Fractal Design has launched its fabric-covered PC case, dubbed the Mood, to provide a more aesthetically pleasing option for living rooms. This design could easily be mistaken for a mini single tower speaker. Fractal Design showcased this compact Mini ITX chassis during Computex 2024 along with other products but we now have more technical details about the case.
To access the internals of your Mood build, the casing slides up easily, with its fabrics wrapped on all three sides and a large dust filter behind to allow ample airflow. The top panel is vented, and the included case fan propels air through the top of the tower. Fractal Design's Mood can be had with breathable fabric in either black or light grey. The company recommends using a lint cleaner to clean the fabric part of the case in its manual. Fractal's combination of design choices and materials makes this case a lightweight at 4.6kg.
This pillar design case is compatible with the recently introduced SFF-ready Enthusiast Nvidia GeForce GPU standard. The specs list notes that the Mood supports up to 325mm long graphics cards that are 2.75-slots thick, which comfortably exceeds the aforementioned Nvidia specifications. Graphics cards can be vertically mounted and connected with an included PCIe 4.0 riser.
For cooling, the case design allows for up to 114mm tall CPU air coolers or 280mm radiators. The case comes with a single 180mm fan on top to blow air toward all the components. Users can install up to 2x 120/140mm fans in the front.
There is room for up to 1x 3.5-inch drive, 2x 2.5-inch drives in the case, in addition to the M.2 storage which your motherboard provides. Two expansion slots are available, but most GPU choices will take up both spaces (up to 2.75-slots).
Either an SFX or SFX-L power supply is required to complete a Mood build. The case dimensions of just 212 x 212 x 453mm, so the SFF power supply is a must, as is the use of an ITX motherboard.
Front panel ports include 1x USB Type-C 20 Gbps (USB 3.2 Gen 2x2) 2x USB Type-A 5 Gbps (USB 3.0) and 1x Combo jack. Next to this array of ports is the power button.
Using a non-conventional material for a PC case usually commands a premium, and the Fractal Design Mood seems to be no exception to this rule, coming in at US$149.99. Fabric has been used by other PC case companies previously, most notably by InWin, which made the Alice case with various printed fabric exteriors.
We think Fractal's Mood may appeal to people looking for a more living-friendly case without RGB lighting. This is an increasingly popular niche, with many other case makers making mini ITX cases featuring minimal designs - but using fabric for the exterior offers some appealing differentiation.
