Arctic (company)

"ARCTIC" redirects here. For other uses, see Arctic (disambiguation).
Arctic Switzerland AG
Private, AG
Industry
Founded 2001 (2001)
Headquarters Hong Kong
Area served
 Worldwide
Key people
 Magnus Huber (Managing director)
Products
Website www.arctic.ac

Arctic Switzerland AG, formerly known as Arctic Cooling,[1] is a Chinese manufacturer of computer cooling components, mainly CPU and graphics card coolers,[2] case fans and thermal compound. Since 2010, Arctic expanded its business by starting a range of products to cater other consumer demands beyond that of computer cooling hardware. Nowadays, Arctic also offers various consumer products[3]—spanning audio,[4] home entertainment,[5] computer peripherals and RC toys.[6] In 2012, Arctic was nominated as one of the finalists in the annual PCR Awards.[7]

Founded in 2001, Arctic has offices in Hong Kong, the United States cooperates with different production facilities in China. Arctic products are distributed worldwide through distributors,[8] dealers and retailers. The United States, United Kingdom and Germany are Arctic’s major markets. The company has also collaborated with leading graphics card brands such as HIS,[9] Inno3D,[10] PowerColor[11] VTX3D[12] and Sapphire[13] in the development of OEM cooling equipment.

History

In 2001 Arctic Cooling was founded in Switzerland by Magnus Huber and Gebhard Scherrer.[14] As the company name suggested, in the past, the business focused entirely on computer cooling solutions. Today, in order to expand the business into other areas especially in consumer electronics, by 2010, it began to develop a diverse range of products that spans beyond cooling into computer peripherals, audio products and home entertainment PCs. For this reason, Arctic Cooling was changed to Arctic in 2010.[15] Since 17.11.2015 Arctic Switzerland AG is in liquidation.[16]

Logo

Products

Computer Cooling

Being the company's original focus,[17] Arctic designs and manufactures cooling products[18] for computer hardware.[17][19][20][21][22][23][24][25][26][27][28][29][30][31][32][33][34]

and broad compatibility. The company owned a number of patents for its fan and cooler designs[35] as well as for special technologies used in the air coolers including PWM sharing,[36] low noise impeller,[37] cross blow and anti-vibration technologies.[37]

Accelero

Accelero is a trademark[38] of ARCTIC (formerly Arctic Cooling) for its line of graphics card coolers.[39] The Accelero line of coolers are targeted to high-end graphics cards based on GPUs from Nvidia and AMD.[40] The Accelero series utilizes different types of cooling technologies namely air cooling, passive cooling as well as air and liquid combined cooling[41] to offer different options for different customers. In 2006, Accelero X1 and Accelero X2 are the first VGA coolers introduced in the series by the manufacturer.[42][43] The Accelero series has collaborated in a number of OEM projects with motherboard and video card manufacturers to develop customized graphics card cooling solutions.[44][45][46][47] ARCTIC is the first video card cooler manufacturer to use a copper base for their heatsinks.[48]
In May 2012, ARCTIC released the Accelero Hybrid, which is claimed to be the world’s first graphics card cooler with integrated air and liquid solution in the market.[49]

Features

Graphics card coolers are generally served as an upgrade or replacement for the stock cooler in order to reduce noise, temperature and enhance the overclocking capability of the GPU.[50] ARCTIC’s heatsinks are claimed to provide quiet, high performance cooling,[51] which also makes the Accelero series one of the most popular graphics card coolers in the market.[52]

Thermal Compound

Among the company's array of thermal compound, the MX-4 received the Top Product Award from the German magazine PC Games Hardware.[53][54]

PC Case

Fusion Power Supplies and Storage Devices

Fusion is a branding name for which Arctic uses to name many of its PSU's and storage devices.

Audio Series

Arctic started to develop its audio products such as speakers, headphones and headsets since 2010 and it has expanded to wireless audio system near the end of 2011.[58]

Living series

In June 2011, Arctic entered the HTPC market with its first mini HTPC, MC001 Entertainment Center Series, which was first introduced in Computex 2011.[59] In 2012, Arctic introduced more advanced models with MC101 Series, AMD Trinity-powered HTPCs which are aimed for multimedia users. The MC101 Series features AMD Trinity A8/A10 APU, AMD Radeon HD 3D graphics, up to 1TB hard disk storage, SSD, up to 8GB DDR3 memory and built-in TV tuner.[60]

On top of the entertainment centers, Arctic offers as well an audio gateway that works as a Windows Media Center Extender : Audio Relay.[61] It is not DLNA certified but is compatible with the protocol.

