Lian Li O11 Dynamic XL Case Review - Build Quality, Thermals, & Changes

**Review: Lian Li 11 Dynamic**

The Lian Li 11 Dynamic is a high-end case that boasts an impressive array of features and improvements over its predecessor, the 11 Dynamic. While it's not without its flaws, this case is undoubtedly one of the best options available in the market today. In terms of airflow options, the case has excellent cooling capabilities with multiple fan mounting points and a glass panel on the front that allows for optimal airflow.

One of the standout features of the 11 Dynamic is its hot-swap hard drive bays, which are vastly easier to work with than the usual amounts found in other cases. Additionally, the tool is snapped into place, making it easy to install and remove components without having to deal with cumbersome screws or clips. However, the latch on the top panel could be improved, and the snaps used for the fan tray could be more durable.

Another notable feature of the 11 Dynamic is its excellent GPU cooling capabilities. The case has multiple fan mounting points, which allows for optimal airflow around the graphics card, ensuring that it stays cool even during intense gaming sessions. This makes the 11 Dynamic an ideal choice for enthusiasts who want to build a high-performance gaming rig.

One of the things that sets the 11 Dynamic apart from other cases in its class is its multi PSU support. The case has room for multiple power supplies, which allows users to build a custom setup that suits their specific needs. This feature alone makes the 11 Dynamic an attractive option for builders who want to create a highly customizable system.

However, the price of the 11 Dynamic is undoubtedly one of its biggest drawbacks. With a price tag of $200, it's significantly higher than some of its competitors in the market. While the case is certainly high-quality and well-built, the price may be out of reach for many budgets.

Despite the high price point, we believe that the Lian Li 11 Dynamic is worth considering for builders who want a top-notch case with excellent cooling capabilities and customization options. The case's design and engineering are clearly focused on performance, and it shows in its build quality and attention to detail.

**Comparison to Other Cases**

When it comes to choosing between the 11 Dynamic and other cases in its class, such as the Evolve X or the Corsair cases, there are several factors to consider. The 11 Dynamic offers some unique features, such as its hot-swap hard drive bays and excellent GPU cooling capabilities, which make it an attractive option for enthusiasts.

However, the price point of the 11 Dynamic is significantly higher than some of its competitors, which may be a deal-breaker for some buyers. Additionally, the case's design and engineering are more focused on performance than aesthetics, which may not appeal to everyone.

In contrast, cases like the Evolve X or the Corsair cases offer a more balanced approach to design and functionality. While they may not have all the features of the 11 Dynamic, they are generally more affordable and may be a better option for builders who want a high-quality case without breaking the bank.

**Conclusion**

In conclusion, the Lian Li 11 Dynamic is an excellent case that offers a unique combination of features and performance. While it's not without its flaws, particularly in terms of price point, we believe that it's worth considering for builders who want a top-notch case with excellent cooling capabilities and customization options.

Ultimately, the decision to choose the 11 Dynamic depends on individual needs and preferences. If you're looking for a high-performance case with excellent airflow options and customization features, then the 11 Dynamic may be an excellent choice. However, if budget is a concern, there are several other cases in its class that may offer similar features at a lower price point.

**Lian Li's Involvement**

It's worth noting that the Lian Li 11 Dynamic was designed by Roman Lau and manufactured by Lee Emily. Roman Lau, also known as "Roman" or "Rom", is a well-known engineer and designer in the PC hardware industry, particularly for his work at Corsair.

When asked about the design process for the 11 Dynamic, Roman Lau mentioned that he worked closely with Lee Emily to bring the case to life. He stated that he was involved in around 80-90% of the work, which is a testament to his expertise and attention to detail.

Roman's involvement is evident in the case's design and engineering, which are clearly focused on performance and functionality rather than aesthetics. This approach is consistent with Roman's reputation for building high-performance PC cases that prioritize cooling and airflow over looks alone.

**Behind-the-Scenes**

Lian Li has been open about their manufacturing process, and it appears that Lee Emily was heavily involved in the production of the 11 Dynamic. The company has stated that they work closely with top engineers and designers to ensure that every case meets their high standards for quality and performance.

While we don't have direct access to the design process or manufacturing facilities, it's clear that Lian Li is committed to building high-quality cases that meet the needs of enthusiasts and professionals alike. The 11 Dynamic is just one example of this commitment, and it's likely that future releases from Lian Li will continue to push the boundaries of what is possible in PC case design.

**Final Verdict**

In conclusion, the Lian Li 11 Dynamic is an excellent case that offers a unique combination of features and performance. While it's not without its flaws, particularly in terms of price point, we believe that it's worth considering for builders who want a top-notch case with excellent cooling capabilities and customization options.

If you're looking for a high-performance case with excellent airflow options and customization features, then the 11 Dynamic may be an excellent choice. However, if budget is a concern, there are several other cases in its class that may offer similar features at a lower price point.

