Maingear Potenza Super Stock SFF System Review

The 3Dmark11 score seems like a lot to me, this is a powerhouse for the vast majority of gamers.  Though the dimensions are in the article, seeing is believing: one more photo beside an 800D, HAF-X or Cosmos would be the money shot.  I've often said that the muscle-car era of gaming rigs is past it's prime and the future is smaller and quieter without any compromise in drivability...this is the future.

Eventually everything gets smaller and slimmer. I wasn't too long ago that flat screen monitors were replaced CRT monitors. Perhaps gaming rigs much farther in the future will shrink down to the size of a Mac Mini or even further, a Raspberry Pi.

The problem that I find with a lot of mini itx cases is usually their depth, If you want to build a system with a decent graphics card then it can get too deep to fit inside a media cabinet. By mounting the graphic card vertically Maingear solved this problem but I guess ran into another problem of having the back I/O in an awkward position. Either way this is a powerful and small system.

Can this be the prize for the next contest?? That would be AWESOME!!

Why does Maingear KEEP releasing stuff as if they designed and manufactured it themselves, when they are really just re-badging great designs/products from others?

The case is from Silverstone (FT03-mini).

http://www.silverstonetek.com/product.php?pid=333

I built an i5 based HTPC with one several months ago, and it IS a brilliant case and will fit dual-slot video cards unlike a lot of mini-ITX solutions. The 140mm fan blowing air from the bottom of the case up through the chassis and out the top grill works brilliantly.

Maingear astounds once again. Definitely one of the tops when it comes to high performance builds. I certainly wouldn't mind one of these for a portable gaming system.

MCaddick:

Why does Maingear KEEP releasing stuff as if they designed and manufactured it themselves, when they are really just re-badging great designs/products from others?

The case is from Silverstone (FT03-mini)

I'm so glad someone said this.

I like Maingear, the computers they build are relatively well priced for prebuilt machines, and are always nice eye-candy.

But this is not their case. Neither is their flagship case either; that's a SilverStone too. They should at least credit SIlverStone when describing the case on the build page. It's not a Maingear i5/i7, it's intel. so why can't they call it the Maingear Potenza, that uses the FT03 Mini?

@MCaddick you are absolutely right, I saw a video review for that case a while back and realized my mistake once I read your post. As for the other builds from Maingear they are usually parts that anybody can throw together (I don't know why I thought they made a case out of no where). it's mainly the Maingear laptops that impress me. 

The only thing I like about this is the case, build quality, and pre-built. What I don't like THE PRICE for what you get, I'd prefer to build my own if that meant that I would save a few bucks to get the same results.

It performs well. I think I would prefer not to have the Maingear name brightly painted on it. The case looks good without that flash on it.