Liquid Metal Cooling in New ATI Video Card

MellowTigger writes "Water cooling is so passe, definitely 20th-century. What's the 21st-century geek to do to keep his gaming video card cool? Try the liquid metal technology that will be included in the ATI Radeon X850 XT video card using the cooling technology from Sapphire. This material is reported to be non-flammable, non-toxic, environmentally safe... and 65 times more thermally conductive than water."

new video card

[Renraku]

Also seeks out John Conner.

Re:new video card

[dpilot]

If we put together a Beowulf cluster of these, would they self-assemble into Skynet?

Re:new video card

[AhBeeDoi]

Fortunately, it reassembles itself when the temperature rises.

Re:new video card

[Randy Wang]

... only to have the crap beaten out of it by the latest GeForce.

Re:new video card

[sinner0423]

Uhh, no. The first terminator was looking for sarah conner. The second, which looked like liquid metal, was actually looking for both John & Sarah when it went back in time.

This IS news for nerds, you knew that right? Sorry to nitpick, but I figured you may know why the mods deemed this funny.

Re:new video card

[Wordsmith]

Please elaborate on MS DRM being cracked. Is this something that applies to WMA files as well? The only thing that's stopped me from using online music stores is the lack of something akin to fairplay to ensure the files I purchase won't ultimately be rendered obsolete if/when I buy a new player that may or may not support the same DRM standards being used now.

Re:new video card

[Jah-Wren Ryel]

Please elaborate on MS DRM being cracked.

It was cracked in Japan and then quickly uncracked.
Rather, any of the phone-home restricted content forced an upgrade of the decrypter that was no longer crackable by the original method. T2 was liberated before the phone-home system had started to push out the new software.

The original method amounted to running the player under a debugger and looking for the decryption keys in a known location in memory, grabbing the keys and then using them to manually decrypt to a file. The new software checks for the presence of a debugger and refuses to run. I'm sure it is only a matter of time before that is also circumvented.

In theory, if you have not accepted an upgrade to the windows media system in the last month or so, all of the "on disc" restricted files could still be liberated. It is reportedly a fairly tedious manual process.

I think there is some discussion of the process on doom9.org if you want to dig deeper.

Re:new video card

[TravisWatkins]

The checks for a debugger are in the kernel. Good luck patching that out. :)

Let me just say

[lheal]

Cool.

* ducks *

Re:Why would you buy this?

[lheal]

I don't buy any computer hardware. Not for myself, anyway. I have engineer clients who need good video for CAD, but they don't need liquid-metal coolant, particularly.

Maybe this will become the standard technology. If it allows for quieter fans to keep the decibel level down to double digits, it might catch on.

Re:Why would you buy this?

[VeryProfessional]

<oblig>Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition! </oblig>

3 possible reasons for this

[ross.w]

1. The card runs hotter
2. The card runs faster
3. geek cred points.

I'm voting for 3.

leakage

[LittleGuernica]

When your videocard starts leaking, don't mind the components being destroyed, but worry about a T1000 dripping out of your computer.. from the FAQ: Q: How will I know if my videocard is leaking? A: Ask your parents why "wolfie" is barking and if they answer you while the the dog is actually named "Max" then your videocard is leaking.

Re:leakage

[LittleGuernica]

Darn, the T2 joke has already been made *thinks of other joke to get karma..* *hmm karmawhoring is wrong* *must say something that refers to actual content of TFA* It's ridiculous that cards need to be cooled that way. It;s a way to have faster videocards without actually making a better GPU. just turn it up another nutch and use liquid nitrogen to cool it..

Re:leakage

[pcmanjon]

" Darn, the T2 joke has already been made *thinks of other joke to get karma..*"

Actually, Humor karma doesn't go on your karma record. Check the faq about karma.

More leaks to worry about

[multi-flavor-geek]

So now I have to worry about memory leaks, security leaks, and liquid metal video card coolant leaks, ahhhh crap, this is all getting way to confusing.
I have enough trouble just keeping everything from blowing up everytime I get nailed by a thunderstorm, last time it was crack/fizz/is that smoke? Whats next, crack/fizz/smoke/drip?
It also doesn't mention if it's non-conducting, when I get struck by lightning 5h1t explodes, wouldn't that be fun to watch as the entire motherboard gets sprayed with a liquid metal conductive material, gaaaaaaa!

