IBM Doubles CPU Cooling Capabilities With Simple Manufacturing Change

In its current form, the process is quite inefficient: IBM’s says that up to 40% of a CPU’s total thermal budget (i.e., the cooling capacity available to draw heat away from the core) is consumed by these particles. This inefficiency is made worse because the particles aren’t truly spread evenly throughout the paste. Instead, particles clump together, forming what IBM refers to as the “Magic Cross”, as shown below at Figure 1. This thickened area is a non-homogeneous mixture of paste and particles that dramatically worsens total cooling efficiency across the core.

We finally have a breakthrough worthy of getting excited over, because it’s potential of actually being implemented is high. I’ll let the article explain the method, but it’s a small change that could effectively double the cooling ability of the IHS. If this design is as good as IBM says it is, it would be very likely to see AMD and Intel jump on board quick.

Source: Ars Technica