[Coco] Heat management 101

[Rogelio Perea]

Was doing my daily Ebay stroll and came up to this:

http://tinyurl.com/5ts8rls

How bad could it be inside that CoCo to have the case "modded" like so for
ventilation? That is an avant-garde vents job.

I have a similar CoCo with the full 64k setup and while it gets warm during
regular use, I have not seen through all the years something that would
concern me to try something to manage heat build up. The CoCo in the auction
seems to have a video adapter board, even so I don't think such expansion
would make the CoCo run way hotter... could be wrong.

While on the subject of ventilation, years ago I added the second drive to
my FD-502 system and as it was a self procured upgrade it didn't came with
the cooling fan as the Radio Shack package did. I remember back then keeping
a close watch at the disk power supply the first weeks of use, eventually I
saw no need to install the fan and it has been like so ever since - even
under heavy OS9 LII use the power supply manages with room to spare.

The only mod I have done on heat concerns was in the CoCo 3: which after
installing the 512k RAM expansion there was a noticeable increase in the
heat output through the top vents, so I added one thin fan underneath the
keyboard to help in bringing in some air circulation from the bottom vents.
It has helped.




-- RP