Swiftech Apogee GT



Swiftech needs no introduction to anyone familiar with OEM heatsink and/or water cooling design for Home PC. Founded in 1994 by Gabriel Rouchon, they are currently considered a leader in the industry where thermodynamics are concerned. Swiftech is one a few companies left where you can purchase a well designed, constructed Peltier waterblock, such as their MCW6500-T. Today we have the honor of including two of their blocks in this round-up. Our first contender is the Universal Apogee GT. From the parts spec below including universal mounting plates and various diameter connectors this block gives you a wide variety of options.



Apogee GT Specifications / Features:

The housing is injection molded out of Black Acetal. This process is key to allow mass production of the water-block, and thus economies of scale.

The universal hold-down plate features mounting holes for all current Desktop and midrange server processors (Xeon™, Opteron™). Optional hardware is available for high-end server processors (Itanium™).

Nylon Fittings: 1/4" NPSM to 3/8" and/or 1/2" barbs

Fitting O-ring: (2) EPDM O-ring AS568A Dash Number 112

Base plate dimensions: 2" x 2" (50.5 x 50.5 mm)

Assembly weight: : 6.7 oz (190 g)

Internal structure: the CNC machined C110 copper base plate is at the heart of Apogee™ GT cooling efficiency. Designed using Computational Fluid Dynamics, the Patent Pending Diamond Pin Matrix was further optimized in the "GT" version resulting in increased surface area and coolant velocity. The thickness remains at 3mm to promote a high compliance factor with its mating surface (i.e. the CPU heat spreader) thanks to the base plate flexing ability. This particular feature allows additional "tweaks" to the Apogee™ generation of water-blocks and may yield substantial performance gains as described in the tweaking guide HERE.

Apogee GT Universal kit supports the following:

Socket 478 (Intel® Pentium® 4),

Socket 775 (Pentium® 4, Core Duo, Core 2 Duo ),

Socket 603/604 (Intel® Xeon™ - 400 and 533 FSB) - see note 1

Socket 771 (Intel® Xeon™) - Optional AP-NC604 hardware pack is required.

Socket 462 (AMD® Athlon®, Duron®, MP, XP) - see notes 2 and 3 below

Socket 754, 939, 940 (AMD® 64 bit processors)

Socket AM2 (AMD® 64 bit processors)

Socket F (AMD®)

The Apogee GT offers more flexibility then any other block tested today based on Socket compatibility list above and the inclusion of 1/4" (6mm), 3/8" (10mm) and 1/2" (12mm) nylon barbs. Below we see Apogee GT from a side view in its mounting hardware.



At the heart of its design is a 3mm thick base plate featuring the diamond pin Matrix pattern. Swiftech used computational fluid dynamics when determining the shape and flow direction of the micro-pins.



Below we get a closer look at the shape of the pins, which have to be aligned with the water-flow in order to maximize performance. Their unique shape (as with all the pins in this round-up) contributes to heat transfer, however; Swiftech's Diamond Matrix design is designed to accentuate flow as well.



While the Apogee GT is packaged as universal water block, it shares the same Matrix Pin design as its high performance sibling Apogee GTX. Seen below GT's base plate surface was very high quality.



In our next section we'll examine these differences. Swiftech has given us a great performer in the GT and great value as well.

Apogee GTX....>>