News Diamond-cooled GPUs are coming soon — startup claims 20C temp reduction, 25% more overclocking headroom as it seeks US govt funding for diamond-enc...

[Admin]

Akash System signed a preliminary memorandum of terms with the U.S. Department of Commerce to secure $68.2 million to help it ramp-up operations for producing diamond-cooled semiconductors.

Diamond-cooled GPUs are coming soon — startup claims 20C temp reduction, 25% more overclocking headroom as it seeks US govt funding for diamond-enc... : Read more

 

[bit_user]

OMG, I can just imagine the clickbait headlines now... "Government wastes $Millions of tax payer money on diamonds".

I wonder whether they'll have any problems with the fragility of the substrate or difficulty in handling it.

In the worst case scenario, it could be a graft to get the government to buy a bunch of synthetic diamond, much of which would then be resold into the jewelry supply chain. I hope that's just my imagination running wild and there's more than adequate oversight to prevent such a scheme.

If it works as well as they're saying, and is practical to use, then I'd worry that this improvement in cooling efficiency will simply result in power limits being increased further and AI burning up the planet even sooner.

 

[3en88]

It's true that diamond is the best heat conductor but this doesn't solve the root problem which is heat generation in the silicon. It can take heat away faster sure but it's still the same amount of heat that the diamond needs to transfer to either air or water. The result is a lower temperature gradient between the silicon and the dissipating medium, a cooler chip, but if that's used to clock the chip higher then you will consume more energy and produce more heat that must be carried away. Scaling horizontally is probably more energy efficient and cheaper than a diamond cooling solution.

 

[BearRaid]

The sentence "Akash does not detail exactly how its diamond cooling technology works", directly under a video titled "Akash Systems - How Our Technology Works" is pure gold. It really doesn't explain anything other than the fact that diamond conducts heat well.

 

[bit_user]

Scaling horizontally is probably more energy efficient and cheaper than a diamond cooling solution.

You mean simply using more transistors? Nvidia has already maxed out the reticle size, which is why Blackwell is now using two compute dies. AMD has been multi-die since the previous generation (MI200). Not to mention that wafers on the latest nodes are very expensive and TSMC is now running its fabs at 100% capacity (I've not heard what their backlog is, but I'm sure its not small).

A company called Cerebras is even using basically entire wafers, but the tradeoff is that they each cost $Millions, and Cerebras has nowhere near Nvidia's production volume:

https://www.tomshardware.com/tech-i...cally-equivalent-to-about-62-nvidia-h100-gpus
​

So, obviously just using more transistors isn't really an option. That's why they're already clocked so far beyond the point of diminishing returns.

 

[TheHerald]

It's true that diamond is the best heat conductor but this doesn't solve the root problem which is heat generation in the silicon. It can take heat away faster sure but it's still the same amount of heat that the diamond needs to transfer to either air or water. The result is a lower temperature gradient between the silicon and the dissipating medium, a cooler chip, but if that's used to clock the chip higher then you will consume more energy and produce more heat that must be carried away. Scaling horizontally is probably more energy efficient and cheaper than a diamond cooling solution.

A 25c drop as the article claims will drop power draw a ton as well, leaving room for extra voltages / clockspeeds.

 

[Kamen Rider Blade]

If it works as well as they're saying, and is practical to use, then I'd worry that this improvement in cooling efficiency will simply result in power limits being increased further and AI burning up the planet even sooner.

I can gurantee you that is what most companies would prefer to do, even if it pushes the device way out of the maximum efficiency zone.

 

[Giroro]

The sentence "Akash does not detail exactly how its diamond cooling technology works", directly under a video titled "Akash Systems - How Our Technology Works" is pure gold. It really doesn't explain anything other than the fact that diamond conducts heat well.

I was skimming the article, and I read that line as "Akash does not know exactly how its diamond cooling technology works"

 

[JamesJones44]

A 25c drop as the article claims will drop power draw a ton as well, leaving room for extra voltages / clockspeeds.

Power draw from the datacenter and/or cooler, but the CPU power draw should be unaffected by the cooling solution.

 

[TheHerald]

Power draw from the datacenter and/or cooler, but the CPU power draw should be unaffected by the cooling solution.

Why though, dropping temps by such an amount reduces the chips power draw as well. Or to put it better, it makes it stable at same clocks with lower voltages

 

[redgarl]

Absolutely unnecessary...

Don`t tell me that it is the only thing they could came up with...

 

[gg83]

I can't wait to see if this actually works. Getting the diamond close enough to the chip might have been a big challenge.

 

[gg83]

OMG, I can just imagine the clickbait headlines now... "Government wastes $Millions of tax payer money on diamonds".

I wonder whether they'll have any problems with the fragility of the substrate or difficulty in handling it.

In the worst case scenario, it could be a graft to get the government to buy a bunch of synthetic diamond, much of which would then be resold into the jewelry supply chain. I hope that's just my imagination running wild and there's more than adequate oversight to prevent such a scheme.

If it works as well as they're saying, and is practical to use, then I'd worry that this improvement in cooling efficiency will simply result in power limits being increased further and AI burning up the planet even sooner.

It could keep Intel in the game longer.

 

[JamesJones44]

Why though, dropping temps by such an amount reduces the chips power draw as well. Or to put it better, it makes it stable at same clocks with lower voltages

Ah, I see where you a going now. Yes, lowering the voltage could result in lower power draw if everything remains stable.

