Verdict: Barely any better than the reference AMD HSF

The X-Mars has one of the most traditional designs of any HSF in this Labs test, and unsurprisingly, it didn't perform all that well.

The X-Mars comprises a thin copper base, a finger-slicing collection of copper fins and two medium-size heatpipes. Heat is dissipated from the fins by a temperature-controlled, variable-speed 70mm fan that spins at between 2,000rpm and 5,400rpm. It isn't all that noisy, but when coolers such as the Scythe Ninja can cool an overclocked and overvolted Athlon 64 without a fan, any fan noise seems excessive.

Mounting the X-Mars is extremely easy, as its two metal arms simply clip down onto either side of the standard CPU mounting bracket on Athlon 64 motherboards.

The X-Mars cooled the test CPU to 4ûC below the reference AMD HSF, a pretty terrible result for an HSF costing £23. The Arctic Cooling Freezer 64 Pro cooled the CPU to 18ûC below, and the Gigabyte G-Power Cooler Pro to 24ûC below, and both of these HSFs are similarly priced to the X-Mars.

As a result of its poor performance and uninspiring design, the X-Mars doesn't stand out from the crowd. With so many well-designed HSFs in the market now, you'd bea fool to buy the X-Mars.

• Cases - 21st November 2008
• Motherboards - 24th October 2008
• Gaming Headsets - 26th September 2008
• Dream PCs - 24th September 2008
• Headphones - 12th September 2008
• Media PC components - 22nd August 2008
• PSUs - 14th July 2008

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