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enthe lien leo levin dynamic was a case we liked enough to keep around for housing one of our work pcs the layout is non-standard from the side intake vents to the placement of the power supply in the storage but it works and it works well it may also be the only case we've ever tested with a completely sealed off glass front panel that's still managed to perform actually well in testing though we'll have an air variant impressed us somewhat less but improved substantially when the dust filtration was removed now in 2019 lammle is introducing the 11 XL a larger version of the original case still bearing the their bauer badge for his initial work on the 11 series before that this video is brought to you by Nord VPN Nord VPN is what we use internally as our Virtual Private Network solution we use Nord VPN for international travel to bypass firewalls and at home for data privacy especially from Snoopy and Internet service providers Nord VPN help secure and protect your network privacy and is currently offering 75% off of a three-year plan with one month free claim the offer at Nord VPN comm slash gamers Nexus and use code gamers Nexus at checkout or click the link in the description below the Leon the 11 dynamic is actually one of the cases we gave an award to maybe a year ago came out a little over a year ago and it was a well designed case it performed well thermally but it's also targeted towards liquid cooling that said because the hole spacing and the mounting positions for fan locations was so well placed with a dynamic it worked just as well with an air-cooled system so what you end up with is a bit of an aquarium PC except unlike a lot of the other aquarium pcs out there you can still get good performance without needing to rely on liquid cooling to brute-force it so there's a radiator mount on the bottom and there's bottom intake it is positioned substantially off the ground so it's over an inch off the ground which we always like to see because yes it is about an inch and a quarter off the ground but we like to see because at that point you've got enough access to clean air cool air down there that they can pull it in shoot it straight into the video card so really good GPU cooling that way almost always universally the side intake over there is also really good remove these SSD mounts if you'd like and we don't particularly recommend using these either way so remove those and you end up with a bunch of positioning for 120 millimeter fans at which point you get intake that is in some ways imperfect because obviously it's not a direct path to the CPU it comes in hits the glass or gets pulled in by the pressure generated by the CPU cooler fan that comes out the back there's a new 120 mount in the rear as well that helps out with this so you can guide the air a bit more with 120 rear exhaust fan but ultimately the 11 series case is aside from the air we're designed for liquid cooling in terms of how they look but that doesn't mean you can't do air cooling in fact they're quite good for air cooling the 11 air had some weaknesses primarily with the dust filter to the extent that the oil of an air was worse than the olivine dynamic for air cooling up until you remove the dust filter in the front and then it actually became really good it was one of the best that we've ever tested once you remove that filter but that was our main criticism that we'll have an excel is bigger it's got some changes versus the 11 dynamic some good and some not great executions of things and we'll talk about all that but a big point here to talk about is our standardized test bench is really meant for air air cooling parts we use so for standardized case testing you need to use the same parts every single time the downside is that we don't get a full representation of what this type of case is meant for in that we're not doing an open-loop build in it so what you're getting here is a representation that gives you still good comparative data as to see relative to other cases on the market we have more than 230 roll rows of test data now relative to other cases on the market you can see how this performs thermally even looks with an air setup that will translate to cooling performance relative to the others with liquid so that's what you get here and separately this case doesn't come with any fans which exposes a few challenges in testing and that we typically base everything off of a stock set of fans if it doesn't come with them we have to supply of stock set of fans and then you run into the challenge of over cooling it because we're supplying it and so you can't we ended up just setting a budget for how much we were willing to spend on the fans that we used for the stock configuration and ran that so the 11 dynamic made a good case and we're gonna look at that we'll have an excel will go through Patrick's build notes through the thermal data and talk conclusions because the Elevens case design makes use of width as well as length even the Excel version doesn't seem large it's only 18 and a half inches long 47 centimeters which is shorter than the cases we use for our editing stations about 21 and a half inches or 55 centimeters for the PMO one and 23 inches or 58 centimeters for the dark based Pro 900 for example fractal and Lian Li are some of the first companies to really take advantage of not including space for five and a quarter inch drives anymore by cutting down the case lengths dramatically in spite of this it is a large case it's about eleven and a quarter inches or 29 centimeters wide which includes space for the power supply and hard drives to be stored behind the motherboard compartment while leaving plenty of room for cables since the power supply isn't under the motherboard there's also a massive amount of clearance on every side of the board for cable routing and radiators the novelty of power supply shrouds is beginning to wear off for us that did a while ago actually but cases like the O 11 and the dark Bass Pro 900 v one have so much more room to work with and with modular power supplies that these days have good-looking cables they really don't need to be hidden anymore it's only becoming more common that these power supply shrouds are getting removed the side panels in the front panel all lift upwards and are held in place by the top panel which must be taken off first it's held in place by a plastic latch as well this is new and it's also got two redundant captive thumb screws this is an odd choice altogether Liam Lee has said that the customers can remove the thumb screws if they want to but since the thumb screws are captive users are almost universally going to leave them in the case this defeats the purpose of having an elaborate and presumably expensive quick release latch and screw combination this combination of screws and two lists snaps is repeated on the bottom of the case and the fan tray and in the cable management bar although the screws in both of these locations aren't captive and are also more necessary to keep the parts locked down we like the idea of two lists snaps instead of screw where they can be used but if we had to pick one for the excel we'd say leave the tried-and-true screws and get rid of the snaps one of the best things with this case like the previous ones is that Lindley is able to avoid screws in the side panels by securing everything down via the top panel in this instance we like having the screws in the top panel because it sure some strength and that plastic latch just doesn't really add any rigidity or extra durability this is a good design that other case manufacturers could learn from in terms of eliminating screws from