[Giz] Brilliant Spinning Heatsink Cools CPUs 30 Times More Efficiently - Page 17

Originally Posted by ghostrider85 

Lol, they lost their credibility with that statement, they are full of lies.

Originally Posted by tippy25 

You're joking, right? Please tell me you're joking. Whether the fins are stationary or moving doesn't change the fact that you're dealing with air flowing over a metal surface. You're dealing with convection no matter how you spin it. The charts and pictures don't care how the air got to its velocity, what matters is that the air has a velocity relative to the surface. Yes, the chart deals with constant velocity and the air in this device seems to be accelerating. All that's going to change is the scaling of the graph. The general shape is going to remain the same, and turbulent airflow is still going to be phenomenally better than laminar airflow for heat transfer.

Originally Posted by Kny 

That's an awfully hypocritical statement you have there. Is there even a reason why you are so adamant that this technology cannot be possible? Mostly every single post you've made in this thread is to deter people from thinking that this is viable tech without presenting any real rebuttal yourself, or doing so simply incorrectly. I would literally chalk up every single post of yours in this thread as either a trolling or spam attempt.
On topic: This design is incredibly interesting. Like some others have posted, not all designs are met with warm reception when they should be. Sometimes people, like ghostrider85, just can't accept the possibility that someone knows more than they do, or at least just don't want to jump ship to a new way of doing things. As it stands, this is still in the alpha phase and is nowhere near a completed product. We don't have any preliminary test results to look at, nor do we have any way of disproving their statement that their ideas provide 30x better performance.
And to whoever noted that the noise from the heatsink in the video was too loud and whiny - that was the motor, and they even addressed that. That high-pitched whine likely won't be there on a commercial product, and once they shut off the motor to listen to only the spinning of the "fan," it was near silent.
What I am most interested in is how they plan to adapt their design vertically, since that is how almost everyone's computer is oriented.

FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

Principles of Operation
Q: Is the thermal resistance of the air gap region large enough to be a problem?
A: No—For example, in our current prototype device the thermal resistance of the air gap region is 0.02 °C/W.

Q: How does a hydrodynamic air bearing work?
A: A video of a very rudimentary hydrodynamic air bearing is available at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ed3uWxV2tXg

Q: Does the stationary base plate simply consist of a solid piece of thermally conductive material?
A: As in a conventional forced-convection heat sink, the base plate acts as a heat spreader, and may comprise solid piece of thermally
conductive material or be implemented in the form of a heat pipe.

Q: Is the radial-air-flow architecture depicted here the only possible device geometry?
A: No—a wide variety of device geometries are possible, including axial-flow configurations, and devices in which more than one rotating
cooling fin/impeller operate in parallel to further lower thermal resistance.

Real-World Practicality
Q: Can the device be mounted in any orientation?
A: Yes—the air bearing assembly is held together by magnetic attraction (between the stator and permanent-magnet rotor).

Q: Is a an air bearing suspension mechanically stiff and rugged?
A: Yes—because the rate of change of the pressure lifting force with respect to gap distance is extremely large.

Q: What other types of equipment use air bearings?
A: Devices range from hard disk read–write heads to large CNC milling machine spindles.

Q: What if small (less than 0.001″) particulates are somehow introduced into the air gap region?
A: They are swept outward and ejected by centrifugal force.

Q: How do you prevent contact between the air bearing surfaces at low rpm?
A: Depending on the application, one of several simple, passive mechanisms may be implemented.

Manufacturability
Q: Does the 0.001″ air gap require tight manufacturing tolerances?
A: No—the hydrodynamic air bearing gap distance is passively self-regulating.

Q: Is the surface quality/flatness spec of a conventional heat sink mating surface adequate?
A: Yes—For example, conventional fabrication processes such as cold forging can be used.

Performance
Q: Based on laboratory testing of early prototype devices, what level of performance is expected for a CPU cooler based on
Sandia’s air bearing heat exchanger principle?
A: We expect to achieve 0.05 °C/W in package that is considerably smaller and quieter than conventional high-performance CPU coolers.
Because low-thermal-resistance CPU coolers are particularly susceptible to performance degradation due to cooling-fin fouling (a thin
layer of dust can easily increase thermal resistance by a factor of 2), the added benefit of immunity to fouling is also a crucial performance
specification. Further reductions in thermal resistance would likely involve engineering trade-offs against device size and dBa rating.

Originally Posted by Kny 

What I am most interested in is how they plan to adapt their design vertically, since that is how almost everyone's computer is oriented.

Originally Posted by losttsol 

I'm thinking you will have to have your motherboard laying on the bottom of the case for this to work in computers. The "air bearing" they talk about doesn't seem like it would function with the cooler mounted sideways.

Originally Posted by StormX2 

i mean, it says it work verticle or horizontal, bu tI dont necesarily believe that it will continue to work virtical