It's why some notebooks generate a lot of heat.
The strange phenomenon of laptop heat dissipation
In the field of notebooks (including thin and light laptops and gaming laptops), it is easy to understand the difference in the heat dissipation capacity of different brands and models of machines, after all, there are inherent differences in molds and heat dissipation structures. However, if the heat dissipation effect between the same notebook is also high and low, this is beyond the cognition of many users: why does the same machine that looks the same have different heat dissipation?!
This is the strange phenomenon of laptop heat dissipation.
The origin of the heat source of the notebook
First of all, we need to know where the temperature that makes the notebook "enthusiastic" comes from.
There are many sources of heat inside a notebook, such as processors, discrete graphics cards, chipsets, memory, hard drives, wireless network cards, and batteries. However, the heat sources that can really make us feel (causing the keyboard area to be hot), or that will affect the function of the notebook (triggering the downclock) and stability (overheating restart or crash), are limited to the processor and the discrete graphics chip.
As for other chips or components, they also heat up during operation, but they are nothing compared to the big ones mentioned earlier. There is no need for a rated heat dissipation method, and there is no need to worry about these "small heat households" even if they work 24 hours ×a day, 7 hours a week.
Large fever households are also divided into three, six, nine and so on
In order to cater for users with different budgets and needs, notebook processors and graphics cards naturally need to be divided into three, six, nine, etc., but the higher the function, the greater the power consumption and heat generation, the formula must be eternal.
At this stage, notebook processors are mainly represented by Apollo Lake and Kaby Lake, and their representatives and correspondence are referred to the following table.
Considering that the field of notebook graphics cards is temporarily dominated by NVIDIA, the functions and power consumption of notebook graphics cards at this stage can be compared in the following table.
For notebook processors and graphics cards, TDP is directly proportional to functionality. For example, even the top-of-the-line Core i7-7Y75 is limited by 4.5W TDP, and its comprehensive functions are not as good as the Core i3-7100U (15W), while the Core i3-7100H (35W) can also win the Core i7-7500U.
However, there are exceptions to this for laptop graphics cards.
The GTX900M series mobile graphics cards are all under the Maxwell architecture built on the 28nm process, while the GTX10 series mobile graphics cards are derived from the Pascal architecture on the 16nm process, which has higher performance power and power-saving characteristics, so even if the TDP of the GTX1050 is very low, it can still outperform the GTX965M of higher TDP, which is the most obvious benefit of process and architecture upgrades.
In short, the higher the TDP of a notebook's processor and armed discrete graphics card, the higher the need for a higher power cooling module to reduce heat pressure.
If the power of the heat dissipation module is not enough to "suppress" the "enthusiasm" of large heat users, there will naturally be a risk of frequency reduction and various instability. The higher the power of the cooling module, the more perfect the notebook will be.
The question is, how to calculate and compare the heat dissipation power of the notebook?
The basic formula for the cooling power of a notebook
Limited by the constraints of the fuselage structure and thickness, whether it is a thin and light laptop or a gaming laptop, the planning and operating principle of everyone's heat dissipation module are roughly the same, which is a combination of heat sink + heat pipe + heat dissipation fin and turbofan that covers the appearance of the chip.
The heat is first conducted to the heat sink on the mask chip, then transferred to the heat dissipation fins by the heat pipe, and finally blown by the turbofan to the fins, which take away the heat through the heat exchange between the cold air and the fins, and then reach the intention of temperature control.
Through the principle of gas-→-solid heat exchange, we can roughly obtain a formula: heat dissipation module power = temperature difference× fin area × airflow velocity.
Through the formula, we can get three solutions to improve the heat dissipation ability of the notebook: (1) increase the temperature difference between the fins and the air, (2) increase the area of the heat dissipation fins, and (3) add airflow velocity.
To cater to users of all budgets, each notebook will offer sub-versions with different processors, memory, hard drives, and graphics cards
If this condition is established, the version with i5+ GTX1050 configuration must have better heat dissipation than the version with i7+ GTX1060, because the heat and power consumption of i5 and GTX1050 are significantly lower than those of i7 and GTX1060.
If you think so, you couldn't be more wrong. Considering that thin and light laptops and gaming laptops belong to different consumer groups, we will also discuss these two types of products separately below.
The difference in heat dissipation of thin and light laptops
Nowadays, thin and light laptops are pursuing "weight loss", with the addition of ultra-narrow bezel elements, the 13.3-inch thin and light notebook has broken through the blockade of 1.2kg weight, and the 14-inch thin and light notebook has generally fallen below the 1.5kg mark, and the portability has made great progress compared with the earlier products. In order to take care of different consumer groups, many popular thin and light laptops will provide integrated graphics and independent graphics versions, and there are iterative updates. All of the above is the main reason for the difference in heat dissipation of the same thin and light notebook.
There is no way, now notebook sales are declining, and the profit margin of stand-alone machines is gradually decreasing. For OEMs, "if you can save it, you can save it" has become the first element, and the heat dissipation of the integrated display/low-configuration version of the notebook is "enough", and only the high-configuration version can enjoy the "small stove" that strengthens heat dissipation.