A Closer Look - Inside

The interior of the Fractal Design Ridge follows the general layout dictated by the slim design. The GPU is situated beside the motherboard. The interior framing of the Ridge feels solid and quite sturdy, following the same theme of quality as the exterior.


Once the two sides are pulled off, you may also remove the four screws holding the edge pieces of the case in place. On the top, there are three mounting possibilities for 80 mm fans. These won't interfere with any functional elements within the chassis, so you can still plan for some active cooling, even if the two included 140 mm units have to give way to a thick GPU. On the opposite end, there is not much to see, as the PSU and motherboard will fill these areas of the chassis.


The entire thick aluminium slab may easily be pulled off, even with all the exterior covers attached, as it is simply held in place by sufficiently strong magnets. Behind it, you will find two 2.5" drive bays which have to be mounted on the interior of the frame. Maybe Fractal could have engineered this part of the enclosure to allow for mounting on the outside, just to eek out as much room on the interior as possible, but it is quite well utilized as is.


On the bottom half, the motherboard tray is nothing out of the ordinary, but does provide enough room to fit the board and route general wiring, thanks to the gently curved side panels. Towards the front, you will find the PSU bay, which utilizes a removable frame to which to attach the power supply to. Here any SFX or SFX-L unit will fit quite nicely, with some room for cable management as well.


Out of the box, the top half of the Fractal Design Ridge is certainly dominated by the two retail grade Aspect 14 PWM fans that are present. These are set to push additional air unto the GPU fans, which should make for an interesting thermal benchmark run. The mounting bracket may also hold 120 mm fans, or could be used to secure a radiator of up to 280 mm size too, but doing so will mean that you have to forgo a dedicated GPU. Alternatively, the Ridge can hold a short GPU of less than 175 mm and a compact 120 mm AIO side by side.


Unlike most SFF cases these days which employ flexible and rather expensive PCIe ribbons, the Fractal Design Ridge comes with a study PCB to relocate the PCIe x16 slot to the right position. This, in combination with the small extension piece will provide a quality interface for your GPU. However, Fractal lists 57 mm GPU compatibility, which translates to around 2.5 slots, while still keeping the Aspect 14 PWM units installed. You will have to remove the PCB and its mounting bracket so that you may manouvre your ITX motherboard into position.


Besides the two slots in the front, there are also two additional 2.5" mounting positions underneath the PSU. These utilize plastic clips to snap drives unto. While that does get the job done, these feel a little fragile.


All the wiring within the Fractal Design Ridge is nice and short, so there should not be a massive cable mess when everything is wired up. The individual leads are sleeved black and come with the usual connectors.