Re:More leaks to worry about

[WhatAmIDoingHere]

If you're purchasing a liquid metal cooled video card, you can afford a $50 surge protector or a $200 UPS.

Marketing

[Detritus]

According to their website, the "TOXIC X700 PRO" features "Lethal Cooling". I think they need a new marketing department.

Re:Marketing

[ZorbaTHut]

Man. That sounds like the most awesome card ever. I bet that would sell *tons*.

Re:Marketing

[High Hat]

I, for one, welcome or new liquid-metal-cooled-brains troll overlords!

Liquid Metal Cooling Additional Requirements

[the eric conspiracy]

1. NFPA requires NASCAR style fire extinguisher inside computer case.

2. House wiring must be upgraded and a 440v 3 phase outlet installed next to your computer.

3. Homeowners insurance rider for extreme fire hazard.

4. Fire retardent metal door must be installed between computer room and rest of house.

5. Town must grant zoning variance for indstrial scale use of power in a residence.

6. Special monitor must be installed which notifies the Fire Department when your frame rate exceeds 250.

Re:Liquid Metal Cooling Additional Requirements

[AhBeeDoi]

No barrier is too high when it comes to improving my Counter-Strike experience.

a little bit more info...

[bumptehjambox]

http://www.xbitlabs.com/news/video/display/2005051 9225638.html [xbitlabs.com]

Here's a little bit more info, no word on T1000's involvement.

However, I wouldn't be surprised to hear that owners of this new "metal liquid cooling" at a LAN party ending quite horribly.
I can see it start with a few leaks, the liquid metal all joins together... T1000 lives again...

Gallium

[nickptar]

I'm pretty sure they're using gallium [wikipedia.org]. It melts at 85F, is nontoxic (unlike mercury), and is nonflammable (unlike rubidium, cesium, sodium, and potassium, the only other metals I know of that melt at reasonable temperatures for a graphics card). Gallium also has almost exactly 65 times the thermal conductivity of water.

Re:Gallium

[WhatAmIDoingHere]

"Gallium metal expands by 3.1 percent when it solidifies, and therefore should not be stored in either glass or metal containers. Gallium also corrodes most other metals by diffusing into their metal lattice"

Doesn't sound very easy to store.

Using an alloy?

[Phong]

I would assume that they're using some kind of an alloy that has a lower freezing temperature. One possibility is an alloy of gallium, indium, and tin (also known as Galinstan) which has a freezing point of -20 degrees centigrade.

Re:Using an alloy?

[nickptar]

I believe, based on other posts, that they are indeed using that.

Re:Gallium

[LiquidCoooled]

I think you may be right.

I just found an article in new scientist:


And now, NanoCoolers, based in Texas, US, has developed a liquid metal cooling system that promises to be even quieter and more efficient. The system draws heat away from a circuit by pumping liquid gallium alloy through a series of pipes. The temperature of the liquid is brought back down to normal within an ambient air-cooled chamber.

link here [newscientist.com]

Re:Gallium

[Vellmont]

If it's pure gallium, I'd think it being solid at room temperature would be a real problem (since it freezes at 85F). The entire circuit of gallium would have to melt before it starts circulating. That would cause the CPU to start to get awfully hot before that happened.

It seems more likely that they're using something that's liquid in room temperature. That could still mean some kind of gallium amalgram. Solder for instance has a lower melting point than either of the metals that constitute it.

Re:Gallium

[FidelCatsro]

It will most likely be a Gallium Alloy , as gallium is mildly toxic and has expansive propertys

Or a Gallium alloy... see scitoys.com

[Animaether]

...which melts at an even lower temperature

See also:
http://www.scitoys.com/scitoys/scitoys/thermo/liqu id_metal/liquid_metal.html [scitoys.com]
( kudos to venkeroz on tweakers.net for that link in a post on this story 4 days ago )

Chemically...

