Sony PlayStation 5 Teardown Video: Massive Heat Sink To Keep It Cool?

Sony has shared a teardown video of the PlayStation 5, the upcoming high-end gaming console. The teardown is done by the head of Sony's mechanical design -- Yasuhiro Ootori, and it reveals a lot of interesting features about the console.

The video reveals that the entire back panel of the PS5 is designed for air out and it works as an exhaust. The base of the PS5 is held down by a single screw, and it can be used both in the horizontal and vertical orientation.

PS5 Design And Hardware

There is a single but a 120mm massive fan on top of the console that sucks the air from both directions. The side panels of the console are held on by clips and can be easily removed by sliding them. There is also a massive heatsink that sits directly on top of the processor to help with heat dissipation.

Sony claims that the heatsink on the PS5 is as efficient as a modern vapor chamber found on high-end laptops and computers. This is also the first console to use liquid metal cooling technology to keep the graphics card cool. The company claims to have made several tests to the longevity of this technology.

The liquid metal cooling uses a thermally conductive liquid that sits between the processor and the heat sink. According to Sony, the PS5 should run quieter than the PS4, thanks to the heat sink and the liquid metal cooling technology.

The teardown reveals that the PS5 comes with an SSD storage solution with a memory controller, and users will be able to add an additional PCIe 4.0 SSD for additional storage expansion. The entire console is designed in such a way that it is easy to service and repair with most components being modular. Even the GDDR6 video memory is soldered onto the motherboard just like the CPU and the GPU.

For the unaware, the PS5 comes in two variants. The base model without an optical drive, which retails for $399, and the standard model with a Blu-ray optical drive for $499. Both models offer 1TB SSD based storage and will be available from November 12 in select markets.