3.5h - Cooling: Professor Messer

Cooling

Fans/active cooling

• Cool air is pulled through a personal computer, passed over hot components, and removed from the system.

  • Regularly check your PC for good airflow.

  • Motherboard layout is important here - where the cool air comes from and where the cool air goes depends on this.

• On-board fans: Fans designed to cool an entire adapter/expansion card.

  • Can be bulky and take adapter card space.

  • Typically seen on high-end graphics cards.

• Fans can vary in size, speed, and noise levels

Heat sink

• Copper/aluminium alloy component that transfers heat away from internal components (e.g., a CPU) and allows it to dissipate into a liquid medium (e.g., air).

• Example of passive cooling

• Gets extremely HOT - don’t touch!

Thermal paste

• Referred to as thermal grease or conductive grease

• Placed between the heat sink and the working component to improve thermal conductivity (moves heat away from the component).

Thermal pads

• Placed between a heat sink and a working component.

• Non-reusable, unlike thermal paste - has to be replaced every time a heat sink is replaced.

• Passive cooling

Liquid cooling

• Active cooling type that uses a liquid coolant (e.g., water) to circulate through a computer and provide cooling.

  • It is not a new concept; it works in cars and mainframe computers.

• Typically used on high-end systems (e.g., gaming or graphics work) or on overclocked systems.