Best Of Socket A Coolers
The MC370-OA could be considered the little brother of the popular Swiftech MC462-A cooler. The only difference between the two is that instead of the 9mm thick copper base plate of the MC462-A the MC370-OA has a 9mm Aluminium base plate. It’s obvious this won’t perform as well as the MC462-A cooler; nevertheless we shall see whether a $13 difference between the two is justified.
The cooler is quite large, which boasts a 2.5″ x 2.5″ aluminum base plate, with 196 13/16″ high thermal conductivity long needles. A 6850RPM fan sits on top of the cooler and pumps in a total of 33CFM. The fan produces a noise level of around 43 dba, which is in par with the CAK38. This may sound like a load of noise to some of you people, however believe me, it’s really not as bad as they claim it to be. The fan comes with a 4 pin Molex connector, which goes into the main power supply. Swiftech does not include a chrome guard for the fan as in the CAK38, so take caution when handling the cooler while in operation. One of the most eye-catching features of the MC370-OA is its near perfect finish.
The Aluminium base plate is so smooth and the overall craftsmanship is simply exquisite. Not even the CAK38 have a smooth finish as this one has. Due to the 100% aluminium finish the cooler is considerably lighter than the CAK38.
Installation
This was by far one of the most easiest cooler installations I have ever performed. The MC370-OA uses two clips attached to compression springs to attach itself to the CPU socket. Simply loosen the retaining screws until the grooves clip into the socket. This is one cooler, which puts the least amount of pressure to the CPU during installation. You don’t need to care about a Shim either.
Testing
Here too we used the DFI AK75-EC mainboard and the Duron 700 overclocked to 1000MHz. Arctic Silver II was used as our thermal compound. Temperature readings are taken from a CompuNurse thermal probe + mainboard hardware monitor. In order to stress the CPU we used 3D Mark 2001 at 640 x 480. The tests were run for 30 minutes and temperature readings were taken at the end.
Conclusion
Amazing isn’t it. The MC370-OA performs better than the mighty solid cooper based CAK38. This was way too strange so we performed the tests a few more times, and the results never changed. These splendid results have to be attributed to the 9mm aluminium base plate and the aluminium pins. I guess the Swiftech MC370 is second only to the MC462-A right now. If you don’t agree just drop me a line :). The price tag of $49.95 may be a bit too high for some of you folk, if so take a look at the other coolers we have in offer. However it sure beats the price of the MC462-A, which goes for around $62.95
