The reason why your PC makes noise is because of its cooling system, which requires the use of fans in order to maintain a good room temperature. Although. What would happen if we told you that there is a technology that will allow more efficient heat sinks and, therefore, a lower need for fans? This is a recent discovery from the University of Berkeley. The conformal copper coating.
There are three challenges that every hardware design has to overcome with flying colors. The first of these is performance and therefore being able to do more things in less time. Second, we have energy consumption with respect to performance. And to finish we would talk about the temperature with respect to consumption. So the three elements are related to each other. However, temperature control depends on elements outside the design of the processor, such as cooling systems. Well, given that the consumption of PCs is skyrocketing and with it the internal temperature of many computers, the development of new solutions is required.
Why Conformal Copper Plating Can Change Things
Nowadays all the components usually have a heat sink to expel the heat out of them. In the event that these reach too much temperature, then a series of fans are placed on top that provide fresh air or even liquid cooling in extreme cases. However, this solution, although it is the most common, we cannot say that it is the most efficient.
A team from the University of Berkeley has invented a solution to create Heatsinks with better efficiency. Which consists of a coating of an insulating layer of electricity composed of 2-chloro-p-xylylene to avoid electrical interference. Then on top a coating made of copper . What is achieved with it? Well, a performance in the reduction of temperature by 740%. Which is excellent news, as this makes active cooling systems less necessary. That is, if this solution is standardized, then we could even see fanless gaming graphics cards and thus quieter computers.
Why it may change the future of PC cooling?
Due to the fact that it offers greater heat dissipation per volume unit than conventional methods. Its design seeks to solve three frequent problems of the cooling systems in the different components of the PC.
- It is extremely expensive to scale your cooling capabilities. As these become higher, the need to use increasingly expensive and scarce materials also grows.
- Most systems are designed to cool above the chip and not below. With the advent of stacked chip solutions, a cooling system that completely surrounds the processor becomes necessary.
- Third, we cannot install heat sinks directly on the chip. Since it needs to be encapsulated.
It remains to be seen if this technology will end up being integrated into the different components for PC. In any case, everything indicates that it is extremely promising.
