Despite rampant increases in power dissipation, the use of liquid for cooling electronics remains sporadic. Air cooling continues to be the dominant mode for most electronics applications. Higher power dissipation in ATCA enclosures, PICMG telecomm chassis, medical electronics, laser equipment, etc. mean that a single fan is no longer adequate to provide the airflow required for system thermal management. Therefore, an aggregate of fans in a tray is required. Figure 1 shows varied examples of fan trays used for different electronic systems.
Figure 1: Different Fan Trays Used in Electronic Systems (source: various)
Fan Types
While only tube axial fans are shown in Figure 1, there are five broad categories of fans. These are:
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