the side panels it's secure while reducing mounts and Hardware improving overall ease of use and it cleans up the sides the original 11 was limited to 120 millimeter fans everywhere except for the top which could fit to 140 s and the back technically which could fit in 80 the XL adds support for a further two optional 140 millimeter fans on the bottom tray the cutouts are still clearly sized for 120 but this improves the ability to install the bottom fans over the original case which had some clearance issues especially with larger motherboards the side mounts and new rear mount only support 120 millimeters this isn't bad but it means that buyers should be careful about the dimensions of any radiators that they plan to install we also learned later that the side vents screw hole spacing doesn't accommodate all radiators like the phoenix line from ek because the rails aren't continuous they're spaced non-standard screw hole placement on radiators will require creativity to fit in this case but almost all radiators do have standard hole spacing at least for open-loop cooling and so they should fit the side vent can fit 3 120 fans with some room to spare and blanking plates are included for this gap for any unused fan mounts turning them into SSD mounting points instead these plates are held in with two less plastics and apps that said we like leaving it open because it does actually breathe very well through that side vent the plastic snaps on the blanking plates and the bottom fan tray are replaceable and several extras are included in the parts kit that's good because you'll need them one of the snaps broke in half when we removed to the bottom fan tray the second time I'd be careful with these two and particular the parts themselves aren't that fragile but once they're screwed into the chassis it's easy to lever the tabs back too far and break them permanently although technically this is something the user would do we want to emphasize that it's very easy for the user to do so there's a reason that we only included the extras it's because they expected this to happen the RG certified graphic on the glass panel is a poor investment Tom Lee Emily's part the target demographic for a serious-looking case like the 11 XL that's being marketed based on their Bauer's overclocking reputation and general German Asst probably isn't the same demographic that cares deeply about something called Republic of gamers that and we already have no reason to think that our ogk certification is a compliment anyway as you can see in several of our previous reviews the hard drive sleds are a solid metal with big to grab handles tolerances are tight because they're hot swappable with plugs in the back that passed through to the motherboard and the power supply so the sleds have to index precisely to connect after years of putting together our case test system and then having to take it apart again because I say the power cable slipped off this is one premium case gimmick that we can get behind we like this one there are two hard drive cages and three slots the empty slot is used for the power supply or optionally a hard drive cage or two can be removed to provide room for multiple power supplies we have had a hard time imagining a system that would fit the O 11 XL but also benefit from more than one power supply but the feature is still useful in that the location of the PSU and hard drive cages can be shuffled around one thing we haven't mentioned so far is that like the original 11 dynamic the 11 XL doesn't come with any fans we think that's the right choice for these cases if Linley wants to appeal to serious overclockers with their bauer connection and focus on water cooling any fans cheap enough to pack into a cases overall price are probably going to get replaced from a review standpoint this makes our job a little harder we typically test with the fans that come with it and then we also have a standardized fantast that we run additionally now that we've established that standardized fan test we can run it and treat it as the baseline which is what we did but that also means that we're forced to do the to 140 millimeter bottom fans as intake because they won't fit in the sides and then the 120 fan in the rear for exhaust we figured this would be the best config for just three fans of those sizes there are no front panel mounts and the 140 fans won't mount anywhere else except the top of the case we also ran tests with for 120 Bora fans that Lee and Lee sent us with the original 11 first with three side intake and then with the fourth added as a rear exhaust these fans are rated for 1900 rpm and provide a lot more cooling than we typically run in a KS test but it's also the configuration that we would personally use so we wanted to try it but again the biggest thing here is that because it doesn't come with fans it's hard to do our standard testing where we mostly look at the fans that the case comes with so you'll be buying fans back to that into the price and then we'll let you know through these charts how many you should buy and where you should probably place them as always we're starting the thermal testing with only this case series and then we'll look at comparative numbers this chart shows the various 11 cases like the air and the dynamic average CPU temperature for the 11 XL was fifty three point eight degrees Celsius over ambient for our stock test which is where we did the 140 millimeter intake fans at the bottom and 120 at the rear the test with the three 120 fans all side intake resulted in a better temperature of 50 point 2 degrees over ambient since the side fans move the air more directly through the top of the case and the CPU cooler then the bottom case fans can't this is especially true with the large GPU blocking them right in the middle the fourth fan in the rear exhaust mount lowered temperature further down to forty eight point seven degrees celsius delta T over ambient by directly pulling hot air away from the CPU cooler though we'll have an air without any filter using these stock fans that came with it performs best on this chart adding three extra fans to the O 11 air but keeping the filter was still worse than stock without the filter and the original 11 dynamic was tested with Bora fans only resulted in a forty nine point two degree value as compared to the ex Alice fifty point two degree value the results are satisfying Lee close between these two and show minimal change if any at all compared to the rest of the chart fifty two point eight degrees over ambient is approximately in the middle on the same level as the NZXT H 700 I the three fantast is more comparable to our old eleven results since they utilize the same type of fans and fifty point to see those over a means is just one degree higher than our original result that's either down to margin of error or using the same 120 Miller fans to push the air through a larger case volume the XL has an advantage over the original 11 and that it has a mount for a rear exhaust fan as well hence the four fans this time rather than 348 point seven degrees Celsius over ambient is a little bit better than the three side intake fan result for the original 11 but the exhaust fan doesn't have the dramatic effect on CPU temperatures that it might in a configuration with your intake fans though 11 XL gets representation through most of the chart we've got a spot at the top and at the middle for these results GPO Torture thermals are next GPU temperature in the torture testing average forty six point seven degrees Celsius delta T over ambient and scored the same width in variance with the three faster side and take fans on the XL instead that's good news for the side