I've recently begun to really like small form factor builds. Not so tiny, that the majority of component options are eliminated; just small enough to make it a little more of a challenge to get quality stuff in there while still looking tidy 
I had already put together my wife's latest build in a Corsair 240 and liked it a lot, but wanted to try something new. I also love Fractal cases, so I decided on the Node 804. I originally was going to go with an air cooler as I find (and have seen in many reviews) that high-end air options are significantly more quiet than their closed-loop liquid cooler counterparts. I decided against an air cooler for a couple reasons:
1) I couldn't find one I liked the looks of which would give me the cooling capacity I wanted while also fitting in my case. The Phanteks PH-TC14PE, Noctua NH-D15, Thermalright True Spirit Power, and Cryorig R1 Ultimate were all on my short list. I kinda wanted a "dark"-looking tower if I was going to put one in, so that narrowed it down to the Phanteks or Cryorig. The heights of those two are listed at 171 and 168, respectively, and the Node 804 has a listed max supported CPU cooler height of 160mm. These factors, more or less, eliminated all of my top picks for an air cooler.
2) I also wanted this build to look "clean" and putting a massive, tower-style cooler inside the chassis of a small case, kinda makes things look crowded. My compromise would have been a "dark" cooler cooler, which I thought might not look so gigantic, but those were too tall*.
3) I do want a quiet system, but that includes the GPU. I knew I'd be overclocking my 970, so I also figured the less hot air in the case, the cooler my card would stay and the slower the fans would have to spin. An air cooler in the "main" chamber of a cube case will dump decidedly more heat in there than a CLLC radiator housed in the "rear" chamber.
* As I mentioned, the listed max supported height for a CPU cooler in the Node 804 case was 160mm. I happened to have a Noctua NH-D15 when my Node 804 arrived, so just for fun, I put it in the case. To my surprise, the cooler, spec'd at a height of 165mm (with fans), actually fit with a mm or so to spare. Again, however, it just took up too much room for my tastes.
Picture of NH-D15 in the Node 804 (I wouldn't believe me either)
So all that led me to the many AIO options. One of the reasons I went for the Node 804 was its support for 280mm radiators, so I limited my options to just those. I found a great deal on a very lightly used H110, and it looked to be up there with the other options in performance, so that made my decision relatively easy.
TL;DR Last night I got the H110 installed successfully. It was, on the whole, a fairly easy task. All tubes and cables reached where they needed to. Plenty of room in the rear chamber of the Node 804 to fit the 140mm fans and 280mm radiator. The only hiccup came when I was ready to mount the fans/radiator to the top of the case.
The screw holes available on the Node 804 on the top of the case for 140mm are laid out like this (not to scale and this "diagram" looks terrible if you're reading this on a phone):
o---------------------------140mm---------------------------o-----20mm-----o---------------------------140mm---------------------------o
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o---------------------------140mm---------------------------o-----20mm-----o---------------------------140mm---------------------------o
They designed it with the assumption of 20mm of space between the screws of each fan.
The screw holes in the H110 don't quite line up:
o---------------------------140mm---------------------------o---15mm---o---------------------------140mm---------------------------o
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o---------------------------140mm---------------------------o---15mm---o---------------------------140mm---------------------------o
Corsair assumes that the screw holes in the case will be 15mm apart.
All four holes for one of the fans line up perfectly and, honestly, if you only used 4 screws, it would probably be secure enough. I decided it didn't seem like too big of a deal to just drill 4 more holes, though. Measured a few times first and didn't have any issues.
Ideally, I would have liked to see "elongated" screw holes in the top of the Node 804. That would give you the ability to slide your fans toward the rear or front into the desired position and also would avoid "incompatibility" issues like this one.
The only other issue I'd like to note is the tube length. As you'll see in the pictures below, the tubes are definitely long enough on the H110 to reach from the rear chamber of the Node 804 (or, likely, any dual-chamber case), but it is a bit tighter than I'd prefer. It's just one of the tubes which is "stretched" and even it has some wiggle room. It's not as tight against the RAM modules as it appears and i could easily remove the RAM without taking off the waterblock/pump.
Performance is great. I haven't tested it too thoroughly, but even with a very lazy TIM application, temps on my 4690K (stock) during a small-FFT P95 run were below 60c (max 59). It idled (browser use) between ambient and 27c. From a quick Google search, this seems on par with others' results. It is also very quiet. Not as quiet as high-end air coolers, but not nearly as loud as I had guessed. From reviews, I was thinking it'd be almost twice as loud as high end air. I would say it's maybe 50% more loud and quite far from being obnoxious. It also stays quiet during system startup. The H80i in my wife's PC ramps up to full blast during boot (I can't find a way to disable that - will have to keep playing) and I was worried the H110 would do the same. I was happy when it only ramped about about 25% higher than it "settled" at.