 

[bit_user]

Ah, I see where you a going now. Yes, lowering the voltage could result in lower power draw if everything remains stable.

But datacenter GPUs are almost certainly either power or thermally-limited. So, whatever savings they get would just be used to clock them higher. The end result will be the same or more power consumption.

 

[DS426]

It's true that diamond is the best heat conductor but this doesn't solve the root problem which is heat generation in the silicon. It can take heat away faster sure but it's still the same amount of heat that the diamond needs to transfer to either air or water. The result is a lower temperature gradient between the silicon and the dissipating medium, a cooler chip, but if that's used to clock the chip higher then you will consume more energy and produce more heat that must be carried away. Scaling horizontally is probably more energy efficient and cheaper than a diamond cooling solution.

Heat dissipation takes a multi-faceted approach, and like it or not, we're going to have chips that consume records amount of power going into the next decade. At least we're looking at an improvement in pulling heat away right at the source, though I agree that given the expense, that's why this solution is being targeted at military, space, AI datacenters, and some special applications.

 

[Tonet666]

So people now can wear as neckless their gpu/cpu and brag that they are dimonds ?

 

[hotaru251]

diamond in tech sphere needs treated as what it is..a rock.

Diamond industry's scam of value of diamond in jewelry sphere shouldnt be allowed to penetrate their value in tech sphere else you will add inflated cost for un-needed reason.

 

[bit_user]

So people now can wear as neckless their gpu/cpu and brag that they are dimonds ?

We're already half way there.

https://www.etsy.com/listing/1546051606/space-tech-necklace-with-ic-chip-large
​

 

[bit_user]

diamond in tech sphere needs treated as what it is..a rock.

Industrial diamonds have been around for a long time, usually employed in cutting and sanding applications.

Diamond industry's scam of value of diamond in jewelry sphere shouldnt be allowed to penetrate their value in tech sphere else you will add inflated cost for un-needed reason.

I think you needn't worry about that. This tech isn't being sold to consumers, but rather chip engineers who are making rigorous cost/benefit decisions.

Speaking of consumer products, we have diamond-enhanced thermal paste and while I can't say its price isn't at least a little inflated by the notion that it contains diamonds, it's certainly cheap enough to be affordable for most PC builders.

 

[wwenze1]

Looks like it may be true under certain circumstances (e.g. smartphones) but probably not with high-power GPUs already pressed against heatpipes

I'd comment more if they start posting actual product pictures instead of some random AI-generated motherboard thing

 

[80251]

Maybe we'll see this story revisited in American Greed.

 

[Heiro78]

OMG, I can just imagine the clickbait headlines now... "Government wastes $Millions of tax payer money on diamonds".

I wonder whether they'll have any problems with the fragility of the substrate or difficulty in handling it.

In the worst case scenario, it could be a graft to get the government to buy a bunch of synthetic diamond, much of which would then be resold into the jewelry supply chain. I hope that's just my imagination running wild and there's more than adequate oversight to prevent such a scheme.

If it works as well as they're saying, and is practical to use, then I'd worry that this improvement in cooling efficiency will simply result in power limits being increased further and AI burning up the planet even sooner.

My problem is more why is government funding needed for companies to invest into this research instead of them investing their earnings into that research instead of paying higher amounts to shareholder/ investors through various methods. It's almost like the government money is being funneled to those same shareholders/ investors.

 

[bit_user]

My problem is more why is government funding needed for companies to invest into this research instead of them investing their earnings into that research

It's a startup. They have no earnings, because they have no product. They need investment in order to refine the technology to the point where it can be used in products. Only then will they actually have revenues.

Venture capital firms don't like to invest in basic research, which makes technology development hard to do. That's when it makes sense to have things like government grants. In some cases, government-backed loans make sense, which are a better & cheaper option for the taxpayer.

It's almost like the government money is being funneled to those same shareholders/ investors.

If government grants are helping either develop an industry or avoid being at the mercy of having it be controlled by a foreign government, then the return-on-investment makes sense. That's definitely what spurred CHIPS, as too much of the semiconductor supply chain was concentrating in East Asia.

We're agreed that government shouldn't generally be throwing money at companies and industries that are non-strategic or already profitable on their own. When I say "throwing money", I include tax breaks, which is an easily-overlooked form of government spending and currently benefits many industries that don't really need it.

 

[Heiro78]

It's a startup. They have no earnings, because they have no product. They need investment in order to refine the technology to the point where it can be used in products. Only then will they actually have revenues.

Venture capital firms don't like to invest in basic research, which makes technology development hard to do. That's when it makes sense to have things like government grants. In some cases, government-backed loans make sense, which are a better & cheaper option for the taxpayer.


If government grants are helping either develop an industry or avoid being at the mercy of having it be controlled by a foreign government, then the return-on-investment makes sense. That's definitely what spurred CHIPS, as too much of the semiconductor supply chain was concentrating in East Asia.

We're agreed that government shouldn't generally be throwing money at companies and industries that are non-strategic or already profitable on their own. When I say "throwing money", I include tax breaks, which is an easily-overlooked form of government spending and currently benefits many industries that don't really need it.

Thanks for the thorough explanation. I thought this company was just another highly invested one. Have a good one