and take configuration since our baseline arrangement has to 140 fans at the bottom pushing air straight into the GPU adding the fourth fan is exhaust didn't significantly improve temperatures either which makes sense for the GPU but at least having an exhaust fan biasing airflow towards the top of the case didn't hinder the performance the O 11 dynamic with three side fans ran at forty eight point one degrees with the eleven exile at forty six point nine degrees we're within variants here especially since these were tested over a year apart comparatively the baseline dt of forty six point seven degrees is excellent for the 11 XL as it should be because of the bottom intake and is comparable to the half x or our old favorite the r l06 by silverstone the fact that the three fan and four fan configurations perform the same or even very slightly better for the four fans is a credit to Lian Li yes we added a lot of high performance fans to the case for these tests but it's still impressive that they can cool the GPU this well in a case with a glass front panel this proves that the front doesn't have to be matched for those who want to make it glass you can but there should still be room to breathe elsewhere the lack of a PSU shroud and the extra height of the Exile means that GPU air coolers have tons of room to breathe the blades of the GPUs cooler sit about 18 centimeters above the case floor with the mounted on the top CIE slot with no obstructions between blender is next CPU temperature during the blender CPU render was thirty six point eight degrees Celsius on average a more competitive result than the torture number tied with the define s to the bottom the top air flow pattern we picked for our stock configuration means that CB temperature is influenced by GPU exhaust and with the GPU load at zero for this test the CPU delta improves GPU accelerated rendering is next for blender resulting in a twenty two point four degrees Celsius over ambient the average on the GPU giving us a realistic look at performance without any torture tests and this is cooler than almost anything else on the chart except for the cooler master SL 600 M which shares the bottom intake layout speaking of realistic testing if you want to gaming workload firestrike is next the GPU temperature was slightly higher in fire strike extreme stress testing than it was in the torture test as usual averaging forty seven point nine degrees Celsius over a meal that's actually extremely good still thanks to the bottom intake fans and just slightly above the half X on the SL 600 at the half X has a side intake fan that points directly at the GPU and SL 600 M uses to two hundred millimeter fans at the bottom so even though we use some fairly nice knock to a fans for our baseline the eleven X L is putting itself in good company there is no point in doing a test with no front panel on the eleven X L because the front panel has no fans mounted behind it this likewise made our standardized fan test tricky since we usually do two 140 millimeter front to intake fans and one one twenty rear exhaust the side mounts are the closest we could get to front intake but we couldn't do that either because the mounts only fit 120 fans we therefore decided to stick the 140 intake fans on the bottom of the case and treat that as our baseline stock test as well as our standardized fan test there's no perfect science doing case reviews as we've often said and this is one of the examples why so reexamining the fifty three point nine degrees Celsius CPU DT average from our original torture test though we'll have an excel when using the standardized fan placement against others lands alongside the ROG Strix Helios towards the warm end of this fairly small charge but it also doesn't come with fans and could be reconfigured in a better way for this counter example we've replaced the CPU stock bar with the three fan side intake configuration of similar cost it outperforms the h5 10 elite and definitely the BitFenix and so but cases with a more direct path to the cpu for air flow like the Versa j24 outperform it with the standardized fan configuration it's important to remember that this configuration doesn't favour the CPU and that we were forced to test this way because the fans that we used for this test won't fit in the side mount where we'd prefer to put them that's why we strongly disagreed with doing standardized fantasti evarin cases originally but it was so highly requested by viewers and commonly requested that we added it to the extent that people thought not doing it was somehow not really showing the full picture but as clearly illustrated here the fan placement matters so much in a case that there's no perfect way to standardize it we also spent 20 minutes explaining why this particular chart can be flawed and needs to be used very carefully all done in the previous video and if you haven't watched that you need to before you try to take anything away from this chart the three side intake configuration ends up at fifty point two which would move it up to the top of the chart this configuration does favor the GPU and 46.7 DT is the best TB result we've recorded so far for the standardized fantast given that the GPU temperatures were nearly as good with the side mounts filled we're comfortable saying the 11 XL is a good enclosure for air-cooled GPUs the 11 stock is completely silent aside from interior fans because it doesn't have any fans in it putting the three noctua fans in and setting them to 100% for baseline and standardized fantastic put the noise level 40 7.5 DBA which would be one of the loudest cases aside from the or next to the original 11 dynamic with three side intake fans the define house to vision RGB with stock fans would also be nearby the 11 XL was not a case built with noise suppression in mind beyond sealing off the front panel noise normalizing the 11 XL is also a little questionable given that the case doesn't come with any fans performance is entirely down to the fans that we picked ourselves normalizing our three Noctua fans to 36 DB a required cutting their speed to 50% resulting in a toasty 60 point eight degrees Celsius CPU DT average that's still better than the age 510 elite and the BitFenix and so but it's not good again because we had to mount the 140 fans at the bottom of the case on the other hand the GPU temperature averaged just forty seven point two degrees Celsius over ambience practically unchanged from the tests that were run with the case fans at 100% speed to 140 millimeter fans pointed directly into the GPU cooler is overkill enough that's slowing them down to be 36 DBA here still allows them to be effective and this has good implications for the side intake configuration as well which is also good at GPU cooling it ends up the best and GPU thermals for this reason so what we really learned from all this is that you should be balancing your fan placement between the bottom and the side for this case the 11 exhale lives up to the reputation of the original 11 dynamic and is just different enough to justify existing alongside it ease of installation has increased with the size of the case as there's simply more room to put things and the hot-swap hard drive bays are vastly easier to work with than the usual amounts the tool is snaps found throughout the case are a less well implemented quality of life improvement but the idea behind them is good and we hope that Leonie can work out a better solution in the future but forget the latch on the top panel engineer more durable snaps for the fan tray though $200 is a high price we wouldn't recommend choosing the Exile over the base model dynamic just because it's new if your components