The world's first carbon-based CPU cooler

[FghtinIrshNvrDi]

Serra, it's not a 120mm fan. It's a new style of fan that gigabyte has been using in their coolers. They're astoundingly quiet and are more of a tower shape instead of a traditional fan that moves air in one direction. Like I said, I've used one.

Ryan

[Iconyu]

Serra, it's not a 120mm fan. It's a new style of fan that gigabyte has been using in their coolers. They're astoundingly quiet and are more of a tower shape instead of a traditional fan that moves air in one direction. Like I said, I've used one.

Ryan

The fans they've been 'stealing' from model electric jet turbines?

[GIGAFAN]

I have gigabyte 3D cooler.The fan realy works.
Grafit is better heat conducter ,but it does have a flaw.It`s very easy to break ,and that much weight on grafitic base makes me VERY woried.Especialy if you have to tighten the screws ,to hold it.And the surfice of the base is easy to damage to.
Second is heat transfer between the base and the sink with the fan.The grafitic core ,and the fan are useless if this fails.

[DeltZ]

graphite layers must also be in line and parallel to conduct heat well i think. i.e. vertical layering opposed to horizontal. as there is weak forces between layers in graphite. Therefore it is only good in conduction under certain circumstances.

[SoF]

gonna have to take a look on it myself tomorrow.
really don't want to make any speculations about performance myself yet - everybody thinks, what he thinks before the first review

[Tony]

I love the way you get this all wrong, I just read this whole thread and was amazed by what some of you think of the cooler and of OCZ.

Anyway, I will explain briefly how this cooler is working.

1 the base is made from directional conductive graphite, we used this material 3 yrs ago but then it was to brittle...now we have a version that is strong enough for direct to CPU contact under pressure.

2 the base has micro channels that over lap each other...this is how we are able to extract so much heat.

3 the fluid is not water, we may use a special coolant but we could use an oil based coolant also.

4 The pump runs off the same impeller as the fan and is centrifugal....it is placed very close to the base and pumps directly on to it, the fluid then travells up the copper tubes to the fluid distribution manifold where it is distributed to the radiators.

5 The radiators have micro channles also, this means they transfer heat at an astounding rate, i have been told the transfer from the base to the radiators of heat under test was measured under a second and the same temp on the base is seen by the radiators...this means this cooler has an ultra high efficiency rating at heat removal.

6 The air cools the radiators on the way into the cooler and then on the way out...total cooling area on the unit here is 0.5M squared...we can make this smaller or bigger depending on how much heat we want to remove.

7 The radiators in the sample here are copper, we have decided to move to Aluminum though to save on weight....there may be a slight drop in thermal performance but its so slight you will never be able to measure it

8 Cooling performance is governed by the temperature of the air entering the unit....deltaT would remain constant for all tests but tested in a warm case will push the temps higher over a test on an open bench.

9 Regarding Cryo Z, units are in production, we are not showing it here but you will see it on sale in the USA soon.

[Movieman]

Tony:
Just to add a little:
graphite has been used in nuclear reactors for years for it's incredible abilty to absorb heat.
In the US it was used until liquid cooled reactors became the norm.
It was used in the Chernobyl reactors also.
No, it wasn't the cause of the meltdown.
I'd love to test one of these. Sounds like an excellent design.
Got 2 that will fit a socket 771 base?
I've got 2 cpu's that push 144w that will test the hell out of them!
PS: Keep the copper..

[Tony]

Tony:
Just to add a little:
graphite has been used in nuclear reactors for years for it's incredible abilty to absorb heat.
In the US it was used until liquid cooled reactors became the norm.
It was used in the Chernobyl reactors also.
No, it wasn't the cause of the meltdown.
I'd love to test one of these. Sounds like an excellent design.
Got 2 that will fit a socket 771 base?
I've got 2 cpu's that push 144w that will test the hell out of them!
PS: Keep the copper..

a copper unit this size is to heavy...trust me there is no difference in performance.

[Movieman]

a copper unit this size is to heavy...trust me there is no difference in performance.

I trust you cause you've probably seen the numbers.
now about those 771 mounts..I have 2 dual clover systems here running at 3200+ on air..One is going to water, the other stays on air..
Got a mount for those that will work and who do I mail the check to?

[unregistered]

This thread is really kind of funny ...

So here is a bit more insight: The WayCool technology has been licensed from OnScreen Technologies and we have built more than 50 prototypes over the last year for all kinds of application. This said, copper is reaching its limitations of thermal transfer capability with modern CPUs that run lower power than earlier generations but also have much reduced die area -- therefore higher area power densities than anything before. ... that is up to 200 W/cm2 under normal conditions and way more in overclocked systems.

The only materials that can handle that type of thermals are based on directional graphite, which is the material used in this water block. The design is proprietary and patent pending so I won't comment further.

