Apple Hints At Future Liquid-Cooled Laptops

Lumenary7204 writes "According to the Register, Apple recently received US Patent Application No. 20080291629 for a 'liquid-cooled portable computer.' The filing describes a system where a 'pump ... coupled to the heat pipe is configured to circulate the liquid coolant through the heat pipe.' All claims of obviousness aside (after all, PC enthusiasts have been using liquid and phase-change cooling for years), the existence of the patent application seems to indicate that laptop manufacturers are in agreement with physicists and engineers who say we are running up against the practical limits of air-cooling such compact pieces of equipment."

Comments

Re:Oh my!

[Anonymous Coward]

"pump ... coupled to the heat pipe is configured to circulate the liquid coolant through the heat pipe."

Why does it seem like that should be followed by 'and shipped to your door in plain, discreet packaging'?

Because you're 14 years old and horny?

Re:Liquid Nitrogen

[Xiroth]

The university of Chalmers in Sweden has been experimenting with liquid Nitrogen for some time now and their solution (while not cheap) is extremely effective for cooling of small electronic devices. Give it some time and I'm sure this will made it into mainstream (and Abble may very possibly claim that they invented the thing as well).

I doubt it - that sounds like a miniture cryobomb to me. Depressurising liquid nitrogen (i.e. exposed to air) cools very, very fast, so if the device was ruptured it could cause some very nasty cold burns. This might be applicable in some limited circumstances, but the risk of costly litigation is too high for the general consumer market.

Wrong Direction

[lobiusmoop]

With the rise of netbooks, I think the laptop market is moving more towards smaller and more efficient, rather than big and powerful. I'd much rather see an ultra-portable Apple laptop that needs _no_ cooling assistance and gets 12-18 hours on a basic battery (so I can leave the power brick at home!) than another high-wattage crotch burner in the marketplace.

Re:Wrong Direction

[TheRaven64]

Considering that they bought a company that designs low-power chips, I wouldn't be surprised if you see this. Apple tends to divide its product lines into the consumer and pro models, where the pro models are very low-volume, high-margin and the consumer models are much higher volume (I wouldn't be surprised if something like the MacBook sells more units than any other laptop - Dell or Asus may sell a few times more laptops, but it's divided among a lot of product lines). This is the kind of thing you'd find in one of their pro lines. For their consumer lines expect something more like an iPod touch - 1-2GHz dual-core ARM SoC designed by former PA Semi people, same UI as the Touch, but a slightly larger screen and a keyboard.

What about weight?

[Anonymous Coward]

Presumably the weight of the liquid is greater than the weight of the fans - by how much I don't know

Re:This won't fly.

[Nerdfest]

It`s sad, but I think this should probably be modded informative rather than funny.

Apple is a corporation.

[argent]

Apple is a corporation. Corporations are by law required to be psychopathic money-hungry bastards (that's what the SEC regulations for public companies amount to). Don't attribute human emotions and motivations to corporations... corporations reflect ANY human attributes only in spite of what they are.

Setting that aside, the third reason for a patent is to provide defensive ammunition against the OTHER psychopathic money-hungry bastards that might use THEIR patent against you.

Didn't end well last time

[countach]

This didn't end well last time with most of the G5 Power Macs ending up leaking their coolant and destroying their insides.

Re:Liquid Nitrogen

[Anonymous Coward]

"Abble may very possibly claim that they invented the thing as well"

WTF is an Abble?

That's even lamer than Micro$oft, you should be ashamed.

Re:This won't fly.

[theaveng]

You hit the nail on the head. Everybody has, at one point or another, experienced liquid leaking from their water heater, or air conditioner, or car radiator. It creates a mess, an expensive repair, and a shorter operational lifespan versus an air-cooled device. ("My g5 liquid cooled computer...is leaking and dripped onto my power supply. I am looking at a little under a thousand dollars for repair...with less than 2 years of actual use.")

I'd much prefer choosing the air-cooled PC with no moving parts (except a fan), even if that means I only run at 3000 megahertz instead of 6000. All I do is surf the net or stream Heroes off nbc.com, and I'm happy to take a slightly slower "engine" inside my computer (just as my Honda Insight only has 67hp). I don't need a lot of power for my daily routine and neither do most people.

Re:This won't fly.

[theaveng]

Well the person I quoted in my post only had his computer for 3 years, as have many other PowerMac owners, and it already started leaking in just that short timespan, so your attempt to dismiss the problem so casually is an epic fail.

As for my avoidance of constant upgrades:

My Commodore 64 is over twenty years old, one of my laptops is about ten years, my second laptop is five, and my desktop PC is also five. If any of them were liquid-cooled, they'd likely be dead by now due to fluid leakage. Liquid cooling shortens lifespans faster than air cooling. Why do I keep things so long? One reason is because there are those of us who were not born with a silverspoon in our mouths, and therefore we have to economize and make things last rather than upgrade every other year.

The second reason is the same reason why I drive a 67 horsepower car; I don't need a pocket rocket either to get to work, or to surf the net. I don't buy into the whole "conspicuous consumption" idea that many Americans (including yourself) like to embrace. I think it's foolish and a waste and the key reason why our economy is hovering on the brink of a second Depression. You casually dismiss this as "fearmongering" but I call it intelligent budgeting. I'm proud to say that I have no debt; can you say the same?

Re:This won't fly.

[theaveng]

>>>pompous author.

Where's the "doesn't know how to make an argument without ad hominem attacks" tag?