler. This will give a good idea of how well the case is able to remove heat from the system - our primary concern in case testing, although you can probably expect to achieve better results by using a larger cooler if the case in question supports it. The graphics card fan was locked at 70 per cent speed ad the system was loaded using Prime95 and Unigene's Heaven benchmark. We used Realtemp and GPU-Z to monitor the temperatures, taking the maximum values when the readings had plateaued.


Temperature

Airflow is canalized by making the fan at the back as the only intake, and using the power supply as an exhaust. This allows for the CPU to get fresh air, and exhaust it through the power supply. The Raijintek's balanced allowed it to obtain some sizeable leads over the two other mini-ITX cases we tested. It's CPU delta T was at least 2C cooler than the nearest competition and 3C cooler than the Lian Li PC-TU200. The GPU delta T results were the most eye-opening though.



Its result of 56C was 2C cooler than the nearest competitor - the Silverstone FT03-Mini, and a massive 5C lower than the Lian Li PC-TU200. Noise-wise the Metis Plus was unobtrusive, with its fan making a gentle air noise, so it's clear that even before you reach for your pump and radiator, the Metis Plus already makes for great case for an air cooled system.


Conclusion

First impression go a long way with a chassis, you either love the look of it, or you don’t. Fortunately, the Metis Plus is drop dead gorgeous, and that dark brushed aluminium finish just oozes premium quality. With that stunning brushed aluminium construction throughout, you’re certainly getting a product that looks and feels worthy of the retail price. Raijintek Metis Plus is available online for €65. The chassis has the same 120-mm rear-mount fan as the original Metis, but the new model also adds a mount for a second 120-mm spinner on the top panel. The Raijintek Metis Plus could easily fit a full gaming rig, that is if you use an SFX power supply to fit a longer graphics card. However due to the minimalistic and compact design, the Raijintek Metis Plus could also be home to an HTPC system. There was no major setback in terms of ease of us, cable management can be easily handled by bundling all the cables on the top of the case. If you are using a modular power supply, this process could be a lot easier if you get a set of short cables. It is also mod friendly as you can remove every single panel off the case using screws. Full size ATX power supplies are also supported so not having to worry about the overpriced SFF ATX power supplies is surely a plus point! There were no major flaws in terms of ease of use. There are still some things missing, like an SFX to standard ATX power supply bracket, and a dust filter. Last up, the Raijintek Metis Plus delivers some interesting results of its own. It's the coolest running case of the roundup. The performance of the Raijintek Metis Plus can be attributed its 120mm exhaust fan which moves a significant amount of air, as well as a design that favors a strong side-to-top airflow through the use of carefully placed vents.



From a stylish desktop chassis in the office to a slick looking HTPC build, the Raijintek Metis Plus is perfect for the job. With the mini-ITX motherboard market offering everything from X299 to Ryzen With Vega solutions these days, you can really create something special with this chassis. Personally, I would love one on my desk, or even just as a highly portable gaming system for a VR rig or LAN gaming system. It’s not expensive, and the premium build materials, build quality, and that stunning black finish make it all worth it.