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Another Water-Cooling System For Laptops
big writes "NEC has developed the world's first slim sized water-cooling module for notebooks. It uses a piezoelectric pump driving method. This water cooling-module enables a highly advanced, slim sized, notebook PC with minimal operating noise." Toshiba has been working on water cooling in laptops at least as far back as the year 2000.
I have a 12in powerbook and originally I would have thought something like a water cooling system would be nice, but that would limit my many discovered extended capabilities for my laptop. You see during the winter I use my laptop as the furnace for my apartment building (I live in Montreal, Quebec.. You can imagine it gets pretty cold). It was however becoming a real problem this summer as it got so hot as to melt through to the basement level of my building. My landlord was in the process of drawing up a lawsuit, but then I discovered an alternative to simple water cooling that I think should be considered by enlarge by the geek community.
12in powerbook hydro electric plant! Disregarding the fundamental laws of thermodynamics I have managed to use my 12in heat plant as a tool to turn great amounts of water into steam. Believe it or not, I'm actually powering the entire of Centre-Ville on just my laptop. The city since has graciously agreed to pay my landlord for all damages. Combine that with my cold-fusion dock bookends and I think the energy crisis is over.
But seriously folks... I can't believe how hot laptops and computers are running these days. It really is enough to keep a room warm without a heater. Is water cooling the future or just cooler processors?
-Rob
"Lisa in this house we obey the laws of thermodynamics!!"
But with laptops getting smaller and lighter, who wants a heavier bulkier machine that can run faster. Better off using a desktop if that's the way you want to go.
I want to know where I can guy something like this to upgrade and mod laptops we all already own.
It is bad enough having a laptop burning your lap and now I have to worry about frostbite instead.
Did you wet yourself, or did your laptop spring a leak?
There is water in my desktop! Oh wait, that is my fish tank... There is water in my laptop! Hold on, those are my seamonkeys.
"There is no teacher but the enemy."-Mazer Rackham
Ha, my 1999 patent application for water-cooled laptops should be approved any time now. I'm calling my lawyer!
When can they water-cool my shower? Damn furnace has been acting up for weeks now.
I have a sony viao, and water cooling would help it a ton. So it has a 2 ghz processor, half gig of ram, 60 gig drive, ati radeon, dvd burner, etc... It can barely keep up with a 16 speed cd burn with the hard drive it has. When I play games at 1600x1200 resolution the radeon gfx card gets so hot i think it is going to catch the laptop on fire. :) So with good water cooling maybe we can have a world where there will be no reason to have desktops anymore.. just laptops.
Between being dropped, xrayed, beat on, slid, bumped, scratched, and the like, doe we need _more_ liquid than that which is normally spilled on a laptop to be present in it?
I'd like a nice cool-operating laptop, even if it is a little slower, as long as it has enough RAM, decent enough video, and good storage. Speed, as long as it's fast enough, isn't a major concern. The Athlon at home takes care of that. I want connectivity and portability.
If IBM still made the 240 series Thinkpad, I'd snap a newer one of those up in a heartbeat...
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
I'm looking forward to be able to overclock my laptop CPU without damage that way. Imagine the 4GHz pentium... ;-)
Ok, the battery will be burnt in 15 minutes, but there is a price for everything...
Secretary tells help desk, "I just spilled coffee on my boss's keyboard. What should I do?" Help desk pilot fish decides, "What the heck, it's just a $35 keyboard. Have her disconnect it and wash it out in the sink. If that doesn't work, we'll replace it." Next call is from her enraged boss: "Who the hell told my secretary to put my new $4,000 laptop in the sink and run water all over it?"
(source)
I hope you didn't miss the: "This product is suitable not only for use in notebook PCs, but also in servers and desktop computers."
I am already dreaming about a silent PC in my bedroom (check out silentpcreview)
If heat is an issue, instead of attaching a huge tank to the side of a ghee-whiz watercooled notebook, why not build one using *underclocked* cpus and air cooling. Or use the crusoe. I don't know about NEC, but my personal preference is that my laptop be portable.
It seems to me manufacturers think everybody wants one with desktop CPUs drawing 20 amps, just so they can say Lookie, my laptop runs at 2.8 ghz!!!!
Run Crusoe, it's cool in more ways than one.
Wonder if the user would be able to shut off the computer fast enough should the water pump decide to buy the farm?
:-))
Why not just develop a Transmeta-type CPU that uses less power? That way there won't be such an extra need for the extra cooling capacity. What's next? Helium cooling? Not that there are THAT many users out there who really needs all the CPU cycles/sec. (Engineers and gamers don't count.