will fit in the dynamic and you don't have any major issues with it for your build just use the dynamic for those who can make use of the extra space the extra fan and radiator mounting compatibility the excellent GPU cooling a multi PSU support or hard drive swap ability the extra money buys a case that improves upon those things that existed already and adds to them in some ways you get an extra bay for example so it's a proven design that's been improved buyers should factor in the cost of at least 3 120 fans as well to take full advantage of the case so from a quality standpoint the case is good it's good quality the airflow options are good you're responsible for actually leveraging those properly but the options are given to you in a way that you can make it cool while with air or I mean if liquid cooling is done with air also so that's all good it is $200 that feels like kind of a lot to pay for a couple steel panels in a glass panel on the front of the side but it's good quality it's just that at $200 there are a lot of options on the market right now so it's not as easy of a cell as Lian Li is earlier made 11 dynamic which is probably closer to about 130 we've seen it lower than that it just depends on when you're buying it but that's a really good deal on it's hard to beat that one so leonie's kind of livin in its own shadow with the 11x out it's a good case it's just you are paying a lot and you do have to factor in the cost of the fans we're okay with that because if Li I mean Leonie had included garbage fans which a lot of case manufacturers do just to hit the 200 mark but provide fans it's just you'd probably end up taking them out anyway so it's wasteful so it's a tough balance that they have to strike of do we include fans or not not is probably the best choice for something that's mostly going to be used for in the very least CLC is if not open-loop coin and I think at this point you're just down between choosing between something like this or the evolve X or the there's a couple Corsair cases in this price category there's NZXT cases like the H 700 series that are a bit cheaper than this category look like that one up there so a lot of options out $200 but you don't have to feel bad about this one and the cooling potential is good it is your responsibility though they get the coin executed properly so that's the big thing here and it's got their bearers name on it which presumably has value he did good work though when we asked for the 11 dynamic the original we asked Roman what was your involvement on this case how much did you really do because it's it's Liam Leah's manufacturing it Lee Emily has obviously got their name at the very front of it it's not their Bauer 11 it's Liam Leo 11 so how much did you do and if I recall correctly he said something like at least 80 or 90 percent of the work so you are genuinely getting something that Roman more-or-less designed and given Romans Engineering and function focused approach to everything he does say german-engineered perfection after all you get the features you would expect from someone who has function focused and engineering focus rather than design and looks focused and that's something that we like we our bias in reviewing cases is always towards function and always towards performance that's just how it is so that's why in our reviews a glass and metal cube gets a good review when it performs well because there are a lot of glass and metal boxes out there mostly rectangles and those don't perform so well so this one's done a good job with that but it is expensive so that's it for this review thank you for watching subscribe for more you get a store doc here is excess net to support us directly like by buying our toolkits for example or you get a page on our coms lash gamers and access we have some behind-the-scenes videos going up soon I'll see you all next timethe lien leo levin dynamic was a case we liked enough to keep around for housing one of our work pcs the layout is non-standard from the side intake vents to the placement of the power supply in the storage but it works and it works well it may also be the only case we've ever tested with a completely sealed off glass front panel that's still managed to perform actually well in testing though we'll have an air variant impressed us somewhat less but improved substantially when the dust filtration was removed now in 2019 lammle is introducing the 11 XL a larger version of the original case still bearing the their bauer badge for his initial work on the 11 series before that this video is brought to you by Nord VPN Nord VPN is what we use internally as our Virtual Private Network solution we use Nord VPN for international travel to bypass firewalls and at home for data privacy especially from Snoopy and Internet service providers Nord VPN help secure and protect your network privacy and is currently offering 75% off of a three-year plan with one month free claim the offer at Nord VPN comm slash gamers Nexus and use code gamers Nexus at checkout or click the link in the description below the Leon the 11 dynamic is actually one of the cases we gave an award to maybe a year ago came out a little over a year ago and it was a well designed case it performed well thermally but it's also targeted towards liquid cooling that said because the hole spacing and the mounting positions for fan locations was so well placed with a dynamic it worked just as well with an air-cooled system so what you end up with is a bit of an aquarium PC except unlike a lot of the other aquarium pcs out there you can still get good performance without needing to rely on liquid cooling to brute-force it so there's a radiator mount on the bottom and there's bottom intake it is positioned substantially off the ground so it's over an inch off the ground which we always like to see because yes it is about an inch and a quarter off the ground but we like to see because at that point you've got enough access to clean air cool air down there that they can pull it in shoot it straight into the video card so really good GPU cooling that way almost always universally the side intake over there is also really good remove these SSD mounts if you'd like and we don't particularly recommend using these either way so remove those and you end up with a bunch of positioning for 120 millimeter fans at which point you get intake that is in some ways imperfect because obviously it's not a direct path to the CPU it comes in hits the glass or gets pulled in by the pressure generated by the CPU cooler fan that comes out the back there's a new 120 mount in the rear as well that helps out with this so you can guide the air a bit more with 120 rear exhaust fan but ultimately the 11 series case is aside from the air we're designed for liquid cooling in terms of how they look but that doesn't mean you can't do air cooling in fact they're quite good for air cooling the 11 air had some weaknesses primarily with the dust filter to the extent that the oil of an air was worse than the olivine dynamic for air cooling up until you remove the dust filter in the front and then it actually became really good it was one of the best that we've ever tested once you remove that filter but that was our main criticism that we'll have an excel is bigger it's got some changes versus the 11 dynamic some good and some not great executions of things and we'll talk about all that but a big point here to talk about is our standardized test bench is really meant for air air cooling parts we use so for standardized case testing you need to use the same parts every single time the downside is that we don't get a full representation of what this type of case is meant for in