Funding no soulless box - CASENDRA by REMHA - 8.8L folding wooden SFF case

[REMHA]

Hello there.

I've spent the last months carefully engineering my dream SFF case: ℂ𝔸𝕊𝔼ℕ𝔻ℝ𝔸
She follows a more restrained design with no RGB, envisioned not to live her life hidden away under a desk, but rather to turn heads and be recognized.

made to (un)fold

To create a satisfying physical interaction, CASEDNRA is crafted from recycled acrylic glass combined with beechwood panels. The party trick is that, with the help of clever folding techniques, a single envelope-style shell wraps around a modular structure, revealing the interior when needed.

hardware support:

• Mobo
• ► mini-ITX
• CPU
• ► cooler up to 55mm
• RAM
• ► height up to 61mm
• PSU
• ► SFX (idealy with modular cable mngmt.)
• GPU
• ► up to 63x157x327mm
• ► PCIe 4.0x16 or 3.0x1 riser available
• Fans (exhaust)
• ► none
• ► or dual 80x10mm ID-Cooling® (PWM)
• ► or dual 92x14mm Noctua-A9® (PWM)
• Drives
• ► single 2,5" bay
• ► +2 with 3mm shorter RAM & CPU cooler
• ► +1-6x 3,5" or 1-12x 2,5" (Memoria Kit)
• Front-i/o
• ► single USB-C (3.0 or 3.2)

test config:

• AMD R7 7800X3D
• Nvidia Geforce RTX 3090 FE
• Corsair Classic 2x32GB DDR5
• ASRock A620i Phantom ITX
• Corsair SF600
• WD SN550 1TB Nvme
• Thermalright AXP90-X47 with Noctua A9x14 fan
• dual Noctua A9x14 top case fans (exhaust)
• (+ASUS PB248Q 16:10 monitor in 24" iMac shell)

happily dual-booting Bazzite and Microslop W10.


With 160mins heavy gaming (MSFS24, Indiana Jones ATGC, ...) I averaged CPU 58°C (Tdie) and GPU 66°C (Tdie) / 90°C (Tmem). That's with fans set to 35dbA.

status

CASEDNRA was originally intended as a one off build - Recognizing her unique character, I set the challenge to create a real product, not just a prototype! Endless refinement-pain and developing later and I am almost finished. To boost development and bring CASENDRA to life, a Kickstarter campaign was launched on May 1st.

So whats left to finish? The single biggest remaining obstacle is that - even though the protoype works perfectly enough in my day to day life - I decided to re-engineer the whole structure to accept up to 55mm CPU coolers (current limit: 47mm), while keeping the overall volume similar. (keyboard in picture is Rapoo E2700 - don't get fooled, it's a tiny one!!)

packaging / assembly

To fully circle the sustainability aspect, a tailor-made packaging consisting of nothing but cardboard (and one anti-static bag) has been created.
More details on YouTube: Full Assembly Video (Time-Warp).

[FAQ] increased Firehazard?​

No, maximum temperatures of up to 110°C (TJmax) can only be observed in extreme scenarios and only inside of computing components (e.g., CPU temperature) - never on a touching surface! Even if they were, that by far wouldn't be enough: the ignition temperature of beech wood and MDF is only over 200 to 300°C, which is right around where most plastics (like fans) are already melted or heavily heat deformed. Therefore, no fire hazard is to be expected if handled as intended.

one more thing

There is more! Being a modular structure - I pictured CASENDRA as a great choice for a visually appealing NAS/homelab case. Among other upgrades, there is a "Memoria Kit" which enables hybrid setups between drives and PCIe devices in the GPU compartment:

size comparison

CASENDRA is smaller than the Terra: at ~21cm (8.27") she's just about as tall as your typical DVD box.
Pure Base 500DX for scale (most sold tower pc case in Germany):

questions? suggestions? general thoughts?

last updated: May 2026

 

[REMHA]

"Reserve the first few posts in a new thread to have extra room for updates, pics, specs, FAQs, etc." #1

 

[REMHA]

"Reserve the first few posts in a new thread to have extra room for updates, pics, specs, FAQs, etc." #2

 

[REMHA]

"Reserve the first few posts in a new thread to have extra room for updates, pics, specs, FAQs, etc." #3

 

[robbee]

Nice, I've always been fond of wooden cases and this one looks spot on. How confident are you that the screw holes that hold the side panel closed will not wear out over time? The screws seem to thread directly into the wood, with very little material around them. Some kind of metal threaded insert could extend its life significantly, especially with a screw that will be unscrewed and screwed in again so often.

 

[CTFGaming]

Your packaging design is next level !

 

[REMHA]

Nice, I've always been fond of wooden cases and this one looks spot on. How confident are you that the screw holes that hold the side panel closed will not wear out over time? The screws seem to thread directly into the wood, with very little material around them. Some kind of metal threaded insert could extend its life significantly, especially with a screw that will be unscrewed and screwed in again so often.

Well spotted! The final version will feature metal inserts to be used with M3 screws, eliminating this issue. (btw, I dig your web design! great asthetics.)

To add a little more context, I wasn't happy with the pictured solution to begin with, for one because of wear (which actually is not as bad as you would expect, they do worsen - but all prototype panels I ve been handling so far are still strong enough to hold screws - it's far from smth like IKEA quality, where after one assembly the screws holes are gone...) and secondly because it's more complex to drill all these holes to the side panel manually... takes a lot of time and presicion. I couldn't add threaded inserts right from the get go as there are none available that fit a 7mm thin wooden panel. So how is it solved then? I experimented with larger cutouts and a 3D printed frame that then holds a metal insert to fit a screw. This doesn't wear out and it's eliminates the drilling of holes. All tests have proven successfull, but I haven't come around to engineer them to all occasions on the prototype. I will do this bundled with the 55mm CPU cooler upgrade to avoid spending ressources on new prototypes with minor chnages



They are quiet strong, haven't tested the limit yet - but 1kg of pure GTX 780 Ti was no problem. That should be more than suiffiecent to just hold a side-panel.

Edit: I don't know what the issue is, but I either can't upload pictures... Or they preview fine but after posting they are broken. You need to click the broken preview and it *should* redirect you to the image...

 

[REMHA]

Your packaging design is next level !

Haha thanks! CASENDRA gets a lot of praise for the packaging. Maybe I should just specialize in that instead.

 

[HWI]

Not my jam, but I can really appreciate the design and hope it's successful for you.

 

[confusis]

Front page newspost added: https://smallformfactor.net/news/sff-kickstarter-remhas-casendra/

 

[MarcParis]

Interesting concept