Introduction:

Today we are reviewing Swiftech’s latest and greatest in air cooling, the Polaris 120. The Polaris 120 is Swiftech’s comeback to the mainstream air cooling market. Swiftech had its very successful debut into the air cooling market in 2001, and the company became public in 2005. Swiftech was founded in 1994 by Gabriel Rouchon or “Gabe” as many might know him on the various forums in which he frequents. In the last few years, the company has focused on water cooling products with great success and recorded a record sales year for 2010. Aside from its headquarters in Long Beach, CA, Swiftech also has two master distribution centers located in France and Australia as well as a manufacturing plant in Shenzhen, China. The Polaris design was created in-house by Swiftech’s Lead Thermal Engineer, a Mr. Stephen Mounioloux. The Polaris itself is packed with a pretty decent feature set and looks promising. Some of the primary features are the five 8mm heat pipes, H.D.T. Design and more. Please read on for a thorough analysis of Swiftech’s latest foray into the air cooling market.

Other features of the Polaris 120 cooler are the center section of the fins, which form an enclosure in front of the fan hub where air flow is at its lowest. The edges of the fins are closed, which creates two wind tunnels maximizing airflow around the heat pipes. The shape of the fins and central enclosure create a calculated restriction towards the exit to regulate the air velocity across the entire fin length. The Polaris 120 has a good set of features and Swiftech selected a good candidate to make its re-entry into this market segment. This is the first and we are sure not the last air cooler that will be released by Swiftech. We will take the Polaris apart and inspect it in detail before we analyze and finally put it to the test. Time to take a look at the Polaris in detail.

Manufacturer Description:

The Polaris 120 high performance heat pipe heatsink marks Swiftech re-entry into the mainstream air-cooling arena. The lead concept for this product is value: packing the maximum performance and broadest range of utilizations in an affordable yet qualitative offering.

Features:

- Five 8mm heat pipes – the hottest heat pipes (directly above the CPU) are arranged to receive the maximum amount of air-flow for optimized thermal performance.
- Fins form wind tunnels for optimum air-flow, resulting in more efficient use of the fan, therefore better cooling.
- H.D.T. Direct-touch base technology provides an optimized transfer of the heat to the pipes.
- A single high Power (84CFM) PWM controlled 120mm PWM fan
- Relatively compact footprint
- Mounting system includes retention brackets for all popular processors
- Competitively priced, yet with a broader range of operations compared to other high-end coolers

Supported Sockets:

Next: Unboxing, Packaging and Accessories

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