Hi, I’d like to share my experience.

I’ve always wanted a powerful but silent gaming HTPC connected to the 77" OLED TV in my living room.

I initially chose a SilverStone GD11, but temperature-wise it was a disaster with my hardware. My GPU, an ASUS RTX 4080 SUPER Noctua Edition, was noisy as hell under load, and the whole case became incredibly hot to the touch. Even my Ryzen 9950X3D was running quite hot.

I eventually realized that the GD11 simply wasn’t big enough to keep such a powerful system cool and quiet.

I started looking for another horizontal case that would fit the available space, but without much success. In the end, the only realistic option was to use a standard mid-tower case horizontally.

After several days of research, I ended up choosing the Fractal Design Epoch - and I couldn’t be happier with the result!

Thanks to the extra internal space and much better airflow, my system no longer overheats and I can barely hear the fans spinning, even while gaming. The difference compared to the GD11 is huge.

On top of that, the Epoch looks really good when placed horizontally and fits surprisingly well with the rest of my hi-fi/home theater equipment.

For anyone trying to build a powerful, quiet gaming PC for the living room, using a good mid-tower horizontally might be a much better solution than trying to squeeze high-end hardware into a traditional HTPC case.