[cyberfunk2]

As it's a liquid metal.. and the only one liquid at temperatures around room temperature to 100 degrees C are lead, mercury and maby a lead tin amalgam.. it's got to be some new thing.

I'm curious about the chemical composistion of this new amalgam, as it must be (unless they're using highly reactive cesium, which I really doubt).

Anyone know any chemical details ?

Re:Chemically...

[RzUpAnmsCwrds]

"and the only one liquid at temperatures around room temperature to 100 degrees C are lead, mercury and maby a lead tin amalgam"

Room temperature liquids aren't required, as the card likely operates in the 50C-80C range.

Re:Chemically...

[cyberfunk2]

Yea, but what happens when we're at a cold start?

Re:Chemically...

[sydb]

The poster said "room temperature to 100 degrees C,", which comfortably straddles your 50C-80C range.

I could write you off as a normal idiot, but you actually fucking quoted that in your reply.

Re:Chemically...

[cyberfunk2]

i'm confused.. are you yelling at me or him ?

Re:Chemically...

[puppet10]

and Gallium [webelements.com]

Re:Chemically...

[cyberfunk2]

I'm a chemist, so i'd never forget Hg... I did almost forget Ga tho.. melts in your hand, and not particularly toxic either I hear.

Non Toxic Liquid Metal?

[quakeroatz]

Is this possible?

Last time I checked molten metal (burning death) and Mercury (deadly poison) was toxic.

AHHH, Nothing like a warm sip of heatsink juice to warm you up on a cold winter night.

Re:Non Toxic Liquid Metal?

[John Meacham]

Yeah, galinstan is liquid at room temperature and quite safe (compared to mercury). I have a vial of it on my desk. fun stuff.

make your own, it is 68.5% Ga, 21.5% In, 10% Sn or you can buy it online.

A cool application is to make a _perfect_ parabolic mirror. You do this by spinning a puddle of it. The centrifugal force pulls it against the sides and is countered by gravity pulling down the center making a perfect mirror for a tesescope always pointing exactly straight up.

Re:Non Toxic Liquid Metal?

[John Meacham]

Umm.. Centrifugal force is quite real and describes exactly the effect I am talking about. You are probably thinking of centripetal force, which is exerted on the galinstan by the walls of its container, which would be another accurate but less useful in this context way of putting things since you probably want to think of the mirror as stationary for doing the math and intuitively thinking about the shape of the mirror.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Centrifugal_force [wikipedia.org]

I am not sure where the persistant my

Think of it as an improved heat sink

[Greg Hullender]

Several metals or alloys are liquid below the boiling point of water. My favorite is "Wood's Metal," which is used to make gag teaspoons. (They melt in your coffee -- but don't drink it!) http://ptcl.chem.ox.ac.uk/MSDS/WO/woods_metal.html [ox.ac.uk] Gallium melts at an even lower point, but looks to be harder to handle. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gallium [wikipedia.org] None of these, though, has a higher specific heat than water, but, of course, they're claiming superior heat conduction, so perhaps the best way to think of it (whatever metal they chose) is as a very, very elaborate heat sink.

--Greg

Re:Think of it as an improved heat sink

[argent]

Sounds like the metal wouldn't need to actually be liquid to work, then, and the electromagnetic pumps are redundant.

You begin to wonder...

[RemovableBait]

First in the Blizzard range will be the SAPPHIRE Blizzard RADEON X850 XT and Blizzard RADEON X850 XT Platinum Editions. Blizzard delivers the future of gaming with the ability to push blistering frame rates and deliver environments erupting with vibrant colours and highly detailed textures rendered in High-Definition clarity.

Combining Sapphire innovations with game developers' creations, users won't miss a single feature of today's gaming titles. This hardware boasts 16 parallel pixel pipelines, 256MB of G

Real Information

[Rufus211]

Geeze, why does /. keep on linking to physorg, which has crappy articles and no links to real information about stuff.

Here's a more in depth article on X-bit [xbitlabs.com]. NanoCoolers has a pretty in depth description [nanocoolers.com] of the product. It's basically a watercooling loop but using a molten metal. The really cool part is that because the metal is obviously electrically conductive, they're using a DC current combined with some magnets to take advantage of Lorentz force [gsu.edu] to propel the fluid.

