Final Words & Conclusion

The Verdict

There's a high grade of appeal to the new Lian Li PC-O11 Dynamic, it's an innovative aesthetically pleasing design, however, it certainly is not perfect as I stumbled into many little flaws. The good news is that the chassis sells at roughly 130 USD/EUR. Lian-Li was able to keep the costs down by simply removing the fans (there are no fans included), and secondly, the Lian-Li is synonym towards Aluminum chassis which Lian-Li pretty much did not use. The Lian Li PC-O11 Dynamic, is all steel and tempered glass. Merely one small element is aluminum, the tiny piece bezel front facing plate (where the IO connectors are), that's a small piece of brushed aluminum. To keep Lian-Li competitive in the chassis market, that, however, was the only logical step for them to make.  We understand this fully and actually applaud them for making that bold move. 

Aesthetics

With the PC-O11 Dynamic, Lian-Li offers a dynamic looking chassis (pardon the pun), HOWEVER, that's only when you are looking at it from the tempered glass sides. The top and right side panels have massive amounts of meshes, and that my friends does not look pretty at all. It's good for airflow though. But yeah, you need to be aware of that if you have a right side angled view at the chassis.

Secondly, the HUGE shiny metal plate at the size of a 2.5" SSD at the inside with Lian-Li/der8auer printed on it, is so obnoxiously in your face all-the-time that you'll quickly start to get annoyed by it. It's baffling to see, and likely is going to cost Lian-Li sales, it's as simple as that. Chassis like these need subtlety with branding and logos, period. Any, if not all chassis manufacturers get that in the year 2018. Looking at the chassis from that other side of the scope, it's a nice looking chassis with the dual-compartment design, showing your components, and in the end highlighting radiators etc. I do have to applaud Lian-Li for the innovation and creativity that went into this chassis as it does have some unique design elements. What finishes the chassis properly is that tempered glass and the open feel combined with an all black/dark design -- that does the trick and is the trend in 2018. Every little LED on your motherboard suddenly becomes interesting and fascinating (if you are into the LED trend).

Features

There is a proper sheer amount of details and features that Lian Li put into this mid-tower chassis. We like the fact the PSU is hidden, albeit space is limited. You can house enough HDDs/SSDs, the HDD bay, however, will not get any proper ventilation. Please be aware of that. The grommet holes for managing your cable routing are nice, and overall there is spacious enough cable management options on the backside. You can opt to display the SSDs on the front side or tuck your SSDs away in the rear. Aside from the HDD bay, the cooling capacity of this case is okay in its design but is obviously that is regulated and managed by whatever you install for fans and radiators. For the liquid cooling fanatics, you can fit multiple radiators sizes in the chassis including an up-to 360 mm radiator, without the need for any nasty modifications. Installation should be easy enough as well, however you will likely run into some clearance issues cable routing wise.

Final Words

There is always a compromise to be made with Lian-Li designed chassis, for the Lian Li PC-O11 Dynamic the aesthetics are pretty much spot on as to what people desire and want in the year 2018. This chassis, however, caters a very specific, and perhaps limited, audience though, the ones that have a true foot-fetish for liquid cooling and anything RGB. The tempered glass side and the front panel is where the magic happens as the chassis is all about the front and left side 'open' feel and views onto your PC components and cooling.

Where Lian-Line goofed up is the shiny and reflective metal plate in the back at the size of a 2.5" SSD at the inside screaming with Lian-Li/der8auer printed on it, is unbearable in your face all the time you look at the chassis. I have nothing against them both, of course, but you will get annoyed by it as it takes away the focus of your expensive components and build. As a manufacturer you should always treasure and apply subtlety with branding and logos, I'll leave it at that and hope to see that removed with future designs.

On page six of this review, I've shown you a concern, one that you can see in the photo above, this is build quality related. While the chassis overall is a sturdy build, the glass and top metal panels are all secured with steel pieces that are bolted on. During transport, we learned, they can quite easily break off. Herein is a quality issue to be found and Lian-Li might actually see quite a bit of RMAs based on this problem. Perhaps we've just been unlucky, but things we notice, we mention, period. However, it's time to end this article, for pure looks and innovative design I will grant the chassis our "recommended" award, as this chassis should not be rated on pricing and small quirks, as simply put, it isn't a perfect chassis. I find the aesthetics lovely, but only looking at it from the tempered glass sides. The vents/meshes anywhere and everywhere can get bothersome to see. As far as pricing goes, the chassis sells at 130 bucks. So when you think 130 bucks and Lian-Li, that immediately will make you think, "hey that's cheap". As their aluminum chassis easily go for 250 bucks right? In the end, though, this is a metal chassis with two glass panels. it does not come with a fan or LED controller and even lacks fans. So with that in mind, the chassis needs to be really good to be able to be worth that money. It's a call that only the end-user and buyer can and will have a decisive answer on. For brevities sake, Lian-Li did include one small piece of brushed aluminum at the front plating. Does that make this worth 130 bucks? If I am being totally honest, that answer is no. I feel this is a 99 USD/EUR product, and judging from some pre-sales, that's where the chassis is going to and needs to position itself to be able to compete with the other names in the chassis arena as in this metal/tempered glass segment, as there is a lot to choose from. Advancing on that, we can see where and how the money is spent, and understand the lack of aluminum, and personally, I feel it's a really good move for Lian-Li to make.  Remember though, this chassis does not come with any fans or technology in the form of FAN HUBs, controllers or even a single RGB LED (well that might actually be a good thing). That said, this chassis will serve a very specific end-user, it's not for everybody, but the ones that do appreciate the looks and plan 100% liquid cooling will admire this chassis. It certainly stands out from any regular design, but we look at it as a design that can become a solid basis for future chassis.

• Sign up to receive a notice when we publish a new article
• Or go back to Guru3D's front page.