that we're not doing an open-loop build in it so what you're getting here is a representation that gives you still good comparative data as to see relative to other cases on the market we have more than 230 roll rows of test data now relative to other cases on the market you can see how this performs thermally even looks with an air setup that will translate to cooling performance relative to the others with liquid so that's what you get here and separately this case doesn't come with any fans which exposes a few challenges in testing and that we typically base everything off of a stock set of fans if it doesn't come with them we have to supply of stock set of fans and then you run into the challenge of over cooling it because we're supplying it and so you can't we ended up just setting a budget for how much we were willing to spend on the fans that we used for the stock configuration and ran that so the 11 dynamic made a good case and we're gonna look at that we'll have an excel will go through Patrick's build notes through the thermal data and talk conclusions because the Elevens case design makes use of width as well as length even the Excel version doesn't seem large it's only 18 and a half inches long 47 centimeters which is shorter than the cases we use for our editing stations about 21 and a half inches or 55 centimeters for the PMO one and 23 inches or 58 centimeters for the dark based Pro 900 for example fractal and Lian Li are some of the first companies to really take advantage of not including space for five and a quarter inch drives anymore by cutting down the case lengths dramatically in spite of this it is a large case it's about eleven and a quarter inches or 29 centimeters wide which includes space for the power supply and hard drives to be stored behind the motherboard compartment while leaving plenty of room for cables since the power supply isn't under the motherboard there's also a massive amount of clearance on every side of the board for cable routing and radiators the novelty of power supply shrouds is beginning to wear off for us that did a while ago actually but cases like the O 11 and the dark Bass Pro 900 v one have so much more room to work with and with modular power supplies that these days have good-looking cables they really don't need to be hidden anymore it's only becoming more common that these power supply shrouds are getting removed the side panels in the front panel all lift upwards and are held in place by the top panel which must be taken off first it's held in place by a plastic latch as well this is new and it's also got two redundant captive thumb screws this is an odd choice altogether Liam Lee has said that the customers can remove the thumb screws if they want to but since the thumb screws are captive users are almost universally going to leave them in the case this defeats the purpose of having an elaborate and presumably expensive quick release latch and screw combination this combination of screws and two lists snaps is repeated on the bottom of the case and the fan tray and in the cable management bar although the screws in both of these locations aren't captive and are also more necessary to keep the parts locked down we like the idea of two lists snaps instead of screw where they can be used but if we had to pick one for the excel we'd say leave the tried-and-true screws and get rid of the snaps one of the best things with this case like the previous ones is that Lindley is able to avoid screws in the side panels by securing everything down via the top panel in this instance we like having the screws in the top panel because it sure some strength and that plastic latch just doesn't really add any rigidity or extra durability this is a good design that other case manufacturers could learn from in terms of eliminating screws from the side panels it's secure while reducing mounts and Hardware improving overall ease of use and it cleans up the sides the original 11 was limited to 120 millimeter fans everywhere except for the top which could fit to 140 s and the back technically which could fit in 80 the XL adds support for a further two optional 140 millimeter fans on the bottom tray the cutouts are still clearly sized for 120 but this improves the ability to install the bottom fans over the original case which had some clearance issues especially with larger motherboards the side mounts and new rear mount only support 120 millimeters this isn't bad but it means that buyers should be careful about the dimensions of any radiators that they plan to install we also learned later that the side vents screw hole spacing doesn't accommodate all radiators like the phoenix line from ek because the rails aren't continuous they're spaced non-standard screw hole placement on radiators will require creativity to fit in this case but almost all radiators do have standard hole spacing at least for open-loop cooling and so they should fit the side vent can fit 3 120 fans with some room to spare and blanking plates are included for this gap for any unused fan mounts turning them into SSD mounting points instead these plates are held in with two less plastics and apps that said we like leaving it open because it does actually breathe very well through that side vent the plastic snaps on the blanking plates and the bottom fan tray are replaceable and several extras are included in the parts kit that's good because you'll need them one of the snaps broke in half when we removed to the bottom fan tray the second time I'd be careful with these two and particular the parts themselves aren't that fragile but once they're screwed into the chassis it's easy to lever the tabs back too far and break them permanently although technically this is something the user would do we want to emphasize that it's very easy for the user to do so there's a reason that we only included the extras it's because they expected this to happen the RG certified graphic on the glass panel is a poor investment Tom Lee Emily's part the target demographic for a serious-looking case like the 11 XL that's being marketed based on their Bauer's overclocking reputation and general German Asst probably isn't the same demographic that cares deeply about something called Republic of gamers that and we already have no reason to think that our ogk certification is a compliment anyway as you can see in several of our previous reviews the hard drive sleds are a solid metal with big to grab handles tolerances are tight because they're hot swappable with plugs in the back that passed through to the motherboard and the power supply so the sleds have to index precisely to connect after years of putting together our case test system and then having to take it apart again because I say the power cable slipped off this is one premium case gimmick that we can get behind we like this one there are two hard drive cages and three slots the empty slot is used for the power supply or optionally a hard drive cage or two can be removed to provide room for multiple power supplies we have had a hard time imagining a system that would fit the O 11 XL but also benefit from more than one power supply but the feature is still useful in that the location of the PSU and hard drive cages can be shuffled around one thing we haven't mentioned so far is that like the original 11 dynamic the 11 XL doesn't come with any fans we think that's the right choice for these cases if Linley wants to appeal to serious overclockers with their bauer connection and focus on water cooling any fans cheap enough to pack into a cases overall price are probably going to get replaced from a review standpoint this makes our job a little harder we typically test with the fans