!@#$% whole-grain cereal. When I want fiber, I eat some wicker furniture. - G. Carlin
This product is suitable not only for use in notebook PCs, but also in servers and desktop computers.
I don't know about you, but I sure as hell wouldn't want so much as a drop of moisture anywhere NEAR a $35k Sun blade server.
More attention that warranted seems to be the issue with laptops these days. So long as laptops run Windoze, what's earth-shatteringly different between different models? The true worth of laptops could be about $400 (what HP offered Thailand). Anything much above that is just waste of money.
Rather than cooling, why not work towards standardizatrion on laptops. The power supply for these gizmos range from 8.6V AC to 33.4V DC. Power supply connectors come in all fancy pinouts and crazy designs.
The lesser the laptops, the better it is for the environment. laptops break down more often thsan desktops (13.5 times more often actually) and are often ir-reparable, or too cost prohibitive. It's time there was legislation requiring standards on all laptops - those that didn't conform ought to be banned outright. This is a classic case of capitalism screwing global interests for a few dollars more.
If you keep throwing chairs, one day you'll break windows....
Hitachi came out with a watercooled P4 notebook a while back....
Hmm..
I wonder whether we can substitute the water for something else.. I mean, like a car, we can substitute radiator-coolant. Maybe there's a a screw we can loosen and open to drain the water out, then refill back with some sort of coolant for laptops.
Yeah, while we are at it, it'll spin-offs to a few types of coolants available... and computers will be more and more like a car!
I like the green colored jelly type radiator coolants, dunno what is it called.. heck, I'm a computer mechanic, not a car mechanic..
Will sys-admin for food
Seriously though, there are no new technology on the horizon that would make silicon run cooler, and the speed of core-voltage drop does not keep up with frequency bumps (heat is square of frequency for CMOS gates).
at the mean time, i like to point out that even without water cooling, they can make some thin-ass notebooks*. I don't see why water-cooling is such a big deal.
sorry site in japanese - panasonic does not sell their really good notebooks in the US. summary: ~2.7lb including DVD drive, up to 7.5hr operating time, Pentium-M 1.3GHz, max 512RAM, etc. They also make one that's 999grams (just under 2.2lb) that does not have the optical drive.
My life in the land of the rising sun.
I am moving around a lot. Although I loved my dual-p3 1000Mhz slot 1 to death, carrying that case along with a 19" CRT Sony monitor, speakers w/ sub, heavy UPS, and that mess of wires that filled a box or two became difficult. I still need the ability to just pack it up and move around but i still like the idea of being able to work with an almost full power system. So for me best thing has been a company called Sager and there 88xx series. They use all desktop components in a massive 12 lb but its just one thing not twenty. However, now I have a smaller notebook for travelling specifically (sony u101), and two handhelds both an ipaq and a sony nz90. So its less than before but best of all, it stashes really well in one of those paper boxes that has 10 reams in it. =)
Hey NEC, we said we wanted laptops that are more PORTABLE, not more POTABLE...
...like this computer. As far as I've heard, C3's get better performance than the crusoe while having equally low heat production/energy consumption - haven't seen any numbers, though. Btw, has anyone gotten one of those Lindows laptops? They're pretty cheap, light, and small...are they cool and quiet, too?
Put a tap on the side and I will never have to leave the water to make a cup of tea!
This is basically a means for spreading the heat from the processor efficiently into the large flat surfaces that are the only heatsink you can get on laptops. The problem at present is that the processor occupies a small area and the heat has to escape sideways through a limited area of metal. A liquid flow can transfer heat much faster and spread it more efficiently because water actually has a greater heat capacity than metal, and the pumped flow can be faster than the conduction flow through metal.
Looking at the NEC design, as described in the article, I would have thought that the risk of leakage was far less than water entry via spillage, rain, or simple condensation.
As for pumps stopping, what happens with modern Intel CPUs when fans stop? They slow down and so control their own temperature. It's only AMD CPUs that suddenly fry themselves.
The basic idea isn't even new. Over 50 years ago exhaust valves in high performance engines were drilled through and part filled with sodium metal. As the valve got hot the sodium melted, then the vibration caused it to move around transferring heat from the hot valve face to the water cooled guide. Doubtless geeks at the time worried that the sodium would somehow escape and damage their engines.
Panurge has posted for the last time. Thanks for the positive moderations.
I think I'll make a bong out of it!
====
Crudely Drawn Games
You know you should stop doing what you're doing when your thighs get wet.
How many NASA managers does it take to screw in a lightbulb? "That's
a known problem... don't worry about it."