Re:Real Information

[argent]

Thank you for lookingthat up for us, I'm also getting really tired of the way Physorg is using Slashdot to drive clicks into their sandtrap.

PhysOrg == PR Central

[jonabbey]

Yeah, PhysOrg is clearly a marketing front for PR releases with any sort of science-y edge to them.

See Paul Graham's already classic The Submarine [paulgraham.com] for details on how this crap works.

Old story, new again.

[gordguide]

The liquid metal cooling topic was covered on /. before, eg:
http://hardware.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/05/ 03/1421243&tid=222/ [slashdot.org]

The technology probably derives from http://www.nanocoolers.com/products_cooling.php/ [nanocoolers.com]

Sapphire is just the OEM manufacturer of ATi cards. For quite a while you could only get ATi branded cards but now you can get them from ATi or Sapphire. I doubt they have much to do with the technology besides licensing it.

Near-silent

[Rxke]

From TFA
"The revolutionary use of an electromagnetic pump means no internal moving parts, low power consumption and delivers near silent operation. "

Near-silent? What is making the noise then?

Liquid Metal info

[cyberfunk2]

Did some research, found the following two patents:

http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PT O2&Sect2=HITOFF&p=1&u=/netahtml/search-bool.html&r =1&f=G&l=50&co1=AND&d=ptxt&s1=nanocoolers&OS=nanoc oolers&RS=nanocoolers [uspto.gov]

And

http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PT O2&Sect2=HITOFF&p=1&u=/netahtml/search-bool.html&r =2&f=G&l=50&co1=AND&d=ptxt&s1=nanocoolers&OS=nanoc oolers&RS=nanocoolers [uspto.gov]

It looks like they're using a Gallium/Indium (rare elements) alloy. This is certainly not environmentally safe from a chemical point of view as these are toxic heavy metals. I think by environmentally safe they are pointing to the "sealed" system that they are advertising. That is, they dont exepect the systems to leak, as they do not require any refilling.

Basically, their argument appears to be that it's safe because it cant get out, just like coolant in a nuclear reactor. This is actually a reasonable claim, however, we shouldnt take it to mean that the liquid metal coolant itself is evironmentally sound, just that the system, while in operation, is.

P.S. it appears they've also experimented w/ Lead/Bismuth, mercury, and Sodium/Potassium alloys.

Re:Liquid Metal info

[Velox_SwiftFox]

Hmm. According to material safety data sheets I've Googled at, Indium has and LD50 in rats of 4200mg/Kg (4.2grams/kilogram), What I see for Gallium is "Chronic Effects: Intravenous administration to humans caused metallic taste, skin rashes and bone marrow depression as well as anorexia, nausea and vomiting. May cause damage to kidneys."

So "Do not mainline". Otherwise, s'ok.

Re:Liquid Metal info

[Pollardito]

so what happens when you're *gasp* upgrading to the next video card and want to dispose of this one? there's already a disposal problem with a lot of computer parts, is this comparable or worse and will the companies that dispose of parts now be ready to accept this new one?

Metal?! Ah, I see why... I think?

[TerranFury]

When I first saw that they were using liquid metal, my first thought was "Why?!" Water has a gigantic heat capacity, and is in may ways the Ideal Coolant.

But then I saw: "Electromagnetic pump with no moving parts." So it looks like they're sacrificing some of the coolant properties of water so that they can use something very electrically-conductive, and gain the advantage of silent operation.

That said, IIRC there are no-moving-parts water pumps that use electrochemical effects (something with electrolysis and dragging ions through the water), but I've always assumed that they're limited to small flow rates.

Now I want to know how this no-moving-parts liquid-metal-pump works. Maybe use a square-cross-sectioned pipe with an insulating top and bottom and conductive sides; pass a current between the sides, and put large permanent magnets above and below? Or do it linear-induction-motor style? Hmmm...

Near silent

[Man of E]

I think my favorite bit from the blurb is the statement that it "delivers near silent operation". Using an electromagnetic pump might do away with the enormous fans that make current cards sound like a hovercraft.

