With the voltage level of digital logic devices decreasing, shouldn’t the thermal challenges decrease as well? Tony Koryban received just such a question and, predictably, has a very thorough answer:
Dear Thermal Pessimist,
Isn’t your job actually getting easier day by day? It seems like every year the voltage level of digital logic devices goes down another notch. Years ago everything ran on 12V and 5V. Now you got your 3.3V logic family, your 1.8V stuff, and 0.5V is just around the corner. Isn’t the heat generated proportional to the square of the voltage drop? Pretty soon the power you deal with will be only 1/100th as much as your grandpappy handled back in the good ol’ days of TTL (Twentieth Thentury Logic). Why be so pessimistic, except about your job security?
Pollyanna, Cape of Good Hope?
So what do you think? Tony has his own point of view, which you can read by clicking over to Tony Koryban Mailbag Archives.