The LAST R600 Rumours & Speculation Thread

As explained by rwolf, take history into account and we get a resounding 'No' to it being on 65nm.

US

 

What is this, I've never heard of it before. What high-end CPU coolers use this technique?

Jawed

 

It's a phase change cooler with the product name of VapoChill Micro (it won't let me link directly, so choose the link to the Vapochill Micro). Asetek is apparently rumoured to be one of the companies suppyling this type of cooler for ATI OEMs/AIBs, although they use the Vapochill name for several other products too. The only difference between the different versions of this CPU cooler is the noise/airflow of the fans. Obviously the shape and design would be different for a graphics card, but the principles behind the phase change technology would be the same.

 

link does not work.

 

Try again, though you might have to go through from the top level. It's one of those annoying sites that doesn't work properly unless you have javascript and cookies enabled.

 

thanks, works now.

 

OK, so it's an enhanced "heat pipe" design as far as I can tell, where the heatpipe is shaped into a single unit that contacts the die as well as spreading heat to the cooling fins. As opposed to traditional heat pipes whose pipes are attached to the shoe which contacts the die.

Jawed

 

I always consider heat pipes to be more solid conductors of heat designed to spread the heat evenly or quickly out to the fins. Phase change uses hollow structures filled with liquid that is designed to dissipate heat by evaporation inside the unit, which then cools and drops back down to the hot base. The heat transfer happens not just by conduction to the fins, but also by the energy used to evaporate the internal liquid into a gas. It's kind of like how sweat cools down your body, but happening inside the hollow heat pipes.

I don't know how much more effective it is than standard heatsinks, but I read quite a few reviews about this cooler when it came out, and it did rate very highly and get very cool temps depending on the fans used.

 

I'm pretty sure that all the heat pipes you'll find in modern coolers use phase change. I think it's merely the interfacing that sets the Asetek coolers apart - there are less "lossy" interfaces between the die and the liquid in Vapochill, that's all.

Jawed

 

Yep, AFAIK standard heat pipes are hollow and do contain a fluid.

 

I'm only amazed that the best Vapochill system mentioned only offers 200Watts of cooling

 

You could try using this link.

 

I thought of that, but you lose all site navigation if people wanted to look a the rest of their site.

 

?? That doesn't make sense..
Thos heatpipes are solid and make use of the material's propertie to conduct heat easily... and a bigger diameter allows for more heat to be transported..


then again maybe i'm wrong..

 

Fixed

Standard heatpipes are hollow and work by having a fluid inside that vaporizes at the hot end and condenses at the cold end. Making them solid wouldn't do much good, you can move heat much much faster by moving the media that contains the heat, then to wait for the heat to spread through the medium.

 

I though that Phase change cooling involved a condenser, compressor and a evaporator. Not just a hollow copper heat pipe with liquid inside.

http://www.systemcooling.com/vapochill_ls-01.html

 

"Phase change" just means that the fluid changes phase It doesn't describe the equipment used in the process.

 

You're wrong D sorry). Heatpipes are in fact hollow, and contain a liquid which is used to ferry heat quickly from the source through evaporation/condensation going on inside *afair. Most heatpipes though use wicks nowadays to hold the liquid so that gravity does not effect optimal positioning. I don't know what kind of liquid they use, but I believe it is some sort of alcohol. It basically just has a really low boiling point, evaporates readily at low temps (eg. ~30 C). I'm getting a lot of this stuff from my head, so it may be slightly off. The difference between this and the Vapochill Micro basically comes down to the kind of transfer liquid they use. The Vapochill uses r134a which is a refrigerant. I don't know of the benefits of this in a room temp environment over the heatpipe's transfer material. I know that in traditional Vapochills the use of higher great rXXX refrigerant gives it the ability to reach lower temperatures without freezing. Some stock units can reach ~-30C or more.

The differences between the two systems are not that simple and I'm not describing them totally correctly, but thats the basic premise.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heat_pipe

 

Basic principle should be the same and the pipes will be lateral instead.