Based on the earbursting noise produced by my current computer, I've pretty much decided that the next one I build is going to be as silent as possible. Maybe we won't have to give up graphics power for silence.

Re:Near silent

[Rob Simpson]

Yeah, finding quiet/silent parts for a PC is difficult... here's a few that I'm using if anyone is interested:

Antec Phantom 350 PSU [silentpcreview.com]
Gigabyte 6800 fanless (only 12 pipes, but not a big sacrifice...though if this liquid metal stuff works it should make things easier the next time I upgrade) [cooltechzone.com]
Thermalright CPU heatsink [thermalright.com] with a 120mm fan on a Zalman fan bracket [zalman.co.kr] and set at minimum on a Zalman fanmate control.
All in an Antec 3700BQE case [silentpcreview.com] with quiet 120mm exhaust fan.

The annoying thing was that as soon as I got rid of one whining or droning noise I'd notice a slightly quieter one... Now, it's inaubible except in dead silence.

Note ads always mention the UP side:

[Ancient_Hacker]

Yep, Gallium does indeed conduct heat many times better than water. Too bad that's not a relevant parameter here.

With a cooling loop, you'd like a liquid that can carry a lot of heat per trip and doesnt get too hot in doing so. Water gobbles up a whole kilocalorie per cc for each degree. gallium is dreadful by comparison-- it has a FIFTEEN times poorer specific heat, so it either goes up 15 degrees per cc as it passes the GPU, or the pump has to put out 15 times the flow rate to give the same cooling rate as plain old H20.

Good old H20.

Re:Note ads always mention the UP side:

[ikeleib]

Water takes one calorie of energy input per degree Centigrade raise in temperature.

Re:Note ads always mention the UP side:

[Mornelithe]

Right, and the specific heat of water is 1 calorie/(gram*degree C) which is approximately 1 calorie/(cc*degree C), depending on the density of your water. That's little-c calorie.

Therefore, the original poster is wrong. Water only absorbs one calorie for each degree, not a kilocalorie. However, he is correct that gallium has a poorer specific heat:

Gallium: 370 J/(kg*K)
Water: 4184 J/(kg*K)

And it's, apparently, only about 6 times as dense (if Google hasn't failed me). So the same volume of gallium would he

about time

[Illserve]

This opens the door for cooling systems based on knives and stabbing weapons.

Not new tech!

[Mac Nazgul]

This has been used inside aircraft engine exhaust valves since the 1930's. Liquid Sodium would be sealed inside the valve. It's non-toxic and is still used today.

Re:Not new tech!

[Vegeta99]

Non-toxic doesn't mean non-hazardous. Sure, sodium may not be biologically toxic, but have you ever thrown a chunk of it into water?

Re:Not new tech!

[ahecht]

Well, sodium is non-toxic until it comes in contact with any living thing, where it will combine with water to form sodium hydroxide (aka Liquid Plummer). It's like the tree falling in the forest question, but in my book, sodium is toxic.

Environmentally safe, but not friendly

[ThreeDayMonk]

Although it might be "environmentally safe" insofar as the leaked metal is not toxic, it's still far from being environmentally friendly. The fact that a graphics card needs liquid metal cooling is cause for concern.

Efficient cooling just means transferring the heat generated away from the card more rapidly - the energy input is still high, with all the negative consequences of that (cost, pollution, geopolitical instability, etc.). What we should really be demanding is more efficient systems that don't

environmentally safe? Too short a history....

[davidwr]

non-flammable, non-toxic, environmentally safe

Yeah, they said that about water too but stupid college students die from it every few years anyways.

Seriously, this is cool stuff but any new substance should be considered at least slightly suspect until long-term dangers are known. That's not to say we shouldn't use it, only that we should be intellectually honest with ourselves.

Question

[Spy der Mann]

Couldn't they focus more on producing chips that DON'T generate so much heat?

That way we wouldn't need to spend another N bucks on the cooling system.

I want this stuff in my radiator

[TheLittleJetson]

Then I could run a turbo without a heavy intercooler.

