Palit could be leading the “cooling revolution” for GPUs with hybrid system

Graphics card manufacturer Palit has teased new information about its upcoming GPU coolers promising a “cooling revolution” to come at Computex 2024. 

Announced via Twitter alongside a brief 12-second teaser, Palit tells consumers to “get ready for the future of graphics card cooling at Computex” as it’s “unveiling a new concept of graphics card thermal solution”. 

While there’s little concrete information to discern from the clip, what’s apparent is the new cooling solution will be found in the company’s Game Rock division which is making a comeback. The Guitar Hero-inspired branding remains as seen from the reinforced backplate, too.

What’s more interesting is the apparent small water chambers attached with large transparent screws which seem to be attached to the middle of the cooler. While only one side is showcased, it’s possible that the water blocks could be present on both sides. That’s an exciting development considering the triple fan cooler present.

If we were to guess, it appears as though the water blocks built into the side of the cooler may run a dedicated aqua pipe directly to the silicon which needs the most sophisticated cooling. As graphics cards get larger with the GPU processes getting smaller, there are more transistors in a smaller space, meaning increased heat output.

It’s not known yet whether this new hybrid system will be reserved for the new graphics cards made by AMD and Nvidia, although it’s been rumored we could hear from the manufacturers at Computex next month. If not the Radeon 8000 and RTX 50 series, then this hybrid system may be reserved for potential new 7900 XTX and RTX 4090 variants. 

A water cooling block for a GPU is nothing new, nor is the idea of combining the two as DIY water blocks have been sold to replace stock coolers such as what we’ve seen with the Phanteks Glacier and Corsair Hydro X series. However, this hybrid system could prove to be significantly more sophisticated in how it implements the water. 

Computex is scheduled for June 4 – 7 which means there are just over two weeks to go until everything kicks off. We’ve seen GPU coolers getting larger with the likes of the recently unveiled quad-slot XFX Radeon 7900 XTX Phoenix Nirvana, so the idea of strapping water blocks to the side of a GPU cooler could make sense here, too. 

GPUs are likely to get larger and hotter

As the die size of graphics processing units gets smaller as the number of transistors increases, the chips will likely run much hotter when under load. Over the past four years, we’ve seen a trend from 7nm down to a 5nm TSMC process which Nvidia and AMD both use, and this means the current generation of GPUs heat up a lot faster than their predecessors, which requires larger coolers to compensate. 

While unconfirmed by either AMD or Nvidia, it’s believed the die size will once again shrink. While this could be down to 4nm or even 3nm on the new RDNA 4 and Blackwell architecture respectively, one thing is for sure; advanced cooling will be needed to keep up. We’ll have to get used to GPUs with quad slot coolers, and now potentially even water blocks built in to keep those core temperatures at bay. 

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