Computer heat sinks, such as fin arrays and heat pipes, are much larger than silicon chips and are continuing to grow in size. This trend is driven by the increasing chip heat generation rates and has serious implications for overall system performance. The large volume of existing heat sinks causes discrete memory, video, and power-delivery components to be crowded away from … [Read more...]
Thermal management of highly integrated electronic packages in avionics applications
The packaging and thermal management of electronic equipment has become an important issue because of increased power levels and the simultaneous miniaturization of the devices. With the advent of denser device packaging and faster intrinsic speeds, cost, reliability and size have been improved, but, unfortunately, packaging and thermal management have not followed at the same … [Read more...]
Future trends in heat sink design
In today's electronics equipment, total system dissipated power levels are increasing with every new design. Increases in power levels combined with the market expectation of reduced package sizes lead to heat problems that, if uncontrolled, can significantly shorten the life of the electronics. Although this "increased power - decreased size" scenario has been prevalent for … [Read more...]
Natural convection modeling of heat sinks using web-based tools
Heat transfer in electronic packages is a complex problem involving a network of resistive paths for the various laminated structures, bonding adhesives, lead frames, and attachment mechanisms, such as ball grid arrays. However, despite the multitude of materials and interfaces within an electronic package, the largest thermal resistance, and consequently the controlling … [Read more...]
Heat pipe fundamentals
The use of heat pipes in thermal management is increasing rapidly as power densities in electronics continue to rise. Heat pipes are attractive because they can typically carry 100 or more times as much heat as an equivalent piece of solid copper. The basic principle of heat pipe operation is very simple. A small amount of working fluid, typically water, is sealed inside a … [Read more...]