I'm very happy with the end result
I had already put together my wife's latest build in a Corsair 240 and liked it a lot, but wanted to try something new. I also love Fractal cases, so I decided on the Node 804. I originally was going to go with an air cooler as I find (and have seen in many reviews) that high-end air options are significantly more quiet than their closed-loop liquid cooler counterparts. I decided against an air cooler for a couple reasons:
1) I couldn't find one I liked the looks of which would give me the cooling capacity I wanted while also fitting in my case. The Phanteks PH-TC14PE, Noctua NH-D15, Thermalright True Spirit Power, and Cryorig R1 Ultimate were all on my short list. I kinda wanted a "dark"-looking tower if I was going to put one in, so that narrowed it down to the Phanteks or Cryorig. The heights of those two are listed at 171 and 168, respectively, and the Node 804 has a listed max supported CPU cooler height of 160mm. These factors, more or less, eliminated all of my top picks for an air cooler.
2) I also wanted this build to look "clean" and putting a massive, tower-style cooler inside the chassis of a small case, kinda makes things look crowded. My compromise would have been a "dark" cooler cooler, which I thought might not look so gigantic, but those were too tall*.
3) I do want a quiet system, but that includes the GPU. I knew I'd be overclocking my 970, so I also figured the less hot air in the case, the cooler my card would stay and the slower the fans would have to spin. An air cooler in the "main" chamber of a cube case will dump decidedly more heat in there than a CLLC radiator housed in the "rear" chamber.
* As I mentioned, the listed max supported height for a CPU cooler in the Node 804 case was 160mm. I happened to have a Noctua NH-D15 when my Node 804 arrived, so just for fun, I put it in the case. To my surprise, the cooler, spec'd at a height of 165mm (with fans), actually fit with a mm or so to spare. Again, however, it just took up too much room for my tastes.
Picture of NH-D15 in the Node 804 (I wouldn't believe me either
)
So all that led me to the many AIO options. One of the reasons I went for the Node 804 was its support for 280mm radiators, so I limited my options to just those. I found a great deal on a very lightly used H110, and it looked to be up there with the other options in performance, so that made my decision relatively easy.
TL;DR Last night I got the H110 installed successfully. It was, on the whole, a fairly easy task. All tubes and cables reached where they needed to. Plenty of room in the rear chamber of the Node 804 to fit the 140mm fans and 280mm radiator. The only hiccup came when I was ready to mount the fans/radiator to the top of the case.
The screw holes available on the Node 804 on the top of the case for 140mm are laid out like this (not to scale and this "diagram" looks terrible if you're reading this on a phone
):o---------------------------140mm---------------------------o-----20mm-----o---------------------------140mm---------------------------o
|
|
|
|
|
|
o---------------------------140mm---------------------------o-----20mm-----o---------------------------140mm---------------------------o
They designed it with the assumption of 20mm of space between the screws of each fan.
The screw holes in the H110 don't quite line up:
o---------------------------140mm---------------------------o---15mm---o---------------------------140mm---------------------------o
|
|
|
|
|
|
o---------------------------140mm---------------------------o---15mm---o---------------------------140mm---------------------------o
Corsair assumes that the screw holes in the case will be 15mm apart.
All four holes for one of the fans line up perfectly and, honestly, if you only used 4 screws, it would probably be secure enough. I decided it didn't seem like too big of a deal to just drill 4 more holes, though. Measured a few times first
and didn't have any issues. Ideally, I would have liked to see "elongated" screw holes in the top of the Node 804. That would give you the ability to slide your fans toward the rear or front into the desired position and also would avoid "incompatibility" issues like this one.
The only other issue I'd like to note is the tube length. As you'll see in the pictures below, the tubes are definitely long enough on the H110 to reach from the rear chamber of the Node 804 (or, likely, any dual-chamber case), but it is a bit tighter than I'd prefer. It's just one of the tubes which is "stretched" and even it has some wiggle room. It's not as tight against the RAM modules as it appears and i could easily remove the RAM without taking off the waterblock/pump.
Performance is great. I haven't tested it too thoroughly, but even with a very lazy TIM application, temps on my 4690K (stock) during a small-FFT P95 run were below 60c (max 59). It idled (browser use) between ambient and 27c. From a quick Google search, this seems on par with others' results. It is also very quiet. Not as quiet as high-end air coolers, but not nearly as loud as I had guessed. From reviews, I was thinking it'd be almost twice as loud as high end air. I would say it's maybe 50% more loud and quite far from being obnoxious. It also stays quiet during system startup. The H80i in my wife's PC ramps up to full blast during boot (I can't find a way to disable that - will have to keep playing) and I was worried the H110 would do the same. I was happy when it only ramped about about 25% higher than it "settled" at.
I'm very happy with the end result
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