a stupid but curious question

[Evatron]

one thing i noticed with a lot of heat sinks is the interesting design. so sure, i understand if you space out plates of metal like a grill it disperses the heat better, but then i thought: wouldnt the most practical heat sink just be a big **** off block of steel? i mean for as something as small as a CPU a solid chunk of metal against it would be plenty right?

 

[Evatron]

No. You need surface area to move heat to the air.

A block of steel would soak up a lot of heat but you'd not be able to move heat to the air much so it'd just get silly hot over time.

fair point. it would be interesting to experiment with shapes to disperse the heat while still keeping it as 1 solid material.