Vantec

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VANTEC Thermal Technologies
Type Private
Founded 1994
Headquarters Flag of the United States 43951 Boscell Road, Fremont, California, 94538
Industry Computer hardware
Electronics
Products Disk enclosure, Laptop cooler, Computer cooling, Computer power supply and more
Website www.VantecUSA.com

Vantec Thermal Technologies is a privately-held multinational corporation with headquarters and an R&D team in the US, sales/purchasing office in Taiwan and factories in Taiwan, Korea and China. Vantec designs and manufactures thermal products and computer peripherals. Consumers can buy Vantec products from brick-and-mortar electronics stores or online retailers. The company does not sell to end-users directly.

Contents

[edit] History

Jeffrey Huang and Sheena Chang started Vantec in 1994 in Fremont, CA.[1] The company started as a manufacturer of CPU cooling fans for system integrators and end-users. In the late 90's, Vantec's CPU cooling fans became widely popular because of their greater heat dissipation efficiency. The brand gained recognition notably in the AMD processor overclocking communities.

The company launched TMD Tip-Magnetic Driving CPU cooling fans in 2002. TMD fans are known for their durability and low-noise operation. The high demands of quiet home entertainment computers made this product line a big hit for Vantec. Many CPU cooler manufacturers followed the trend after seeing Vantec's success and the price drop of TMD technology. In the same year, Vantec also introduced the NXP-101 multi-function panel. This product is the first on the market with front USB and Firewire ports which answered the needs of many computer power users. It became a standard feature of many current computer cases.

In 2002, the company introduced its first computer power supply (PSU), which was first on the consumer market with three cooling fans and a black brushed aluminum casing.[2] This design became popular for high-end power supplies as the heat and power consumption from high-performance video cards increased. Vantec has carried external hard drive enclosures since 2004. The company made an effort to change the image of the external hard drive enclosure from a cheap device to a neat gadget by improving the quality as well as the look and feel. The NexStar 3 series were the first on the market to adopt mirror-finished double-coated aluminum casings with a variety of colors (black, blue, red and silver). There were several companies that copied the concept, but the quality was not on par with the NexStars.

Being active in supporting local communities and identified as a successful business leader, founder Sheena Chang was invited by Fremont Mayor, Bob Wasserman, as a commissioner of the Economic Development Commission in the City of Fremont.[3] Jeffrey Huang and Sheena Chang are also chairs and members of several computer associations

The company moved to a new 30k+ square-feet facility in 2004 within the Pacific Commons Shopping Center where it is adjacent to a Costco and the future Cisco Field ballpark of the Oakland Athletics.

[edit] Markets

Vantec products are distributed worldwide. The US headquarters manages the North American markets. The Taiwan branch manages European, South American and Asian countries including Australia and New Zealand.

[edit] Products

[edit] Storage products

  • External hard disk enclosures: NEXSTAR, NEXSTAR 2, NEXSTAR 3, NEXSTAR GX, NEXSTAR DX, NEXSTAR LX, NEXSTAR SX, NEXSTAR MX, NEXSTAR CX, NEXSTAR Hard Drive Dock, IDE to USB Adapter, SATA/IDE to USB 2.0 Adapter and IDE to SATA converter.
  • Removable hard drive racks: EZ Swap, EZ Swap2 and EZ Swap EX.
  • Media player: AVOX AVX-100TX.
  • SATA controllers: SATA PCI host cards, eSATA cardbus and serial ATA PCI-E host cards.

[edit] Peripherals

[edit] Cooling products

  • Case fans: Stealth, Tornado, Thermoflow and Spectrum series.
  • System cooling: Vortex hard drive cooling systems, chipset coolers, fan cards, video card and memory coolers.
  • CPU coolers.

[edit] Notebook accessories

  • Notebook coolers and water coolers.
  • Notebook docking stations, keypads, and security locks.

[edit] PC Mods

  • Quiet solutions: case fan and power supply vibration dampener kits.
  • UV fans, cold cathode lights, UV LED fans, UV slot protectors.
  • UV reactive cable sleeving kits.

[edit] References

  1. ^ VantecUSA.com About Us. Retrieved on 2008-06-01.
  2. ^ Vantec Stealth 470w PSU Review. Retrieved on 2008-06-08.
  3. ^ Economic Development Commission in the City of Fremont. Retrieved on 2008-06-08.

[edit] External links