I want a laptop that lasts for 8 hours. A regular workday, or a long bus/car/plane trip.
If my 20+ year old Tandy 102 can last for 2 weeks on four AAs, why can't a new laptop go for 8 hours?
And my damn 8600 is taking 20 minutes to copy a file! ;)
If the thing were designed appropriately, you could have the freon doing a phase change from liquid to vapor where heat was being generated, then the vapor condensing back to liquid at the case. I'll betcha the major snafu will be the hinge. The idea is to make the whole case surface area isothermal.
The intention is to eliminate pumps by using wicking to transport the fluid to the hot spot, whereas the vapor travels by pressure.
Incidentally, has anyone looked to see if halon makes a halfway decent refrigerant? It looks neat that in the event of a fire, you could vent it to knock off the fire. Isn't halon another fluorocarbon? I haven't seen much spec on it for use as a refrigerant, but maybe another slashdotter has...and being I just posted the idea here, its now prior art....
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
Forget water cooling.... Just use a Mac for a Laptop (1/4th the heat) for the same workload.
Or even far more than 1/4th when doing benchmarks such as the open source RC5 cypto benchmark in which a Mac with a G4 in a laptop totally crushes intel offerings, not merely from its barrel shifter and not merely from a couple altivec instructions, but overall.
Macs conserve batteries. Some older mac powerbooks allow you to run os 9.2.2 permitting virtual memory to be DISABLED saving more electricity from not needing drives spinning.
Even a commmon 1998 powerbook mac could play an 130 minute dvd on one heavily used older battery, while no intel latptop in 1998 could play a 130 minute dvd without having to swap batteries at least once, I seem to recall.
Most mac powerbooks never need to have their internal emergency fans kick on, even while crunching hard core mathematical benchmarks on warm days.
Maybe Apple should take a look at it for its hopefully-soon-to-come G5 laptop.
Cats are intended to teach us that not everything in nature has a function.
you are a communist anti-technology bigot!
Thankfully all the laptops I prefer to run are the many award winning apple powerbooks... which can crunch our rc5 benchmarks with elegance while remaining cool to the touch using efficient low wattage risc chips (the microcontroller based g4 iteration).
plus I can turn off virtual ram to conserve more power if needed (no hard drive spin).
1) Water pressure of the electromagnetic centrifugal pump is relatively weak. If the thickness of the circulation channel is decreased, cooling-liquid flow is restricted. (2) The system is difficult to install as the tank, pump and CPU attached area are all inter-connected to a metal pipe and a rubber tube. (3) Installation of a large tank is necessary as cooling liquid seeps through the resin parts of the tank, pump and the connection tubes resulting in liquid reduction over time.
These three "selling points" to me just stress how prone to failure this product can be. I read it as follows:
1. The water pressure sucks. 2. The thing is pain to put together 3. And the water will evaporate in a New York minute.
Guess the writer was given some heavy truth serum before he wrote this one up.
Harpo Tunnel Syndrome--my wrist feels funny.
What we want is a water cooler show, because you can discuss it at the water cooler at work. Now, you can just discuss it over your laptop.
Analytic & algebraic topology of locally Euclidean meterization of infinitely differentiable Riemmanian manifold
There are lots of other coolants which are non-conductive... I once saw a supercomputer which was built inside a plexiglass tank and actually was submerged in an electrically non-conductive liquid bath.
The bloke needs his head examined. This is one of the most insightful posts on this thread.
That far back, huh? The year 2000, eh? I remember it well, like it was only a few years ago...
This system does not use a centrifugal pump.
the whole assembly is integrated in the metal tank/heatsink and powered by a membrane pump powered by 5 volts piezo.
In othere words: they are trying to sell it as a single component, reliable, maintanacne-free and easy to install.
This space is intentionally staring blankly at you
You can get laptops with via C3 processors too. or transmeta crusoe. They dont run as hot because they don't burn that much batteries.
That means you can keep you laptop running for a whole working day and just do the stuff you need to do instead of marveling at the fantastic speed (with wich your laptop that drains the batteries).
Probably being humble and satisfied with little is not good for the economy (the manufacturer's economy that is).
This space is intentionally staring blankly at you
After going through a long line of laptops for my wife (love that Circuit City return policy), we finally settled on an IBM ThinkPad T40. No water cooling, but it does not run hot (1.3GHz Centrino). The main thing it had going for it was that you could actually touch type on the keyboard. At 4.5lbs and less than 1 inch thick, I'm not sure you could get much smaller and still have it be usable for general use.
Why does my laptop need to throw off so much heat, eg. have such high power consumption to begin with?
