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Liquid Metal Cooling in New ATI Video Card

Posted by timothy on from the not-that-that's-excessive-or-anything dept.

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."

3 of 335 comments (clear)

  1. I can't figure out what might be in it by Beryllium+Sphere(tm) · · Score: 4, Interesting

    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".

  2. Re:Gallium by WhatAmIDoingHere · · Score: 5, Interesting

    "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.

    --
    Not a Twitter sockpuppet... but I wish I was.
  3. Metal?! Ah, I see why... I think? by TerranFury · · Score: 3, Interesting

    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...