Gizmodo: heat sink

The Penny as Heat Sink

John Mahoney — Fri, 16 Jan 2009 12:00:00 EST

In fine DIY style, a Lincoln cent works well to vent some BTUs from tiny components. Imagine opening up your new gear to find these in place of ceramic future fins. [Hacked Gadgets]

The Heat Sink Computer Loves to Sweat

Mark Wilson — Wed, 01 Oct 2008 17:40:00 EDT

This computer uses 100% passive cooling (read: no fans or liquid chilling systems). So how is that possible? Well just look at the thing. It's like one big freakin' heat sink. We don't have much information on the design, but from what we can tell, copper tubing helps dissipate the heat from hot spots like the processor to the outer casing. Don't get us wrong, we'll take a low wattage fan if it keeps our system running properly. But as a feat of design and engineering, this system is pretty...uhh...well we we're gonna say "hot" but that doesn't work in this case. A few more shots:

Standing up, it looks kind of like a Mac Pro but cooler. That last pun was originally unintentional, but we're leaving it all the same. [Hacked Gadgets]

Self-Refrigerating Plastic Sheets Could Make Ultimate Heatsink

John Mahoney — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 13:20:00 EDT

Researchers at Penn State have cooked up a new plastic that can be cooled by simply running a current through it. It uses the electrocaloric effect to rearrange its individual atoms when charged, allowing for heat to more easily come and go. By wrapping up a chip in the stuff and zapping it with current, researchers hope they've found a way to make more efficient heatsinks for laptops and other gear with small, hot enclosures. Right now the process requires too much voltage to be feasible (120v, rather than the couple of volts your laptop battery could give it), but manufacturing improvements could make it ready for prime time, and Intel seems interested.

Says Rajiv Mongia, an Intel engineer:

"The fact that they've been able to develop a polymer-type material that can be used in a relatively thin film is worth a second look [compared with previous ceramic heatsinks that worked the same way]," Mongia says. "Also, it's working in a temperature range that is of interest to us."

[Technology Review]

DIY Case Mod Turns Your PC Into a Gigantic Heatsink

Sean Fallon — Thu, 06 Mar 2008 18:00:15 EST

Once PC case modder has taken his battle with heat to a whole new level using a design that is 100% passively cooled. That is to say, the entire case is one gigantic heatsink. Unfortunately, numerous problems were encountered during the project and in the end, a faulty motherboard and power supply issues made a proper test of the case problematic. So, even though the mod is flawed, there are plenty of ideas that can be gleaned from the process itself that could result in something a little more practical. Hit the link for instructions. [Metku via Hack n Mod via Gearfuse]

Check if Your 360 Will Die in One Easy Step

Mark Wilson — Fri, 03 Aug 2007 09:55:00 EDT

Granted, there is no magical way to tell whether or not you are one of the alleged 30% of Xbox 360 owners who will suffer the red rings of death. But there is an easy way to check if your unit shipped with the new heatsink Microsoft has added to later units—a feature that we're guessing gives you a much higher chance of survival.

Stick your camera up to the power button side of you Xbox and take a picture with flash. If you see a heatsink (a pile of darkness), good. If you see an empty space and a DVD drive (like in this picture), bad...and your days are probably numbered, my friend. [benheck via kotaku]

Microsoft Adding Extra GPU Cooling to Retail Xbox 360 Elites

Jason Chen — Tue, 31 Jul 2007 13:00:42 EDT

Apparently Microsoft has started adding extra GPU cooling to new retail Xbox 360 elites in order to stave off overheating problems (and the three red lights) the units may be having. These added heatsinks were only previously found in refurbished Xbox 360s in Europe, which meant we were pretty much SOL. Ben Heck dismantled a new Xbox 360 and found a new heat pipe and new materials, but still thought that the cooling was a bit weak because there are no fans directly on any of the components. [Ben Heck via Evil Avatar]

Giant CPU Heatsink Big as Some Motherboards

Brian Lam — Sat, 03 Feb 2007 09:22:38 EST

You can watercool a hot rig, or you can go for the biggest fan/heatsink CPU combo I've ever seen. The copper block transfers heat to the aluminum fins via 6 heatpipes. The aluminum radiator is cooled by dual 12 CM fans that have the added effect of chilling out the motherboard and anything else in your case.

Also, this is one of the main components in a hovercar.–Brian Lam

CPU Heatsink [Via Thrasher]

Zalman's Big-Ass Fan

Travis Hudson — Fri, 30 Dec 2005 12:36:22 EST

Zalman has teamed up with some British Aerospace wind tunnel engineers to design this, the Big Boy Turbo Mega Fan 2. It requires an absurd 1400W of power and the included documentation even gives instructions on how to daisy chain power supplies to properly feed this beast. If you squint hard enough you can see a size comparison to a pack of delicious menthol cigarettes.

World's Largest CPU Cooler [OhGizmo!]

AN8: Hotter Than A Crack Pipe

Travis Hudson — Mon, 15 Aug 2005 11:08:00 EDT

ABIT is experimenting with a pipe to diffuse the heat from it s A8N motherboard. The advantage is that this is a much quieter solution than those noisy fans, which always interfere with the sound of frag grenades exploding. The pipe leads to a heat sink located on the rear of the motherboard, where the I/O shield and ports are. One of the possible downsides is that the size of the heat sink leaves less room for expansion ports. ABIT has included three standard PCI slots, one 16x PCI Express and two 1x PCI Express slots. The shorter 1x PCI Express slots are in place to compensate for the size of the chipset. Seems like a pretty solid board and especially nice for those cooling junkies out there.

ABIT AN8 Ultra - Passively Cooled Motherboard [TrustedReviews]