All that heat was generated by your battery which of course is ticking down several multiples faster than it should as a result. Cooler laptop = longer battery.
It won't DO anything though. Automotive 'coolant' is no better than water at conducting heat. What it's for is to RAISE the boiling point for the water so the water doesn't evaporate (engines run at above 100C/boiling pt.). Adding salt to your 'laptop water' would do more for it than pumping in ethelyne glycol (car coolant).
'Coolant' is a total misnomer, all it does in a car is flow in a circle from the engine (heat generated) to the radiator (heat expelled to air) and back again. The green stuff (artificially dyed to let you know it's poisonous/leaking) just keeps the water from boiling in the process (and inhibits some corrosion by balancing out the acid in the water).
"Sometimes, I think Trent just needs a cup of hot chocolate and a blankie." -Tori Amos on Nine Inch Nails
On the other hand, the heat still has to go somewhere, and these devices will only help move it around. In a laptop there isn't much real estate where the heat could be dumped, though it helps if these technologies are used to spread the heat into a larger area to reduce the temperature.
But the conventional systems are a bit strange in having the CPU in the middle of everything, while the heat needs to be moved to the edges. Can you imagine a motherboard with the CPU on the 'wrong side' so that it could be directly against the case?
Escher was the first MC and Giger invented the HR department.
What I would like to see in laptop: heat radiated from the panel top and not the base.
'nuf said.
Since at least the mid-1980's my Advanced Projects Reasearch Team has been trying to build computers that will produce espresso coffee. We have managed to build an espresso coffee machine that can compute, but that is not enough. Besides, it gets depressed and decided to make tea instead. Now we can simultaneously cool the mobile computing platform _and_ generate the 100 bars of pressurized steam required to produce a foamy, rich espresso.
I just hope HP and Lexmark do not sell the coffee capsules, or they will end up costing more than luxury champagne.
Ceci n'est pas une signature
With a water cooler in my laptop - does this mean that people will start hanging out in my cubicle to chat? When will they hook up a coffee filter to that thing and make some java while the system is booting up....
I'm against being for anything.
As an owner of a 12" powerbook, I'd have to say the real culprit for the heat is the fact that the case (at least part of it) is made from the same metal that's used in great abundance in really nice cookware. Aluminum is a wonderful conductor of heat.
One of the things I like about the 12" powerbook is Apple's unintended Icy Hot (tm) effect: after an hour of intense typing, it kind of feels soothing to rest my wrists on the area below the keyboard that gets really warm.
Ergonomica Auctorita Illico!
Those were under the heading "Features of the conventional water-cooling system"
And, yes, they were in bold type in the article, too. Right above the text you quoted.
Battery life (and generally heat) often have a direct relation to how "powerful" a computer is. Faster CPU, uses more juice. Bigger screen, brighter, fancy colours... sucks more power.
Arguing an old 486 or less CPU against a modern Athlon/Pentium is like wondering why your 150W bulbs give you a higher power bill over the 40W ones.
Of course, modern CPU's also seem to be very inefficient, with large amounts of power being (presumably) lost as heat. As cores, etc improve we should see heat decrease in relation to efficiency?
I work on laptops at my job and I see alot of mistreated laptops. Most people, but not all, don't seem to realize that just because it's portable doesn't mean you can toss it around like a pillow. Is it really smart to put something this fragile in a machine and sell it to the general public? I've seen screens ripped off, hinges broken and hard drive failures from shock because truck drivers like to velcro them down in the truck, and anything else you can think of from them being treated roughly. All we need is for mom to let the kids play on the laptop and boom, it crashes to the floor and water goes all over the place.
---- "Excuse me. Where's the children's gun section?"
Our office has experienced a lot of heat problems with Dell and Apple laptops (The Dells are actually fine as long as they aren't docked...the docking station covers up the air intake. Nice design Dell). Our Toshiba's and Fujitsus might get hot, but they don't require motherboard replacements after 18 months like some of the Dell and Apple machines. My Fujitsu Lifebook P-2110 doesn't get hot at all on the bottom... no fan either! Of course it runs a modest 900MHz Crusoe... so it's pretty sluggish compared to most of the toasters currently on the market. My advice to people is to stay away from high end processor speeds on new laptops... go for something that will run a little slower and cooler... but will last you much longer (and give you fewer burn marks on the legs).
Maybe if you re-read the article, you'd notice that what you quoted was not the new system.
So, in addition to melting to its own heatsink, my old AMD processor can boil water?
I wonder if water cooling is useful for making quieter portable data/video projectors?