Liquid Cooling for Smartphones/SOCs

[vcoleiro1]

I saw this interesting article today of how Microsoft has been using liquid cooling in some of their smartphones. Not saying Pyra could use it, but I thought I'd post it out of interest.


http://www.techtree.com/content/features/9956/why-microsoft-uses-liquid-cooling-lumia-950.html
http://www.fujitsu.com/global/about/resources/news/press-releases/2015/0312-01.html

 

[lukey]

I don't think this will perform better than a Heat-pipe.

PS: In this article they're mixing up Heat-pipes and Liquid colling: http://www.wpxbox.com/how-hybrid-li...rface-pro-4-possibly-in-lumia-950-xl-as-well/

PPS:

Thats definitely a Heat-pipe so nothing new here. Go along....

 

[levi]

vcoleiro1's image shows something that contains many of the parts of a refrigerator or freezer, the only thing missing from the setup that's currently in your kitchen is a pump. It's not liquid cooling, as liquid cooling uses a pump, and also doesn't rely on phase change. It's also not a heat pipe, as that also doesn't use phase change, and only works to tend to equalise the temperate at its two ends. The article claims they're using a cleverly etched copper panel over the chip that uses the heat to effectively vaporise the liquid, and then only as vapour to pass into the vapour line.

I also wonder what the hell they're using as their refrigerant (for want of a better word). Something that is liquid at room temperature but will vaporise at a few dozen degrees higher.

On the other hand it might just be a disguised heat pipe.

 

[FBnil]

@levi: Freon

 

[Yoyobuae]

vcoleiro1's image shows something that contains many of the parts of a refrigerator or freezer, the only thing missing from the setup that's currently in your kitchen is a pump. It's not liquid cooling, as liquid cooling uses a pump, and also doesn't rely on phase change. It's also not a heat pipe, as that also doesn't use phase change, and only works to tend to equalise the temperate at its two ends. The article claims they're using a cleverly etched copper panel over the chip that uses the heat to effectively vaporise the liquid, and then only as vapour to pass into the vapour line.

Huh? Evaporation/condensation is exactly what makes a heat pipe efficient at conducting heat:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heat_pipe

I also wonder what the hell they're using as their refrigerant (for want of a better word). Something that is liquid at room temperature but will vaporise at a few dozen degrees higher.

What matters is that the system contains the working fluid at both its liquid and vapour forms at the working temperature. Consider a closed container partially filled with water, remove the air, water vapour fills that empty space.

On the other hand it might just be a disguised heat pipe.

I'm sure it's exactly that. Only that they made it into a loop rather than a pipe, probably increases efficiency. Even on a heat pipe there's fluid circulation while it is operating.

 

[levi]

As far as I can tell, Freon is a brand name for a number of coolants, mainly CFCs and HCFCs, most of which have now been banned. But looking at wikipedia's list of refrigerants, there are still a few other molecules with chip-friendly boiling points of 40-60 degrees celcius, and perhaps one of the forumulations of Fluorinert is the answer (perfluorohexane).

Edit: Oops, you're quite right about heat pipes, Yoyobuae. I thought they were just dumb conductors, but it seems I was making an untested assumption.

 

[Nintendo]

Tegra X1 could use this.