Sony PlayStation 5 teardown reveals liquid metal TIM, massive heatsink, and 120 mm double-sided fan are secrets behind its relatively cool operation

[Redaktion]

Sony has officially posted a teardown of the PlayStation 5 yesterday revealing the innards of the console. Highlights of the teardown include the ability for users to add an M.2 NVMe SSD, the mainboard itself, and the cooling mechanism. The PS5 is using a 120 mm double-sided fan to drive hot air away from the massive heatsink, which interfaces with the AMD Zen 2 SoC via a liquid metal thermal interface material.

https://www.notebookcheck.net/Sony-PlayStation-5-teardown-reveals-liquid-metal-TIM-massive-heatsink-and-120-mm-double-sided-fan-are-secrets-behind-its-relatively-cool-operation.497087.0.html

[Valantar]

... the size of that console  :o :'(

Also, that is an extremely complex assembly when compared to the XSX. Have to commend MS on the relative simplicity of their design. At least it's good that Sony went for a big fan, though given the radial design it's bound to be louder than the XSX under heavy loads unless the power draw is much lower (which it won't be, given the high clocks). Radial fans are always louder than axial fans, even when comparing a shitty axial fan to a great radial. Though radial fans have tons of static pressure to force air through dense heatsinks, which Sony is clearly making use of here with that massive hunk of metal.

The use of liquid metal is ... telling, though. It shows that Sony has clearly pushed this chip far past it's efficiency sweet spot, running it far closer to its limits than the XSX. On the other hand a smaller die is cheaper to make, so I guess Sony would be willing to swallow some RMAs due to heat and the added assembly cost of using exotic cooling if that allows them to save significantly on the SoC.