quilciri :
Pfft. I dunno Why Michael kept pushing to buy the desk mini. If the raspberry pi/beagle board/etc have taught us anything, it's that people are dying to make cases for tiny PC's out of the most unusual/adorable thing they can find.
e.g. Barbie dollhouse PC
http://hackaday.com/2014/07/15/raspberry-pi-turns-a-novelty-radio-into-a-real-computer/
Some users might do that, but they are certainly the minority. Most users will stick to cases they can purchase, and right now there aren't any on the market. Until there are, it wouldn't be the best option for most people to buy just the motherboard until there are some third-party cases available.
@bit_user: It will probably be a while before we see ARM board that will work with a mini-STX case. Intel has been trying to push this new form factor for about a year now and there are still very few products on the market. We probably won't see a wider market presence until 2017, and ARM/AMD boards likely won't show up until the end of that year.