Akasa Euler Review

Performance Analysis

It was pretty obvious from the outset that the huge surface area advantage enjoyed by the Streacom ST-FC5S EVO WS was going to deal with the heat of the warmer 65W Core i3-2100 more easily. The Euler was 9°C warmer than the ST-FC5S EVO WS when in our TV cabinet and 14°C warmer in the open, with the former resulting in a rather toasty delta T of 61°C with the absolute temperature in Core Temp approaching 90°C.

At this point the outside of the case was scorchingly hot but then the CPU is nearly double the recommended TDP - a rather predictable result perhaps. The big surprise was that the Euler coped perfectly well when dealing with the same CPU but streaming HD content in Netflix. The delta T of 29°C was still a lot warmer than the ST-FC5S EVO WS, but this is perfectly fine for long term use.
Of course if you have anything more demanding in mind then the extra cooling offered by the ST-FC5S EVO WS is well worth it. With our 35W CPU installed, the temperatures were cucumber-cool, with a delta T of just 36°C, even with Prime95's small FFT test running with the case cooped-up in our TV cabinet. This dropped to just 18°C when using Netflix.


Conclusion

If rumours that Akasa may be working on a more HTPC-focussed fanless case are true then we're very interested indeed. The Euler might lack USB ports and the ability to install an optical drive (you could always buy a USB hub and external optical drive), but build quality is superb and despite its minuscule size it managed to pass all our tests, just. We should stress, though, that using a full-fat 65W CPU should only be considered if your tasks don't require more than 50-60 per cent CPU load - above this the temperatures climb quickly and on warm days it could well be a little too much.

Within the confines of Akasa's TDP limits it's a fantastic silent chassis - which is why we've scored it highly in the cooling department. The Streacom ST-FC5S EVO WS is far more flexible in terms of the system you can build and does do a better job with our 65W CPU. However it costs £120 more and is designed to cool much more power hungry CPUs. The Euler is more than up to the demands of an HTPC or silent office PC, if of course you don't mind the lack of ports. Best of all, it's incredibly easy to install your motherboard, you don't need to buy a cooler or PSU and it costs just £70 including an external power brick. If you're after a cheap way to achieve silence in your living room, the Euler should definitely be on your HTPC case shortlist.