AMD Tested The Idea Of Vapor Chamber Inside CPU Heat Spreader In Ryzen 7000 Prototypes
AMD Tested The Idea Of Vapor Chamber Inside CPU Heat Spreader In Ryzen 7000 Prototypes
The AMD Ryzen 7000 series CPUs introduced a very unusual shape that looks like a spider – but it turns out there’s more to the story behind this venerable piece of metal that helps transfer the heat away from the chip. It turns out the company delved into the idea of vapor chamber within the chip itself, given the ever increasing presence of such cooling systems seen in laptops and smartphones alike.
The heatspreader development dated all the way back to before Covid was even a thing, and this was disclosed by Gamers Nexus as the team paid visit to AMD’s thermal labs revealing various types of prototype designs in the development of Ryzen 7000. The chip maintains the same dimension as the preceding Socket AM4 chips, which AMD reasoned with the idea to maintain cooler compatibility and facilitate an easier upgrade path for existing AMD users.
However, while it sounds plausible on paper, the reality is not quite ideal. The vapor chamber barely improved the thermals, measuring just 1°C between it and the standard IHS design. It had also caused momentary thermal spikes beyond normal limits during sustained workloads during the testing process, making the idea impractical for real-world use. They concluded that the choice of coolers on top of the chip remain the bigger factor in keeping the thermals in check.
GamersNexus has published two videos surrounding AMD’s tour so far – the first of which discussed the backstory of the very prototype Ryzen chip and how the entire company betted itself on it on a Hail-Mary attempt to keep the company afloat. You can watch the part 1 here and part 2 below (timestamped):
Source: Videocardz
Pokdepinion: A very interesting look behind the curtains of AMD’s CPU designs.