Computer peripherals

Arctic offers a selection of computer peripherals including keyboards, mice, USB fans, etc. In the end of 2011, the brand started to offer Apple accessories.

Power series

The Power series offers various USB travel adapters, car chargers and batteries.[62]

Patents and Trademarks

The company has claimed several trademarks and patents for the name and technology applied to their products. Some of the air coolers and case fans produced by the company feature a patent design of the fan holder to achieve vibration absorption and elimination of the buzzing sound when the fan is running. The Freezer 7 Pro features 4 rubber connectors which serve as a vibration damper to absorb the vibration of the running fan and prevent the vibration from transferring to the heatsink and the case.[63] The Arctic F Pro PWM employs the same technology to absorb vibration and prevent it from transmitting across other components within the case.[64]

Arctic claims to be the patent holder of the PWM Sharing Technology, namely PST, which shares a single PWM signal with all the other PWM controlled devices connected to the motherboard to control all fan speeds and enhance the noise level according to the load.[65]

The Freezer 13 PRO CO employs the patented Cross-Blow technology by the use of an extra fan installed at the bottom of the heatsink to give a boost of cooling performance to the surrounding components, including Northbridge and voltage regulators.[66]

The company utilizes its patented passive cooling technology (DE 20200600) in the Accelero S1 PLUS to enhance the level of natural convection from the GPU by letting more air to pass through the aluminum fins so that heat will be dissipated more efficiently.[67]

Some of the key products including Freezer, Accelero, Alpine, Fusion and Silentium series are registered trademarks in the EU and the US.[68]

Dispute

Arctic was reportedly planning to file a lawsuit against Advanced Micro Devices ("AMD") for the infringement of its trademark "Fusion", the name that AMD used to describe its series of APUs which integrate x86 processing cores with Radeon stream processors on the same piece of silicon.[69] In light of the lawsuit, AMD has announced earlier in 2012 its plans to drop its Fusion branding in favor of the Heterogeneous Systems Architecture (FSA).[70] On 23 January 2013, Arctic announced that the company and AMD have arrived at a mutual agreement in settling the "Fusion" trademark dispute without any disclosure of the terms.[71]

Branding

In 2011, Arctic has started to engage its end consumers through the means of social media (e.g. Facebook[72] ) to reinforce the brand’s awareness. The company was also a platinum partner with PCR Retail Boot Camp[73] – a new conference and expo for the UK PC and IT channel.

Arctic's booth in computex, Taiwan, 2008

Collaborations

A model of Arctic Cooling 80mm computer fan

Arctic also produces cooling solutions for several graphic card manufactures; in most cases improving cooling beyond the OEM cooler. These include but are not limited to:

Partnership with OpenELEC

Due to the strategic mistake of bundleing the MC001 with Microsoft Windows 7 and the high price the MC001 was very badly sold. To increase sales, on 5 February 2013, Arctic announced their new partnership with OpenELEC. Arctic worked with OpenELEC together and combined a fully passive cooled Entertainment system - the MC001 media centre (US and EU version) equipped with the latest XBMC 12 (OpenELEC 3.0) platform. Arctic and OpenELEC and are planning on their next release, aim to provide a more dedicated builds for the Arctic MC001 systems.[74][75][76][77][78][79][80] Shortly after partnershipping with OpenELEC, the development of passively cooled media centers was abandoned.

