Friday, February 3rd 2023
4 kg Literal Hunk of Copper Cools a Core i9 Processor
An 8 lbs (roughly 4 kg) solid cylinder made of copper was used as a fanless heatsink to cool an Intel Core i9 processor. This isn't a heatsink in that it's made of extruded copper, but a literal hunk of copper that is used as raw material. The metal is both extremely malleable and ductile, so it's shipped in such cylinders. The best part—the contraption is surprisingly good at the job, with That-Desktop-User, the Redditor behind this feat, claiming 35 °C idle and 80 °C load temperatures. The processor is essentially a heat-source that's trying to heat up the entire block of metal (with much lesser surface area for heat-dissipation than a real heatsink), which is how temperatures are being held at only up to 80 °C.
Source:
That Desktop User (Reddit)
64 Comments on 4 kg Literal Hunk of Copper Cools a Core i9 Processor
Author said they tested it for 15min. This amount of copper has high heat capacity, however it will just gather it and heat up, but have no real means to dissipate it into the air. The temps might not be as low as ~80°C after a longer time, eg. 1h.
Big massive lump of metal absorbed heat, kin genius.
But for what it's worth
That silly image with that chunk of copper made me smile for a good minute :love:
Built to amaze idiots that never left their room or info-bubble.
Note the fact its a 'literal hunk' of copper, too. Literally, like, seriously, dude, woahhh. It just screams bottom barrel US 'language' skills.
It is a literal hunk of copper.
I'd like to see it hold 80 °C for a day, two days, etc. under full load, and then get back to room temperature.
My pot has been modified so it does a little better but you still can't just let it sit and run like that all day.
Even as a huge hunk of copper with it's large thermal capacity it will eventually become thermally saturated and that's when things get "Spicy" in terms of thermals seen.
Not that anyone cares. :roll: :roll:
Just saying, mine was better and more newsworthy. Eat shit laptop cooling manufacturers! :rockout::rockout::rockout::rockout::rockout:
Such as it is, it's just misleading and stupid.
Even if the stored heat would somehow dissipate into air (although a 4 kg copper cylinder has to small an area for that), even the material itself costs above 30 EUR. Add machining, attacment hardware - and you stll have a "hunk" that can potentially crack your motherboard or CPU with a small mistake.
Your thing - Not mine and leaving it at that.
If I had a copper slug and some machining equipment I could improve on what's seen for better thermals with a chunk of copper like that.
I'm also wondering how much they had to pay just to get a copper slug like it.
What a hunk.
You could get a proper cooler for the price of that block of copper and then some.
Online calculators calculate that about 20 watts can be dissipated by natural convection. An undervolted i9 could do some reasonably useful work at that power, it's in the range of U-series processors. If you keep the rig right under your nose you can improve that to maybe 40 W by just breathing into it.
Just think of potential savings if you build an equally capable PC with a Pentium instead of an i9.
(The parameters I took: height = 200 mm, diameter = 60 mm, hunk temp = 100°C, ambient temp = 20°C, ignoring the effect of motherboard on air flow)Water would be roughly equally effective if you look at heat capacity per unit volume.
Literally, just a hunk. Not a literal hunk. There is no literally sexually attractive hunk either :)
And after 15 minutes you can make breakfast as long as you have a frying pan and some eggs on hand.