new to netwinder

[Ralph Siemsen]

On Sun, Jul 29, 2007 at 11:22:10AM +0200, janrinze at home.nl wrote:

> I have changed the shape of the holes in front of the fan with a dhremel..
> the noise was less.. but this netwinder has ran about 9 years non-stop..
> so actually the fan wasn't all that bad.. :-)

Yes, the really early models had sharp corners (the vents tapered
to a sharp point) making a very annoying whistling sound.  Dremel them
out, or stick round paper circles over them, to reduce the sound.
The next generation of rear-panels had fully-rounded corners, this
cut the noise somewhat.  If one also uses "fand" to control the fan
speed dynamically, it is quite tolerable.

> brings the question.. who has done the heat-design of he case?
> and have they used any CFD software to model the flow?

Doubt it.  Before the NetWinder, Corel had a product called the
"Video Console" which used the same plastic shaped case, just it
was thinner.  If you look at the edge of the netwinder, and notice
there are two seams that run all around, will imagine it without
the plastic between the two seams.  That was the size of the Video
Console, and of course it had far less electronics inside it, so
no forced cooling was necessary.

> Looks like a little 'Netwider revival' meeting on this list :-)

Was bound to happen sooner or later :)

-R