I was a big fan of the NZXT H1 mini-ITX case when it first came out. But then, mine never caught fire. That's because I've been using it as the base for my company's work machine ever since. If I had burned down the PC Gamer office with a faulty PCIe riser cable, my boss would not have been pleased.

Owners who got this chassis were given replacement risers before NZXT stopped selling them while they worked out the problem.

Yes, there were some issues with the first case, which is a shame as NZXT has produced some of our favorite PC cases and still produces some of the best Mini-ITX cases out there. Aside from that particular riser issue, the H1 was a great package to incorporate the little pissant. The same goes for this recently updated version.

At first glance, one could be forgiven for thinking that this H1 V2 is a new release of the same case that looks the same, only with a more non-hardened PCIe riser cable for the GPU. However, NZXT has actually done a lot to improve the overall design, albeit resulting in a more expensive, slightly larger and heavier Mini-ITX case.

The H1 V2 sells for an additional $50 (£40) on top of the original $350 (£300) price tag, and the real beauty of the H1 is that it includes both a powerful PSU and liquid CPU cooler, so the really tricky part of Mini-ITX construction is The H1 is a great solution.

Anyone who has ever built a small form factor PC will understand the pain of running a million unnecessarily long PSU cables around motherboards, graphics cards, and everything else. Furthermore, trying to mount a cooler with sufficient performance in the limited space of a Mini-ITX case ...... itself can be a daunting task.

With NZXT's H1, however, the cooling system and cables are pre-installed, both routed in the best way for the case. And there's a real joy in integration that you won't find in other Mini-ITX cases: even the Hyte Revolt 3, which nearly mimics the H1, takes more work to rig up. With the cooler lifted away, the workspace is so much larger that dropping the heart of the system into the chassis is a breeze.

The back of the motherboard tray has a large cutout, which is very convenient given that many Mini-ITX motherboards use underslung M.2 ports to support SSDs. This makes upgrades and general maintenance much easier. This is often a problem with other ickle cases.

One thing to note, however, is that the clearance between the radiator fan and the top of the memory is not large. It is an additional 1mm higher than the original, but with a maximum memory height of only 46mm, some DIMMs are simply too large; the Corsair Dominator DDR5 stick and mini-ITX B660 used in the Alder Lake test rig were too high too high to close the case.

NZXT provides clear labeling inside and outside the case to assist in the build process. There were problems actually getting into the tool-less design of the first H1, but labeling is included on the outside explaining how to access it. There are also tags and stickers inside showing what is where and how to move things to access the motherboard tray, for example.

It also helps with cooling as well as installing longer graphics cards.

And speaking of cooling, there is a new CAM-compatible fan controller that controls both the 140mm fan in the all-in-one liquid cooler for the CPU and the new 92mm fan at the rear of the case.

Another major change is the switch from a 600W 80-plus power supply to a 750W gold power supply to meet the increased power demands of the CPU and GPU. It also received a slight facelift, reducing the steel ring on the glass front and making it almost bezel-less. A USB 3.2 Gen 1 Type-A port has also been added at the top.

Overall, NZXT has made many welcome improvements to an already very good Mini-ITX case design. However, 750W SFX power supplies are not cheap, and AIO coolers do not fit into relatively small ones.

All of this makes the H1 V2 not just a great small form factor case, but a truly great platform for building your dream Mini-ITX case. As long as that dream does not include an overly tall memory stick.