The second key of the cooler design is the microchannel array contained in each of the heat exchangers. We have achieved designs of less than 1 mm thickness with approximately 80% of the structure being interleaved micro-channels that result in almost complete isothermicity across the entire cooling surface within fractions of a second.

The cooling fluid is moved through a pump - whichever design fits the application, regardless of whether it is a positive displacement, rotary or centrifugal pump or even ion charge pump for smaller units.

The combination of a very high thermal exchange with the heat source with an extremely efficient heat dissipation device that only needs very slow air movement is what this is all about. We built completely passive solutions for graphics cards already that even in a 1 slot form factor beat the crap out of dual slot fan solutions and those will hit the market also in the near future.

The pump and fan are driven by the same motor that can be completely immersed in the coolant - which in that case can also act as noise suppressor for the bearings and as lubricant, similar to dynamic fluid bearings in HDDs.

Since I have spent overall about 3 years in the R&D leading to this prototype, I know very well what it can do and what not and whatever is made public about the technology will hold up.

Regards,

Michael

[Ubermann]

Amen

[Movieman]

Unregistered:
Thanks for the added info!

[Dimitriman]

Seems like a hell of a cooler,
any idea about average retail price at launch?

[Dimitriman]

BTW I think the transparent plastic top doesn't complement well the looks of the rest of the cooler, maybe retail top could be spiced up a little with some carbon fiber looking design? Or at least some color like dark blue.. (just opinion)

How heavy is the copper model being shown in display?

[bing]

Thanks Tony and Michael for the brief insight.

I guess the thermal resistance must be <= 0.11 C/W at say like 100 Watt with "reasonable" noise level ? .. or better < 0.1 C/W

Of course its only makes sense that it must be better than current air champions, especially at the enough economic scale for that new manucfacturing methodologies and new material too.

C'mon share some secret numbers as a teaser for all of us !

[Vapor]

Does CLP eat the carbon? I'm imagining the combo of the two being very potent

[Movieman]

Thanks Tony and Michael for the brief insight.

I guess the thermal resistance must be <= 0.11 C/W at say like 100 Watt with "reasonable" noise level ? .. or better < 0.1 C/W

Of course its only makes sense that it must be better than current air champions, especially at the enough economic scale for that new manucfacturing methodologies and new material too.

C'mon share some secret numbers as a teaser for all of us !

If they will take a 160w quad core and keep it in the 50's it's a winner from my perspective..

[bing]

If they will take a 160w quad core and keep it in the 50's it's a winner from my perspective..

Yeah, agree. But again thermal resistance will vary on different wattage level, but imo it is safe enough to assume the target market set for initial is for dual core which is around 100W.

[unregistered]

The biggest problem will mot likely be the IHS because it is not plane in most cases and further, the interface is low temp solder that has a much lower conductivity than anything else in the therml path. We have experimented with fully liquid immersed chips as well but we need cooperation from the chip manufacturers on that front.

That's the main reason why I really don't want to say anything about the final junction temperatures that we can achieve ... it'll depend on the specific chip in question ... not even the model

[arisythila]

not all that great iirc.


Frank M- water boils at 100c, assuming standard pressure. i promise you the cpu can take well above that before melting. and the pcb and it's components would burn before anything actually melts

Also the Epoxy that they use on mainboards and stuff will burn before the fiberglass.

~Mike

[Anavel0]

I for one am glad to see some new ideas in the processor cooling world. For too long we've only seen larger and larger heatsinks, unless you go to water cooling and their market is getting stagnant also. Must admit I am very suprised to see that it is OCZ that is bringing out the new ideas. Maybe the industry just needed someone to think outside the big shiny copper box.

I'd like to get my hands on one of these as I'm crazy about thermal performance. Even though I'm running a stock A64 4000+. I'm also very curious about the dBa performance of the unit.

Glad to see OCZ coming up with ideas outside of memory. OCZ has always felt like an enthusiast company to me, and what better way to reach out to that market even more then to start making products for other aspects of the enthusiast market as well.

[XS Janus]

Good to see the OZC guys finnaly step up and clear the thread of speculations. I kenw they were laughing in the background these past few days.
I looks like really good cooler. A lot of R&D went in it. Idea implementation sure doesn't strike me as something someone just woke up with.
________
Mercedes-Benz Slk-Class

[Richard Dower]

Graphite and nuclear reactors?!...so are our PC's like gonna explode when they heat up???

:-)

[Serra]

I am glad to have some word from OCZ on the more specifics of the inner workings, it has certainly cleared up a lot of confusion. I would still like to see a more detailed schematic, but it's sounding much better than I had previously feared.

[gdogg]

Graphite and nuclear reactors?!...so are our PC's like gonna explode when they heat up???

:-)

lol, nuclear reactors cannot explode, they can only melt down. Same for a cpu.

Wow they really resemble each other.