Coming soon...

[suitepotato]

Overclocked PCs as lava lamps using real lava...

"So Dave, any idea if you can knock your cpu down a few cycles? The tremors are rattling my windows and keeping my kids up at night and the pyroclastic flow last week incinerated the fence, my garage, and my fishing boat. I know that building a Doom 3 terminal server capable of hosting five million players in real time is important to you, but..."

Speaking of which, go read Eric K. Drexler's Engines of Creation regarding the kind of cooling that some nano

Re:This can't be good.

[yotto]

Considering they said it's environmentally safe, I doubt it's mercury. Considering it's intended to /cool/ your gpu, I doubt it's molten lead.

Even if it were either, why couldn't it be good? 20x the cooling sounds pretty good to me, and if it's safe and environmentally friendly, what's the problem?

Re:This can't be good.

[yotto]

20x

Sorry, s/20/65/

Re:This can't be good.

[smittyoneeach]

they said it's environmentally safe

<cynical remark goes here>

I can't figure out what might be in it

[Beryllium Sphere(tm)]

They say it's not flammmable, so it's not the eutectic alloy of sodium and potassium that's liquid at room temperature. It's not toxic, so it's not mercury.

Gallium might be possible since it melts a few degrees over room temperature. It's only mildly toxic but nobody should call it "nontoxic".

Re:I can't figure out what might be in it

[glMatrixMode]

Nice guess, it's indeed Gallium, as a google search will confirm you.

Re:I can't figure out what might be in it

[deglr6328]

Yes but probably not pure Ga but the GalInStan [wikipedia.org] eutectic instead. Anyway though it's non toxic/non pyrophoric/non volatile is it still a METAL and a leak inside your computer would be instantly catastrophic for obvious reasons.

Re:I can't figure out what might be in it

[ArbitraryConstant]

Isn't there an orwellian definition of non-toxic that means "It won't leak, so it's not toxic."?

Re:This can't be good.

[BibelBiber]

Ah, bother, it's quicksilver. Isn't it?

Re:This can't be good.

[Velox_SwiftFox]

61% Gallium
25% Indium
13% Tin
1% Zinc

Solid at 6.5C
Liquid at 7.6C

Re:This can't be good.

[Junior J. Junior III]

What state is it in between 6.6C and 7.5C????

Re:This can't be good.

[uiucmatse]

It'll be between the liquidus and solidus lines, so you'll have a composition of liquid plus some small amount of alpha-phase.

Re:This can't be good.

[Anonymous Coward]

It's undefined, and if you dare use it at that temperature you'll just get a null pointer exception.

Re:This can't be good.

[HermanAB]

Both liquid and solid: Recrystalizing state.

Re:This can't be good.

[Dahan]

The same state any non-eutectic alloy is between its freezing and melting points--partly solid and partly liquid.

Anyways, there are plenty of metal alloys that are liquid at or slightly above room temperature.

But even discounting alloys, there's are a few other elemental metals other than mercury that are liquid at room temp (assuming your room has a computer or two to keep it warm): Gallium melts at 29.76 degrees C and Cesium at 28.44 degrees (I'd keep the latter far from my computer though). Rubidium melts at 39.31 degrees, so it'd be liquid at the temperatures today's GPUs reach (but I'd keep that far from my computer too).

Re:This can't be good.

[Mornelithe]

Well, it may be solid, but that doesn't mean it isn't absorbing heat. Melting typically takes significantly more energy than would be absorbed by a temperature increase, so the melting metal would probably actually cool your CPU better than the liquid result.

In addition, metals (by definition, I believe) have good heat conduction properties (that's why some heatsinks use metal heat pipes these days), so a large portion of the metal would probably end up melting and start flowing. You probably wouldn't just

Re:This can't be good.

[kernelfoobar]

sodium isn't exactly fireproof
Actually it's a cool thing to see a piece of sodium in plain, simple, pure water....(hint: google for sodium and water)

Re:This can't be good.

[CyberBill]

Salt.

