Wanting to Build or Buy a Small PC

I have always liked small but affordable computers. In the age of dinosaurs, I had an Atari Mega ST, a slim pizza box of a computer that served as the monitor stand and had no wasted space once I put a hard disk inside of it.

A few months ago, I wanted to build a small PC: Buy a barebones system, motherboard, CPU etc. and put them together. Building it was to be part of the fun, aside from getting a useful computer out of it. I started window shopping and looking online for cases and motherboards, parts and specs.

I found a lot of systems and cases that are bigger than I like, even what are called "Small Form Factor" (SFF) systems. They are either quite tall, about 8 inches (20cm) or more, and have a shape that I am not very fond of, or they are slim and look slick from the front, but are then usually 16 inches (40cm) deep. If your desk is 26 inches deep, then that's a lot.

There are a couple of slim, less deep PCs available from big manufacturers which come close, but they all have some fatal flaw, and it's not possible to just opt for a different motherboard because they use non-standard sizes.

And then there is the Mac Mini which has inspired "mini PCs" of similar size. They are built entirely with laptop components, which makes them more expensive, and they have fewer features. The power brick and an external memory card reader add back some of the size, and add to the cable mess.

There should be room (and a market) for small desktop PCs that are fairly full-featured, use mostly desktop components, and are sized between SFF PCs and mini PCs. They would be less than 10 inches (25cm) deep to fit on short desks, on kitchen counters and into bookshelves. They would have an overall volume of less than 10 liters (2.5 gallons), and all components would be integrated into the case (including the power supply and at least a minimal memory card reader).

A typical VCR has a volume of around 8 liters (2 gallons) or less. A PC with the size and shape of a VCR fits well into entertainment systems and should be attractive as a Home Theater PC.

By the way, I did build a PC recently, with one of the smallest microATX cases on the market, and it's indeed a little taller, deeper and more voluminous than I like. It measures about 13.5 liters (3.5 gallons).

I would like to share my thoughts and would love to hear from others who are interested in buying or designing a small desktop PC.