SilverStone Temjin TJ08-E: Fat Case in a Little Coat
by Dustin Sklavos on August 4, 2011 1:50 AM EST- Posted in
- Cases/Cooling/PSUs
- Mini ITX
- SilverStone
- MicroATX
- Mini-Tower
Introducing the SilverStone Temjin TJ08-E
While vendors have been all too happy to send us larger enclosures (and we've been all too happy to receive them), our coverage of Mini-ITX and Micro-ATX cases has been a little lacking. That's why we're pleased today to present SilverStone's new Temjin TJ08-E. SilverStone's Temjin line has been a popular one, and with the TJ08-E mini tower they're confident they have a winner on their hands. It has the kind of clean exterior design we've been clamoring for more of, but can it perform?
I had a chance to take a look at the TJ08-E back at CES and fell in love with it almost immediately. While I wouldn't say I'm biased towards SilverStone, I'm definitely very fond of them. When most other vendors are reiterating and refining traditional ATX case designs, the mad scientists they call engineers seem to be constantly experimenting and tweaking, making some radical changes and some less so. The results are generally enclosures that are a bit more difficult to work with than more standardized designs, but are never dull, almost always eye-catching, and sometimes that mad science pays off.
As a mini tower the TJ08-E still feels a little bit bigger than most, though it's still not as big as Antec's P180 Mini. In some ways it's a reminder that Micro-ATX isn't that micro, but SilverStone has crammed an awful lot of expandability into this enclosure.
| SilverStone Temjin TJ08-E Specifications | ||
| Motherboard Form Factor | Micro-ATX, Mini-ITX | |
| Drive Bays | External | 2x 5.25", 1x 3.5" (can also store a 3.5" drive internally) |
| Internal | 4x 3.5", 1x 2.5" | |
| Cooling | Front | 1x 180mm fan |
| Rear | 1x 120mm fan mount | |
| Top | - | |
| Side | - | |
| Bottom | - | |
| Expansion Slots | 4 | |
| Front I/O Port | 2x USB 3.0, headphone and mic jacks | |
| Top I/O Port | PSU vent | |
| Power Supply Size | ATX | |
| Clearance | 13.25" (Expansion Cards), 150mm (CPU HSF), 160mm (PSU) | |
| Weight | 11.68 lbs. | |
| Dimensions | 15.16" x 8.27" x 14.72" | |
| Price | $99 | |
If you think about it, that's an awful lot of expansion space for an otherwise reasonably small mini tower. On paper at least, all I'd have to do is change out the motherboard in my video editing workstation and I could fit the entire machine, complete with all the hard drives, into the TJ08-E. As you'll see, though, something had to give to get everything inside the TJ08-E.
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superccs - Thursday, August 4, 2011 - link
mATX is a vastly more popular board size, one that I have been using for years.One thing I like to see is well thought out airflow, something that is very rare in most case designs.
JarredWalton - Thursday, August 4, 2011 - link
We decided on two test beds for our case reviews; for ATX-compatible and larger, we use a Sandy Bridge ATX motherboard and test with overclocking. For micro-ATX and ITX, we use a mini-ITX motherboard and, where possible, test with the GTX 580 installed. We figured two set configurations was better than three or four different options. The only thing mATX would potentially add is more performance and more heat, so by that token testing ITX in a uATX case is actually putting less strain on the cooling.JasonInofuentes - Thursday, August 4, 2011 - link
http://youtu.be/IolqkwNSmfAbobbozzo - Thursday, August 4, 2011 - link
FAKE youtube link above!GeorgeH - Thursday, August 4, 2011 - link
Using modular PSUs in small cases like this is often a bad idea and far from required. The problem with modular PSUs is that the modular bits tend to add significant length and stiffness that makes cable routing harder (often significantly.) Non-modular supplies might have an extra SATA cable or two to tuck away, but that's generally easy to do. Problems can come up with PSUs that are much too powerful and therefore come with tons of extra cables, but that's just operator error. :)Knifeshade - Thursday, August 4, 2011 - link
Wouldn't it be fairer to use stock coolers rather than custom CPU coolers? The CPU temp is rather impressive, at just 6-30 degrees Celsius above room temperature. But I can't help but think most of the kudos goes to the custom cooler rather than the cooling prowess of the case.Hrel - Thursday, August 4, 2011 - link
I like this case a lot, but how would one go about improving the acoustics? I mean, I could go out and buy sound dampening foam and put it in... but that stuff is really over-priced everywhere I've looked and that seems like kind of a pain.Dustin Sklavos - Friday, August 5, 2011 - link
The Zalman cooler we use for testing is honestly a bit loud and the Zotac board doesn't really have much in the way of fan control; just putting a quieter cooler (think the Cooler Master Hyper 212+) in would go a LONG way towards quieting down the Temjin.bobbozzo - Thursday, August 4, 2011 - link
This isn't the first article with this problem, but the white on yellow text in the graphs is near impossible to read on both my Dell LCD and my Samsung 2343BW.Also, you mention that the Antec Mini is bigger, but I would have liked to see more details & comparison.
Thanks!
MadMan007 - Friday, August 5, 2011 - link
This thing is begging to be used with a PICO-style PSU and just integrated graphics for those who don't need a discrete GPU.Or for those that do and aren't going to go with a high-end card and madly overclocked CPU, an SFX12V PSU like, oh, I don't know...Silverstone's very own ST45SF.