Hey Everyone.
I see all sorts of custom cases and one off designs now with the advent of 3d printing. And, at least in my experience designing a case is actually quite hard. Reading all the specs for the motherboard, the keep-out regions, figuring out how to mount the gpu reliably, and designing around all of those mechanical constraints of the form factors is a significant challenge, especially for people relatively new. So, i set out to try and make this a bit easier to make case design more approachable, especially for first timers. The goal isnt to make the smallest or densest case with this, but rather to allow people to get their feet wet, make something, and worry more about designing the actual case part and making it look good instead of all the pcie-sig and atx specs.
To that effect, I have here just a motherboard mounting bracket, and a gpu mounting bracket. They are sheet steel, with all the pcie-sig and atx mechanical specs baked in so you dont have to worry about it. There is an M3 mounting hole 28mm away from every corner, or an unthreaded hole 15mm away from every corner. This lets you bolt directly to the brackets, or bolt the brackets to something else. The best part: these can come together in either the traditional, sandwich, or console layout. So you can use these as a starting point to design your own case around them no matter the configuration you want.
Im currently waiting on quotes to get these prototyped, but would love any feedback from folks. Is this something you can see yourself trying out?
Update 09/09/2026 the prototypes are here
And, they even work as intended! All the tolerances work out, everything mounts as i hoped. Below spoilers with hardware installed and the 3 different orientations tested.
The pinch plate on the bottom works very well to secure the GPU by pinching the pcie fingers. This worked out really well. The 2 M3 screws on the top however, where a gpu "usually"s crews in are difficult to install. There is not enough clearance to get a screw driver in there. Its workable for sure, just not convenient.
Next steps are to otimize the design a little bit so its easier to work with.
My main 2 things id like to change after playing around with these are:
1) GPU mounting. Need to make installing the GPU easier. Probably going to optimize a flange away.
2) Nicer dimensions. In the traditional layout, there is no reason i cant make it also be nice whole mm dimensions, so il try to optimize that in.
There was also some feedback from reddit regarding a low profile gpu bracket. strongly considering that.
Update 10/11/2026 Small volume order placed.
Exited to share this update, I placed a small volume order. There will be a low profile version, as well as a standard ITX version. 100 units of the standard and 25 of the low profile. Besides the low profile version, i did also implement the design changes mentioned above. GPUs are now easier to secure (via elimination of the flange that obstructed screwdriver access) and the exterior dimensions are all cleaned up to be whole mm numbers. Also added some more mounting points on the bottom of the motherboard tray. Expecting to make this available mid November
Here are the renders of the final parts that went to production:
I see all sorts of custom cases and one off designs now with the advent of 3d printing. And, at least in my experience designing a case is actually quite hard. Reading all the specs for the motherboard, the keep-out regions, figuring out how to mount the gpu reliably, and designing around all of those mechanical constraints of the form factors is a significant challenge, especially for people relatively new. So, i set out to try and make this a bit easier to make case design more approachable, especially for first timers. The goal isnt to make the smallest or densest case with this, but rather to allow people to get their feet wet, make something, and worry more about designing the actual case part and making it look good instead of all the pcie-sig and atx specs.
To that effect, I have here just a motherboard mounting bracket, and a gpu mounting bracket. They are sheet steel, with all the pcie-sig and atx mechanical specs baked in so you dont have to worry about it. There is an M3 mounting hole 28mm away from every corner, or an unthreaded hole 15mm away from every corner. This lets you bolt directly to the brackets, or bolt the brackets to something else. The best part: these can come together in either the traditional, sandwich, or console layout. So you can use these as a starting point to design your own case around them no matter the configuration you want.
Update 09/09/2026 the prototypes are here
And, they even work as intended! All the tolerances work out, everything mounts as i hoped. Below spoilers with hardware installed and the 3 different orientations tested.
The pinch plate on the bottom works very well to secure the GPU by pinching the pcie fingers. This worked out really well. The 2 M3 screws on the top however, where a gpu "usually"s crews in are difficult to install. There is not enough clearance to get a screw driver in there. Its workable for sure, just not convenient.
Next steps are to otimize the design a little bit so its easier to work with.
My main 2 things id like to change after playing around with these are:
1) GPU mounting. Need to make installing the GPU easier. Probably going to optimize a flange away.
2) Nicer dimensions. In the traditional layout, there is no reason i cant make it also be nice whole mm dimensions, so il try to optimize that in.
There was also some feedback from reddit regarding a low profile gpu bracket. strongly considering that.
Update 10/11/2026 Small volume order placed.
Exited to share this update, I placed a small volume order. There will be a low profile version, as well as a standard ITX version. 100 units of the standard and 25 of the low profile. Besides the low profile version, i did also implement the design changes mentioned above. GPUs are now easier to secure (via elimination of the flange that obstructed screwdriver access) and the exterior dimensions are all cleaned up to be whole mm numbers. Also added some more mounting points on the bottom of the motherboard tray. Expecting to make this available mid November
Here are the renders of the final parts that went to production:
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