that come with it and then we also have a standardized fantast that we run additionally now that we've established that standardized fan test we can run it and treat it as the baseline which is what we did but that also means that we're forced to do the to 140 millimeter bottom fans as intake because they won't fit in the sides and then the 120 fan in the rear for exhaust we figured this would be the best config for just three fans of those sizes there are no front panel mounts and the 140 fans won't mount anywhere else except the top of the case we also ran tests with for 120 Bora fans that Lee and Lee sent us with the original 11 first with three side intake and then with the fourth added as a rear exhaust these fans are rated for 1900 rpm and provide a lot more cooling than we typically run in a KS test but it's also the configuration that we would personally use so we wanted to try it but again the biggest thing here is that because it doesn't come with fans it's hard to do our standard testing where we mostly look at the fans that the case comes with so you'll be buying fans back to that into the price and then we'll let you know through these charts how many you should buy and where you should probably place them as always we're starting the thermal testing with only this case series and then we'll look at comparative numbers this chart shows the various 11 cases like the air and the dynamic average CPU temperature for the 11 XL was fifty three point eight degrees Celsius over ambient for our stock test which is where we did the 140 millimeter intake fans at the bottom and 120 at the rear the test with the three 120 fans all side intake resulted in a better temperature of 50 point 2 degrees over ambient since the side fans move the air more directly through the top of the case and the CPU cooler then the bottom case fans can't this is especially true with the large GPU blocking them right in the middle the fourth fan in the rear exhaust mount lowered temperature further down to forty eight point seven degrees celsius delta T over ambient by directly pulling hot air away from the CPU cooler though we'll have an air without any filter using these stock fans that came with it performs best on this chart adding three extra fans to the O 11 air but keeping the filter was still worse than stock without the filter and the original 11 dynamic was tested with Bora fans only resulted in a forty nine point two degree value as compared to the ex Alice fifty point two degree value the results are satisfying Lee close between these two and show minimal change if any at all compared to the rest of the chart fifty two point eight degrees over ambient is approximately in the middle on the same level as the NZXT H 700 I the three fantast is more comparable to our old eleven results since they utilize the same type of fans and fifty point to see those over a means is just one degree higher than our original result that's either down to margin of error or using the same 120 Miller fans to push the air through a larger case volume the XL has an advantage over the original 11 and that it has a mount for a rear exhaust fan as well hence the four fans this time rather than 348 point seven degrees Celsius over ambient is a little bit better than the three side intake fan result for the original 11 but the exhaust fan doesn't have the dramatic effect on CPU temperatures that it might in a configuration with your intake fans though 11 XL gets representation through most of the chart we've got a spot at the top and at the middle for these results GPO Torture thermals are next GPU temperature in the torture testing average forty six point seven degrees Celsius delta T over ambient and scored the same width in variance with the three faster side and take fans on the XL instead that's good news for the side and take configuration since our baseline arrangement has to 140 fans at the bottom pushing air straight into the GPU adding the fourth fan is exhaust didn't significantly improve temperatures either which makes sense for the GPU but at least having an exhaust fan biasing airflow towards the top of the case didn't hinder the performance the O 11 dynamic with three side fans ran at forty eight point one degrees with the eleven exile at forty six point nine degrees we're within variants here especially since these were tested over a year apart comparatively the baseline dt of forty six point seven degrees is excellent for the 11 XL as it should be because of the bottom intake and is comparable to the half x or our old favorite the r l06 by silverstone the fact that the three fan and four fan configurations perform the same or even very slightly better for the four fans is a credit to Lian Li yes we added a lot of high performance fans to the case for these tests but it's still impressive that they can cool the GPU this well in a case with a glass front panel this proves that the front doesn't have to be matched for those who want to make it glass you can but there should still be room to breathe elsewhere the lack of a PSU shroud and the extra height of the Exile means that GPU air coolers have tons of room to breathe the blades of the GPUs cooler sit about 18 centimeters above the case floor with the mounted on the top CIE slot with no obstructions between blender is next CPU temperature during the blender CPU render was thirty six point eight degrees Celsius on average a more competitive result than the torture number tied with the define s to the bottom the top air flow pattern we picked for our stock configuration means that CB temperature is influenced by GPU exhaust and with the GPU load at zero for this test the CPU delta improves GPU accelerated rendering is next for blender resulting in a twenty two point four degrees Celsius over ambient the average on the GPU giving us a realistic look at performance without any torture tests and this is cooler than almost anything else on the chart except for the cooler master SL 600 M which shares the bottom intake layout speaking of realistic testing if you want to gaming workload firestrike is next the GPU temperature was slightly higher in fire strike extreme stress testing than it was in the torture test as usual averaging forty seven point nine degrees Celsius over a meal that's actually extremely good still thanks to the bottom intake fans and just slightly above the half X on the SL 600 at the half X has a side intake fan that points directly at the GPU and SL 600 M uses to two hundred millimeter fans at the bottom so even though we use some fairly nice knock to a fans for our baseline the eleven X L is putting itself in good company there is no point in doing a test with no front panel on the eleven X L because the front panel has no fans mounted behind it this likewise made our standardized fan test tricky since we usually do two 140 millimeter front to intake fans and one one twenty rear exhaust the side mounts are the closest we could get to front intake but we couldn't do that either because the mounts only fit 120 fans we therefore decided to stick the 140 intake fans on the bottom of the case and treat that as our baseline stock test as well as our standardized fan test there's no perfect science doing case reviews as we've often said and this is one of the examples why so reexamining the fifty three point nine degrees Celsius CPU DT average from our original torture test though we'll have an excel when using the standardized fan placement against others lands alongside the ROG Strix Helios towards the warm end of this fairly small charge but it also doesn't come with fans and could be reconfigured in a better way for this counter example we've replaced the CPU stock bar with the