Vapor chamber tech keeps iPhone 17 Pro cool

Post by thepryz » Sat, Sep 20, 2025, 7:57 PM UTC

cj wrote: post #32

Wistar wrote: post #3

Last night I encountered a 3 min+ ad on YT about the construction of the iPhone 17 Pro. A few seconds were devoted to the cooling system. I watched the whole thing. It was better than the video it interrupted. https://youtu.be/_-AS5DtDeqs?si=rTfubRDArVupqREt

Watching that video, the first thought I have is "So much engineering and I still need to buy a phone case with my new phone?" I'm guessing phone cases are still pretty much required if you drop your phone once or twice a month onto cement/asphalt/marble/etc from pocket height. I would be really curious to hear the internal debate at Apple wrt design tradeoffs + durability. E.g. how much of the iPhone design is only…

Post by jeroenhd » Sat, Sep 20, 2025, 8:00 PM UTC

orev wrote: post #36

Which most people are going to immediately cover with an insulating layer of plastic or silicone. At least the heat will be spread out from one spot (and into the battery?). All phone makers are doing what they can within the design constraints.

Post by lysace » Sat, Sep 20, 2025, 8:07 PM UTC

popol12 wrote: post #72

lysace wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My original iPhone (bought in June 2007 for competetive research) has started swelling and won't boot up. Still keeping it. Maybe I should store it in a bucket of sand though.

Open it, remove the battery and put it in a dedicated recycling bin.

Post by Aloisius » Sat, Sep 20, 2025, 8:18 PM UTC

0_____0 wrote: post #51

esperent wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Heat pipes are one dimensional (a pipe), vapor chambers are two dimensional (a square chamber). Most vapor chambers I've seen on GPUs have the chamber attached to lots of small heat pipes on the side though (they even note this in article, in case you feel like reading it). That said, I assume the main technical breakthrough here is in manufacturing, producing tiny chambers consistently in enough volume for iphones.

Any passive phase change thermal solution is doing the same thing - take thermal energy from one place, and distribute it for dissipation. My point is that the geometric configuration isn't that important, it's doing the same work the same way. Not really worth arguing about, I just suspect that the branding people love that they had a new buzzword in "vapor chamber" to bandy about. I liked this article from 10 years…

Post by whatevaa » Sat, Sep 20, 2025, 8:19 PM UTC

bapak wrote: post #18

amelius wrote: post #10

Why the emphasis on Apple when Samsung was there first? It looks like the competition is making them sweat (pun intended).

Samsung is not Apple. Relatively no one cares about Samsung outside Korea.