HYDRA MINI

Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication

AS CHASSIS DESIGN goes, this is the most extreme example of minimalism we’ve ever seen. There’s no frills here, no excess garnish or gaming flair, there’s no support for crazy, over-the-top liquidcooling, and you can’t make it into a glorified NAS with hundreds of TBs of storage. The reality is that the Hydra Mini is a true manifestation of pure, clean, functional style, merged with exceptional craftsmanship and an attention to detail that makes it perhaps one of the most interesting cases we’ve ever had the pleasure of reviewing. That’s not to say it doesn’t have its flaws, and we’ll cover those in due course, but despite that we can’t help but admire this thing.

So what exactly is the Hydra Mini? Well, it’s a tiny ITX SFX chassis that is built by a small Italian company called Hydra. It’s available in three different color skus (white, black, and a clear satin finish, the latter being slightly cheaper). You can buy the Mini in a bundle, which includes a Hydra-branded PCIe riser extension for your GPU, at around $112 or $105 (not including shipping/import duties), or you can go for the standard case for just $78, or $65 for the satin steel variant.

The chassis itself is a single piece of powder, or clear-coated, 1.5mm folded stainless steel, completed with four machined aluminum feet. Straight out of the box you do have to attach the GPU bracket to the back of the case, but that’s not necessarily a downside, depending on your graphics preference. Outside of that, and its rear mounted vertical GPU, it follows a traditional design style. Your motherboard is installed vertically in the usual orientation, and there are cutouts for your 24-pin ATX power and that PCIe riser in the bottom as well.

For the front I/O all you get is a single LED DimasTech power switch—which you need to install yourself—with blacksleeved cables. On the one hand we could criticize that, but given the overall size of the Mini, the distance between the front I/O and the rear I/O is less than a foot, if you do need to plug in anything there. Additionally on the back of the chassis, there are cutouts for some cable ties, and it also supports a single 2.5-inch drive, along with an SFX PSU.

If you do install a graphics card it’s only supported by that rear bracket, and nothing else. The PCIe riser doesn’t mount to anything directly, which can be a little daunting, but we’ve had no problems with it so far. On top of that the CPU and GPU power cables require a bit of work to get them tidy, but once strapped in and secured with cable ties, they look very clean.

NO-FRILLS FUN

Temps on the whole are impressive, thanks to its unimpeded access to cool air. And rather surprisingly, although it gets dustier faster than a regular case, it’s ridiculously easy to clean—just hit it with a tin of compressed air once a week.

The biggest bugbear we have is the Hydra logo cutout. It goes straight through the steel, so if you have a power supply with a white specs label on it like we do, it shows through to the front. We’re actually working with our resident peripheral reviewer/modder to design a frosted perspex backplate to slot in behind it—that way we can hide the PSU label and add an extra touch of lighting with some LEDs.

All that said, the Hydra Mini is still a fantastic-looking chassis, with exceptional materials, at an incredibly affordable price. Its small design makes it ideal for anyone who's looking to create a sleek, air-cooled gaming, hometheater or office PC, with or without a graphics card. It’s easy to clean, easy to build on, and looks fantastic when you’re done.

VERDICT 9 Hydra Mini

HERCULEAN Bold design; seriously cheap; looks fantastic once built; easy to clean; strong performance.

MARVEL Cutout needs work; extended GPU bracket would be nice.

$112 www.hydra-shop.com