Graphic card design question

[Torquar]

Hi all, just an off the wall question about Graphics card design.

Since heat seems to be one of the bugbears of modern graphics cards, why dont they flip the pcb and have the fan/cooler array mounted on top of the gpu instead of underneath it?

Apologies if there is a well known or obvious reason why this isnt done .

 

[drak3]

Hot air tends to move up, therefore "below" it will be cooler. Furthermore, as the PCI slots are so close to the bridge it will interfere with the heat sink on the bridge. Finally, GPU process is shrinking more as the CPU and eventually the heat will go down as components get closer (we are talking nanometers, but it makes difference yes ) and thus lower voltage will be required and less heat produced.

 

[DJKahuna]

Hot air tends to move up, therefore "below" it will be cooler. Furthermore, as the PCI slots are so close to the bridge it will interfere with the heat sink on the bridge. Finally, GPU process is shrinking more as the CPU and eventually the heat will go down as components get closer (we are talking nanometers, but it makes difference yes ) and thus lower voltage will be required and less heat produced.

Actually, hot air moves from hot areas, to the coolest area. This is why you should have good airflow throughout your case with a fan intake at the front at the bottom. Hot air usually moves upwards because it's usually colder up there. But in a case when you have the CPU and memory at the top, it makes sense to put the HDD's and GPU at the bottom. If you mod your PCI area, and fit a fan there to exhaust hot air, you'd have ultimate cooling without going water cooling or peltier. Also, if you had another fixed to the bottom of the case in the middle, you'd get airflow all the way through along your VRAM and GPU and straight out the back. Does mean drilling holes or using a hot glue gun but may be worth it. So, in an edit from the matrix, there is no design problem.