Word
heatsink
Definitions
01cooling component
n. a metal part in a computer or machine that takes heat away from hot parts to stop them from breaking.
n. a passive heat exchanger that transfers the heat generated by an electronic or mechanical device to a fluid medium, often featuring fins to increase surface area.
“The computer kept crashing because the heatsink was covered in thick dust.”
“High-performance processors require a substantial heatsink and thermal paste to maintain stable operating temperatures under heavy computational loads.”
Technical
02to equip with cooling
v. to add a cooling metal part to an electronic component.
v. to equip a component with a heat-dissipating device. Transitive — takes a direct object.
“The engineer decided to heatsink the new power supply to prevent it from overheating.”
“It is standard practice to heatsink any voltage regulator that is expected to dissipate more than a few watts of power during continuous operation.”
Technical
Synonyms
Etymology
A compound of the English nouns heat and sink. The term adapts the general scientific concept of a thermal sink, a reservoir that absorbs energy without a significant increase in its own temperature.
Etymology adapted from Wiktionary, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.
Domain
Scan code
englishreference.com/q/heatsink