References

  1. ↑ "Arctic Cooling Becomes Arctic", "Hardware Secrets", 3 June 2010. Retrieved 10 May 2012
  2. ↑ "The 25 most wanted VGA cooler at Case King: Arctic Cooling Accelero Xtreme Plus is number 1" (German), "PC Games Harware". Retrieved 17 May 2012
  3. ↑ "Arctic Headsets and Headphones Review", "Hardocp", 9 May 2011. Retrieved 10 May 2012
  4. ↑ "Arctic to develop wireless audio product line", "Audio Pro International", 22 February 2012. Retrieved 10 May 2012.
  5. ↑ "Arctic unveils the MC101 Series Trinity-Powered HTPCs", "Tech Power Up", 1 February 2012. Retrieved 10 May 2012
  6. ↑ "Arctic Hobby Remote Control – discover your inner kid", "Kitguru", 12 January 2011. Retrieved 10 May 2012
  7. ↑ "PCR Awards 2012: The finalists"
  8. ↑ "Arctic goes exclusive with EntaTech", "Channel EMEA", 13 January 2011. Retrieved 10 May 2012
  9. ↑
  10. ↑ "Inno3D GeForce GTX 680: Next Generation Technology is Here", "Inno3d", Mar 2012. Retrieved 10 May 2012
  11. ↑ "PowerColor Announces Partnership with Arctic Cooling for Mainstream Graphics Cards", "PowerColor", 20 April 2009. Retrieved 10 May 2012
  12. ↑ "VTX3D Announces Partnership with Arctic COOLING for HD4870 Series", VTX3D, 18 August 2009. Retrieved 10 May 2012
  13. ↑ "Exclusive Arctic COOLING Solution for Sapphire" "sapphiretech.com", 1 September 2009. Retrieved 10 May 2012
  14. ↑ , www.arctic.ac. Retrieved 10 May 2012
  15. ↑ "Interview with Arctic", 19 December 2011. Retrieved 10 May 2012
  16. ↑ "Liquidation of Actic Switzerland AG". Retrieved 28 December 2015.
  17. 1 2 "Hardware Secrets Interviews Arctic" 14 August 2012, Hardware Secrets. Retrieved 4 September 2012
  18. ↑ , devhardware.com, retrieved 21 May 2012
  19. ↑ “Active Ram Coolers Roundup”, "Real World Labs", 30 May 2010. Retrieved 10 May 2012
  20. ↑ “Arctic Freezer i30 CPU Cooler Review”, eteknix.com, 6 February 2012. Retrieved 22 May 2012
  21. ↑ „Test and review Arctic Freezer A30 (Russian)“, dvtests.com. Retrieved 23 May 2012
  22. ↑ “Arctic Freezer 13 Pro CPU Cooler”, rbmods, 24 April 2011. Retrieved 24 May 2012
  23. ↑ Cooling Freezer 13 Pro CO and Arctic Cooling Freezer 13 Pro (Russian)”, F1CD, 14 March 2012. Retrieved 23 May 2012
  24. ↑ , (Lithuanian) technews.it, 2 November 2010. Retrieved 23 May 2012
  25. ↑ “Freezer 13 CO CPU cooler”, Australian-overclocking, 23 May 2012. Retrieved 23 May 2012.
  26. ↑ “Arctic Cooling Freezer Xtreme Rev.2 (Croatian)“, pctrikovi.com. Retrieved 23 May 2012
  27. ↑ (Czech)„, pctuning, 23 March 2012. Retrieved 23 May 2012
  28. ↑ “Arctic Freezer 7 PRO Rev.2: gadget survey“, gadgety.co.il, 13 May 2011. Retrieved 23 May 2012
  29. ↑ “Arctic Cooling Alpine 64 Pro CPU Cooler Review”, Hardwaresecrets, 4 January 2010. Retrieved 23 May 2012
  30. ↑ Arctic Alpine 11 PLUS CPU Cooler“, funkykit.com, 29 January 2012. Retrieved 23 May 2012
  31. ↑ , hardwarebistro.com. Retrieved 23 May 2012
  32. ↑ Accelero Xtreme 7970 Review“, joinpgn.com. Retrieved 23 May 2012
  33. ↑ “Arctic Accelero L2 PLUS and Accelero Twin Turbo II Review (German)”, freeocen.de. Retrieved 23 May 2012
  34. ↑ “Arctic COOLING MX-4 Thermal Compound Review”, madshrimps.be, 24 August 2012. Retrieved 22 May 2012
  35. ↑ Retrieved 21 May 2012
  36. ↑ "Arctic F PWM", Arctic.ac. Retrieved 10 May 2012
  37. 1 2 "The German Patent and Trade Mark Office (DPMA): bibliographic data (German)". Retrieved 10 May 2012
  38. ↑ “Trademark Assignment Abstract of Title”, United States Patent and Trademark Office. Retrieved 25/05/2012
  39. ↑ “AC Product Launch: Accelero Xtreme GTX Pro”, bonafidereviews.com. Retrieved 25/05/2012
  40. ↑ "Arctic Cooling Accelero X1 VGA Cooler", 23/06/2006. Retrieved 25/05/2012
  41. ↑ , ARCTIC official website. Retrieved 29/05/2012
  42. ↑ "Arctic Cooling Accelero GPU Coolers (X1/X2)", pureoverclock.com. Retrieved 25/05/2012
  43. ↑ “Arctic Cooling Accelero X2”, hardwareheaven.com. Retrieved 25/05/2012
