Antec ISK 110 90w Mini-ITX VESA Compatible Chassis Review

Introduction

The Antec ISK series has long been a favorite of mine. Sure we sometimes need high-end full towers, capable of housing epic gaming systems, but there’s a high demand for compact and efficient systems in the home and the office; something the ISK series is well suited to. The model we’re looking at today certainly is targeted more at the professional market, with many applications from digital signage and office systems, but there’s certainly no reason why you wouldn’t find a use for a chassis like this as a HTPC, space-saving system or more.

As you can see, the ISK110 comes equipped with a nice little bundle of screws, but more importantly, an external power supply adaptor. The ISK110 is capable of powering a system of up to 90w, which may not sound a lot, but given the low power requirements of 2.5″ drives and modern processors such as Haswell, it’s a lot more than it sounds; this is especially true given that this chassis will not house a graphics card.

Given the compact nature of the chassis, this is all the power cables you’ll need on the interior. A single cable attached to the PSU PCB on the interior of the chassis, as has your standard motherboard and CPU power cables, as well as a couple of SATA connectors and a single MOLEX.

Also included in the box, you’ll find this metal VESA mount, giving you the option to fit the entire chassis onto the back of a VESA-compatible display; this could save you a lot of space on your desktop.

Further mounting options are provided via this lovely vertical mount, which provides a stable base for the chassis should you want to stand it upright on its side.

It’s got a few rubber grips on the base and just like the VESA mount, it simply clips onto the base of the chassis.

The chassis its self is nice and compact. Overall, it’s not much bigger than a mini-ITX motherboard and not that much thicker either; there should be just enough room for a low-profile CPU cooler in here.

There’s loads of ventilation in the top section and a little extra on the base to help keep things cool.

The front panel is nicely equipped with four USB 2.0 ports, HD audio jacks, two LED indicators and, of course, the power button.

Around the back, there’s a snap-off mini-ITX cover and a small power port. You’ll also notice two screws in the top panel and two more in the bottom, these are all that is needed to remove either panel.

The base and top section of the chassis, or the left and right side depending on your chosen orientation, has a little more ventilation. There’s also some holes to mount the VESA or vertical mount on the left/bottom side.