Fluid Flow

I just tested my second lap cooling system for my MacBook Pro. The bottom of the laptop is about 4 degrees cooler than version 1.0. I haven’t actually measured the temperature at the base of the cooling system, but I can guarantee that it will not burn your thighs.

Since no one knows what the hell I am talking about, I will backtrack a bit.

A little over a year ago, I was having trouble with my laptop overheating and crashing on me. This was a problem when I as on the road and trying to upload photos. I tried various cooling techniques from dry ice to this little USB powered external fan. Nothing really worked well and I ended up replacing my seven year old PowerMac with a MacBook Pro. It is a much more powerful machine.

But with that power comes lots of heat. And while the innards of the machine can take the heat, my thighs can’t. So I took a thin cardboard box, cut some holes out of it with my knife. Initially it was a passive cooling system, then I thought to attach the USB fan to the back of it. This was version 1.0 of the lap cooling system. While crude, it worked.

Then I found a slightly thinner box that has a footprint very close to my new laptop and decided to use it for a more sophisticated lap cooler. In this case I actually made measurements before cutting the holes in the box and used a drill instead of a knife. Version 2.0 is born.

I like it! And it works.

This entry was posted on Monday, November 3rd, 2008 at 7:11 pm and is filed under Development Notes. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.