MSI employs Stirling Engine Theory

[interman]

During a recent visit to MSI here in Taiwan, we learnt of an interesting and new technology which they are working on with another Taiwanese company called Polo-Tech. It all falls under their ECO friendly design program.

It is still very much a work in progress but from the working concept design we saw in action at the MSI HQ, it is probably not far off from becoming a reality – we hope so too. What are we talking about here anyway? Since power saving is such a hotly discussed topic, MSI has employed the Stirling Engine Theory to power a cooling fan without the need of conventional electricity.

Heat is transferred from the motherboard northbridge chipset and through the Stirling Engine Theory it is able to spin the cooling fan and cool down the heatsink. MSI commented that they would probably end up adding the world’s first powerless air cooler to an Nvidia motherboard, which everyone found rather amusing.

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Pretty much useless invention, but pretty neat regardless.

[Richard_Rahl]

Originally Posted by interman

Pretty much useless invention, but pretty neat regardless.

Neat indeed, but useless? I am not that certain about it. Sure, it is hardly possible to cool a gaming system this way, not even when the cooling system is at its top of refinement. But over a couple of years, this is a good piece of technology to use in low - and midrange desktops. Though I advise MSI to give it "support" in form of the current way of powering them. That is because Stirling engines need some time to gain enough speed, and need heat somewhere from to function.

[interman]

The typical fan it replaces would only use like 3 watts of power though