(Sodium Chloride = NaCl)

I'm not sure if Sodium is flammable or not, it probably is at very high temperatures, but usually people get it too close to water to ever find out. :) ( Na + H20 = NaO(2?) + H2 ) Basically the reaction gives off so much heat that the resulting H2 ignites, at least when exposed to water in large enough quantities.

Re:This can't be good.

[mog007]

Gallium is a fun metal. It melts at around room temperature, in fact you can hold a bit of it in your hand and it will melt right before your eyes. I havn't had the opportunity to play with it, but I've seen pictures. Very cool shit.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

There are other reasons for this...

[Rob Simpson]

"Sapphire's exciting new cooler is a compact, low-profile design using only one additional PC slot. Filled and sealed, it requires no user intervention, no reservoir or refilling and it is card resident so it requires no additional mounting space. The revolutionary use of an electromagnetic pump means no internal moving parts, low power consumption and delivers near silent operation."

A one slot and nearly-silent top end card.

Re:There are other reasons for this...

[cnettel]

only one additional PC slot

That sure sounds like a nice way to say "two slots" to me.

Re:There are other reasons for this...

[Rob Simpson]

Oh, duh. That's what I get for skimming the article. I didn't pay any attention after "no moving parts" anyway. Still probably takes up less space than my current 6800 with its huge heatsink, but either is much better than having a blowdryer attached...

Re:Liquid Metal, Really?

[Anonymous Coward]

It's an alloy of gallium and indium

http://nwc.serverpipeline.com/news/54200844 [serverpipeline.com]

Re:Useless or unintended use.

[Tony Hoyle]

Please give an example of something that is absolutely without use.

A slashdot editor.

Do I get my cookie now?

Re:And here I thought...

[cnettel]

Nah, it will have to reach a temperature close to the melting point to actually absorb heat in any other way than an ice cube may absorb heat when its -5 centigrades. You can't get a higher temperature in the coolant than in the "colee", so to cool by the phase transition itself, you'll need the colee to reach the melting point of the metal. That will also be needed if one is going to get a pump going by magnetic forces, which seems to be the idea here. If it stays solid, it will only be a fancy, encased, h

Re:Yeah but how does it work?

[Dahan]

It uses sodium.

No. It doesn't.

Re:Great Idea.

[__aasmho4525]

hm....

this technique (as purportedly implemented per the article) uses an adjacent slot for the self-contained, sealed cooling module.

net sum zero.

cheers.

Peter

Re:The uprising begins?

[superpulpsicle]

Please, Sapphire has one of the worst history among all 3rd party card manufacturers for overheating.

They are notorious for cutting cost at the fan level with a $1 plastic fan instead of a $3 one.

If they build terminators, it'd be made out of paper.

Both are important

[arete]

Transfering heat over a short distance conductivity is more important than capacity - because getting the heat IN and OUT of the coolant is the bigger issue.

Transfering heat over a long distance capacity is more important than conductivity, because you're physically moving the coolant far away. What you really want in this case is high capacity and low viscosity - for a cooling setup like this "how much work the pump has to do" is probably more important than "what volume of coolant does it use" In very

Re:Night mare

[argent]

your comp might go below the freezing point

Depends on what the metal does when it freezes. Gallium is one of those funny substances that expands when it freezes (another reason pure gallium is an unlikely candidate for the metal), but most metals just stop flowing. When it warms up again it should be fine.

Re:Dupe - sorta

[JonTurner]

>>Liquid metal computer component cooling was discussed here not to long ago.

Indeed. link to Liquid Metal CPU Cooling 03May05 [slashdot.org]

Re:oh yeah? ... ..

[Tony Hoyle]

Score -1: *WAY* too late with the terminator jokes/

Re:Is there something wrong?

[NerveGas]

Buy an Eden-based machine if that's what you like, but I don't see how it's "wrong" for a computer to have liquid cooling.

For most of the history of computing, liquid cooling has been associated with the ultra-high-end computing. I once saw a picture of the pipes that carry the liquid to cool one of the NSA's supercomputers, they were 8" or 10" pipes, if I recall.

Besides, cars get faster and more powerful, televisions get larger, stereos get more powerful, houses get bigger, and cometic surgeons