Editing Computer cooling (section)

{{Short description|Process of removing waste heat from a computer}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=June 2020}}
[[Image:AMD heatsink and fan.jpg|right|thumb|A finned air cooled [[heatsink]] with fan clipped onto a [[Central processing unit|CPU]], with a smaller passive heatsink without fan in the background]]
[[File:ARCTIC Accelero Xtreme Plus II.JPG|thumb|A 3-fan heatsink mounted on a [[video card]] to maximize cooling efficiency of the GPU and surrounding components]]
[[File:Psfan01.jpg|thumb|[[Commodore 128#Commodore 128D|Commodore 128DCR]] computer's [[switch-mode power supply]], with a user-installed 60&nbsp;mm cooling fan. Vertical aluminium profiles are used as heatsinks.]]

'''Computer cooling''' is required to remove the [[waste heat]] produced by [[computer components]], to keep components within permissible [[operating temperature]] limits. Components that are susceptible to temporary malfunction or permanent failure if overheated include [[integrated circuit]]s such as [[central processing unit]]s (CPUs), [[chipset]]s, [[Video card|graphics cards]], [[hard disk drive]]s, and [[solid state drive]]s (SSDs).

Components are often designed to generate as little heat as possible, and computers and operating systems may be designed to reduce power consumption and consequent heating according to workload, but more heat may still be produced than can be removed without attention to cooling. Use of [[Heat sink#Microprocessor cooling|heatsinks]] cooled by airflow reduces the temperature rise produced by a given amount of heat. Attention to patterns of airflow can prevent the development of hotspots. [[Computer fan]]s are widely used along with heatsink fans to reduce temperature by actively exhausting hot air. There are also other cooling techniques, such as [[Water cooling|liquid cooling]]. All modern day processors are designed to cut out or reduce their voltage or clock speed if the internal temperature of the processor exceeds a specified limit. This is generally known as Thermal Throttling in the case of reduction of clock speeds, or Thermal Shutdown in the case of a complete shutdown of the device or system.

Cooling may be designed to reduce the ambient temperature within the case of a computer, such as by exhausting hot air, or to cool a single component or small area (spot cooling). Components commonly individually cooled include the CPU, [[graphics processing unit]] (GPU) and the [[Northbridge (computing)|northbridge]].
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