Air 240 Questions

I have a few questions, hopefully I'm in the right place.

I'm thinking of building my new machine around the Air 240, to fit on a bookshelf next to my desk. The bookshelf is open at the ends, and the plan is for the case window to face out into the room, with the normal "front" panel at the left end of the bookshelf, and the "rear" panel venting at the right hand end.

I think that means using the case as an "inverted tower", as mentioned on the product web page, but what are the implications of that? Can the case be set up to vent on what is usually the base? Are there likely to be any other issues?

Also, what is the actual graphics card height clearance on the case? This thread implies it's more than 43mm, but there's no official number.

http://forum.corsair.com/v3/showthread.php?t=133256

Specifically, I'm thinking of putting an Asus GTX 960 Turbo in there, which is a blower card. Dimensions are 264 x 121 x 37mm. I'd prefer to avoid liquid cooling, and I'm not sure there will be sufficient airflow over the GPU with the small space underneath, hence the blower card. I'm open to be persuaded otherwise, though.

https://www.asus.com/us/Graphics-Cards/TURBOGTX960OC2GD5/specifications/

Thanks very much in advance.

So there are basically two orientations the Air 240 is designed to work in. There's the "standard tower" orientation, where the front vents run vertically on the left side of the face and the window is on the left hand side. Then there's the "rotated" orientation, where the window is on the *top* and the front vents run horizontally.

 

The Air 240 includes feet, but the feet don't come preinstalled, so you can install them in whichever orientation you prefer.

 

Also, while I want to say that 960 would fit, I'm extremely concerned about there being proper clearance for the PCIe power lead on top of the card. You may want to go with a different model.

Hmm, OK, thanks Dustin.

So when the product page says this:

"Flexible installation

The flexibility goes beyond dual Mini-ITX and MicroATX compatibility. The included rubber feet can be placed on any of three surfaces, so you can customize the orientation of the chassis: as a standard tower, an inverted tower, or as a desktop."

http://www.corsair.com/en-us/carbide-series-air-240-high-airflow-micro-atx-and-mini-itx-pc-case

Is the "inverted tower" setup something that is possible, but doesn't work very well?

Actually I wouldn't expect it to be a problem.

Great, thanks.

I'll have a think about the graphics. While the Asus Turbo might still fit using a right-angle connector into the 6-pin, I realized there's still plenty of space for ventilation underneath a single card, so I might just go with the Gigabyte G1 Gaming instead.