  44. ↑ “Arctic Cooling Accelero GTX Pro Review”, rage2d.com, 31/01/2011. Retrieved 25/05/2012
  45. ↑ “ATI 6950 und Accelero Xtreme Plus”, Arctic official website. Retrieved 25/05/2012
  46. ↑ “Accelero L7 – Exclusive ARCTIC COOLING Solution for Sapphire”, tweak.dk. Retrieved 25/05/2012
  47. ↑ “Inno3D iChiLL 9800 GTX Accelero Xtreme – Review” , diTii.com, 29/05/2008. Retrieved 25/05/2012
  48. ↑ “Arctic Cooling ATI Silencer 4”, techPowerUp!, 04/02/2005. Retrieved 28/05/2012
  49. ↑ “Arctic Cooling Accelero Hybrid, The World’s First Integrated Air and Liquid Cooler”, hardwarelook, 03/05/2012. Retrieved 25/05/2012
  50. ↑ "VGA Coolers", svc.com. Retrieved 25/05/2012
  51. ↑ ARCTIC Accelero Xtreme Plus GPU Heatsink Review”, Overclockers.com, 17/11/2011. Retrieved 25/05/2012.
  52. ↑ “Arctic Cooling Releases Two New GPU Coolers”, gnd-tech.com, 4/10/2012. Retrieved 28/05/2012
  53. ↑ “An All-Round Thermal Compound Arctic MX-4”, Retrieved 14 May 2012
  54. ↑ “Arctic Cooling MX-4 Thermal Compound”, Dekada Digital. Retrieved 14 May 2012
  55. ↑ “Arctic Cooling MX-2 High Performance Thermal Compound Review”, overclockersclub.com, 11 December 2007. Retrieved 22 May 2012
  56. ↑ "Arctic Cooling Silentium T11 Case and HC01-TC HDD Cooler Review", Kitguru, 17 November 2010. Retrieved 7 August 2012
  57. ↑ Retrieved 7 August 2012
  58. ↑ "Arctic to develop wireless audio product line", Audio Pro International, 22 February 2012. Retrieved 14 May 2012
  59. ↑ "arctic Cooling Shows Off Fanless Media PC", Tom’s hardware. 1 June 2012. Retrieved 14 May 2012
  60. ↑ "Arctic MC101 series AMD Trinity-powered HTPCs launched", PCLaunches.com. 7 February 2012. Retrieved 14 May 2012
  61. ↑ Review of the Audio Relay, Missingremote.com
  62. ↑ "Arctic Cooling expands from PC to battery business", 8 May 2001. Retrieved 14 May 2012
  63. ↑ " Freezer 7 Pro" www.arctic.ac. Retrieved 4 September 2012
  64. ↑ "Arctic F Pro PWM" www.arctic.ac. Retrieved 4 September 2012
  65. ↑ "Arctic F PWM" www.arctic.ac. Retrieved 4 September 2012
  66. ↑ "Freezer 13 PRO CO", www.arctic.ac. Retrieved 13 September 2012
  67. ↑ "Accelero S1 PLUS", www.arctic.ac. Retrieved 13 September 2012
  68. ↑ "Detailed trade mark information" The Trade Marks and Designs Registration Off of The European Union. Retrieved 4 September 2012.
  69. ↑ "Arctic Cooling Reportedly Plans to Sue AMD for "Fusion" Trademark" , Xbit Laboratories, 23 January 2012. Retrieved 25 January 2013
  70. ↑ "AMD targeted by Arctic over Fusion brand" bit-tech.net, 23 January 2013. Retrieved 25 January 2013
  71. ↑ "Arctic and Boost Up Announce Negotiated Solution with AMD Regarding "FUSION" Trademark in European Union" Arctic official website, 23 January 2013. Retrieved 25 January 2013
  72. ↑ "official Facebook page"
  73. ↑ "PCR Retail Boot Camp Partner Spotlight: Arctic Cooling", PCR-online. 1 February 2012. Retrieved 14 May 2012
  74. ↑ "Arctic announces passive cooled Systems with OpenELEC installed". http://openelec.tv. 5 February 2013. Retrieved 8 February 2013. External link in |publisher= (help)
  75. ↑ "Arctic MC001 Fanless low cost HTPC". http://forum.xbmc.org/index.php. 6 February 2013. Retrieved 8 February 2013. External link in |publisher= (help)
  76. ↑ "Arctic Introduces OpenELEC-based MC001-XBMC HTPC". www.anandtech.com. 5 February 2013. Retrieved 8 February 2013.
  77. ↑ "Arctic MC001-XBMC Media Center Now Available w/ XMBC 12". http://legitreviews.com. 6 February 2013. Retrieved 8 February 2013. External link in |publisher= (help)
  78. ↑ "Arctic MC001-XBMC-(EU)". www.arctic.ac. Retrieved 8 February 2013.
  79. ↑ "Arctic MC001-XBMC-(US)". www.arctic.ac. Retrieved 8 February 2013.
  80. ↑ "Arctic Bundles OpenELEC with Lower Priced MC001-XBMC". www.missingremote.com. 6 February 2013. Retrieved 8 February 2013.

External links

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