Lian Li has just unveiled the Lian Li SUP-01, a new gaming PC case with a completely reworked internal layout that doesn’t even let you mount a graphics card directly to your motherboard. Instead, a PCIe riser cable is used to allow the graphics card to fit in the front of the case.
This bizarre but potentially brilliant bit of case configuration could easily see the SUP-01 land a spot on our best PC case guide thanks to its compact size and effective-looking optimized airflow. Especially as Lian Li isn’t charging a particularly high price for this new case.
In some ways, the SUP-01 isn’t the most remarkable-looking case design, with its single, square side window, blanked-off lower section, and perforated front. However, inside it’s almost completely different to most others and around the back (or right hand side, depending how you think of case design), it uses a completely perforated panel.
There are three main zones to the case, each with dedicated airflow designs. There’s the front section with its perforated panel through which your graphics card can pull air directly and then push at least some of that hot air straight out of that perforated back panel.
Meanwhile, the rest of the back panel is dedicated to mounting AIO cooler radiators and other fans. This means you can pull in cool air directly from outside the case and then push hot air straight out too. Cool air is also pulled in from the grilles behind the rear IO section of the case.
Finally, there’s the motherboard tray area which is cooled by a single 120mm fan that’s mounted on the outside of the case, pushing air through the PCIe bracket area and across components such as your M.2 SSDs. Not only is it strange to see this fan bolted to the back of the case but it’s even stranger that it has to push air through the removable PCIe bracket blanks.
I guess it makes sense that people might want to mount other non-graphics card PCIe hardware in this area so it still needs the PCIe bracket functionality but it definitely looks a bit janky.
As for the PSU, this is housed in the usual blocked off bottom section along with a hard drive/SSD bracket and space for you to stuff all your cables.
The case supports the new back-connect motherboard standards so you can create an even cleaner-looking PC by eliminating most of the visible cables to your motherboard. You also get some RGB in the form of a strip that runs around the top of the closed off base/PSU section.
For such an innovative layout, it’s a shame Lian Li didn’t push the boat out a little further on the styling front. However, with the case including a 510mm PCIe extension cable for your graphics card and three 120mm fans, all for the price of just $149.99, its more simple design has allowed Lian Li to offer what appears to be a decent value case.
The Lian Li SUP-01 release date is today, June 30th, 2024 with both black and white versions available.
This new case isn’t the first time Lian Li has excited us with gaming PC innovations this year with its new power supply design also being a welcome twist on that of most boring of PC components.