This is soooo cool...

[xmastree]

http://global.msi.com.tw/index.php?func=newsdesc&news_no=591

A CPU cooler where the fan is powered by the actual heat using the Stirling Engine (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stirling_engine) principle.

[Luke122]

That's actually a pretty neat idea, but I wonder how fast that fan will get spinning? Will it be sufficient to extract the heat from the cpu? Also, how many moving parts are we talking about here?

I've seen small fans used to circulate heat from wood burning stoves that use a peltier mounted between two heatsinks. When the heat from the stove heats up the bottom heatsink, it's trying to push through the peltier backwards, so it generates enough power to spin the fan.

[Braveheart]

i thought of this! lol i have had this idea for such a long time >_<

[NightrainSrt4]

Everything in that article shows the cooler cooling the Northbridge and makes no mention of being an adequate cpu cooler.

Edit: Direct quote

MSI presents the "Air Power Cooler" chipset cooler with ECO

Either way its neat. I am all for the power reduction, but all the little parts in it just make me think "oh one more thing to break down" type of deal. Cool nonetheless.

[Ap1thy]

that is cool, msi comes out with some awesome stuff

[xmastree]

Everything in that article shows the cooler cooling the Northbridge and makes no mention of being an adequate cpu cooler.
Damn, I missed that...

[TheGreatSatan]

I just don't see it moving enough heat compared to a decent heatsink/fan combo

[Quakken]

Well, the engine itself DOES use the heat of the CPU, but it probably doesn't do an adequate job of using the heat efficiently enough to be a viable CPU cooler.

But that's a pretty cool idea, maybe it could sit on top of a heatsink with a fan moving through it, using residual heat to do the job... let me explain.

http://i229.photobucket.com/albums/ee220/quakken/Heatthing.jpg

There is one of the heatfans sitting on top of the main CPU cooler. Using the residual heat to power the fan that goes through the duct to move air over the passive northbridge cooler to help cool the northbridge. How about that? Maybe even on the side of the CPU heatsink, whatever. It really would just be novel and help move air over the northbridge, while also helping to cool the CPU cooler a little bit.

[TheGreatSatan]

I think that this would be a viable cooling solution for the Northbridge, but not the Proc. At least not on a gaming machine and probably nothing single-cored.