three fan side intake configuration of similar cost it outperforms the h5 10 elite and definitely the BitFenix and so but cases with a more direct path to the cpu for air flow like the Versa j24 outperform it with the standardized fan configuration it's important to remember that this configuration doesn't favour the CPU and that we were forced to test this way because the fans that we used for this test won't fit in the side mount where we'd prefer to put them that's why we strongly disagreed with doing standardized fantasti evarin cases originally but it was so highly requested by viewers and commonly requested that we added it to the extent that people thought not doing it was somehow not really showing the full picture but as clearly illustrated here the fan placement matters so much in a case that there's no perfect way to standardize it we also spent 20 minutes explaining why this particular chart can be flawed and needs to be used very carefully all done in the previous video and if you haven't watched that you need to before you try to take anything away from this chart the three side intake configuration ends up at fifty point two which would move it up to the top of the chart this configuration does favor the GPU and 46.7 DT is the best TB result we've recorded so far for the standardized fantast given that the GPU temperatures were nearly as good with the side mounts filled we're comfortable saying the 11 XL is a good enclosure for air-cooled GPUs the 11 stock is completely silent aside from interior fans because it doesn't have any fans in it putting the three noctua fans in and setting them to 100% for baseline and standardized fantastic put the noise level 40 7.5 DBA which would be one of the loudest cases aside from the or next to the original 11 dynamic with three side intake fans the define house to vision RGB with stock fans would also be nearby the 11 XL was not a case built with noise suppression in mind beyond sealing off the front panel noise normalizing the 11 XL is also a little questionable given that the case doesn't come with any fans performance is entirely down to the fans that we picked ourselves normalizing our three Noctua fans to 36 DB a required cutting their speed to 50% resulting in a toasty 60 point eight degrees Celsius CPU DT average that's still better than the age 510 elite and the BitFenix and so but it's not good again because we had to mount the 140 fans at the bottom of the case on the other hand the GPU temperature averaged just forty seven point two degrees Celsius over ambience practically unchanged from the tests that were run with the case fans at 100% speed to 140 millimeter fans pointed directly into the GPU cooler is overkill enough that's slowing them down to be 36 DBA here still allows them to be effective and this has good implications for the side intake configuration as well which is also good at GPU cooling it ends up the best and GPU thermals for this reason so what we really learned from all this is that you should be balancing your fan placement between the bottom and the side for this case the 11 exhale lives up to the reputation of the original 11 dynamic and is just different enough to justify existing alongside it ease of installation has increased with the size of the case as there's simply more room to put things and the hot-swap hard drive bays are vastly easier to work with than the usual amounts the tool is snaps found throughout the case are a less well implemented quality of life improvement but the idea behind them is good and we hope that Leonie can work out a better solution in the future but forget the latch on the top panel engineer more durable snaps for the fan tray though $200 is a high price we wouldn't recommend choosing the Exile over the base model dynamic just because it's new if your components will fit in the dynamic and you don't have any major issues with it for your build just use the dynamic for those who can make use of the extra space the extra fan and radiator mounting compatibility the excellent GPU cooling a multi PSU support or hard drive swap ability the extra money buys a case that improves upon those things that existed already and adds to them in some ways you get an extra bay for example so it's a proven design that's been improved buyers should factor in the cost of at least 3 120 fans as well to take full advantage of the case so from a quality standpoint the case is good it's good quality the airflow options are good you're responsible for actually leveraging those properly but the options are given to you in a way that you can make it cool while with air or I mean if liquid cooling is done with air also so that's all good it is $200 that feels like kind of a lot to pay for a couple steel panels in a glass panel on the front of the side but it's good quality it's just that at $200 there are a lot of options on the market right now so it's not as easy of a cell as Lian Li is earlier made 11 dynamic which is probably closer to about 130 we've seen it lower than that it just depends on when you're buying it but that's a really good deal on it's hard to beat that one so leonie's kind of livin in its own shadow with the 11x out it's a good case it's just you are paying a lot and you do have to factor in the cost of the fans we're okay with that because if Li I mean Leonie had included garbage fans which a lot of case manufacturers do just to hit the 200 mark but provide fans it's just you'd probably end up taking them out anyway so it's wasteful so it's a tough balance that they have to strike of do we include fans or not not is probably the best choice for something that's mostly going to be used for in the very least CLC is if not open-loop coin and I think at this point you're just down between choosing between something like this or the evolve X or the there's a couple Corsair cases in this price category there's NZXT cases like the H 700 series that are a bit cheaper than this category look like that one up there so a lot of options out $200 but you don't have to feel bad about this one and the cooling potential is good it is your responsibility though they get the coin executed properly so that's the big thing here and it's got their bearers name on it which presumably has value he did good work though when we asked for the 11 dynamic the original we asked Roman what was your involvement on this case how much did you really do because it's it's Liam Leah's manufacturing it Lee Emily has obviously got their name at the very front of it it's not their Bauer 11 it's Liam Leo 11 so how much did you do and if I recall correctly he said something like at least 80 or 90 percent of the work so you are genuinely getting something that Roman more-or-less designed and given Romans Engineering and function focused approach to everything he does say german-engineered perfection after all you get the features you would expect from someone who has function focused and engineering focus rather than design and looks focused and that's something that we like we our bias in reviewing cases is always towards function and always towards performance that's just how it is so that's why in our reviews a glass and metal cube gets a good review when it performs well because there are a lot of glass and metal boxes out there mostly rectangles and those don't perform so well so this one's done a good job with that but it is expensive so that's it for this review thank you for watching subscribe for more you get a store doc here is excess net to support us directly like by buying our toolkits for example or you get a page on our coms lash gamers and access we have some behind-the-scenes videos going up soon I'll see you all next time\n"