Fluent Releases Icepak 4.0 Electronics Cooling Simulation Software

NEW VERSION EXTENDS TIME-TO-SOLUTION LEAD; FEATURES NON-CONFORMAL MESHING

July 1, 2002, Lebanon, NH, Fluent Inc., world leader in computational fluid dynamics (CFD) software, releases version 4.0 of its Icepakä electronics cooling simulation software. The newest version of Icepak delivers the industry's fastest time-to-solution through its combination of non-conformal meshing and unstructured meshing strategies, including assembly meshing. These technologies let the designer build a more computationally-efficient and accurate model faster than any other thermal management software package. According to Icepak Product Manager Dr. Rajesh Nair, "Icepak 4.0's new 'Assembly Meshing' retains geometric shape fidelity, improves accuracy by maintaining model detail, reduces mesh counts by 20-70%, and decreases solution time, design time and project costs."

The Detail, Without the Pain

Early adopters have been impressed with Icepak 4.0's non-conformal meshing. Dr. Sam Zhao, a senior engineer with Broadcom, explains that non-conformal meshing "is especially desirable for large electronic system simulations where detailed thermal models of devices are necessary for improved accuracy in junction temperature predictions." Dr. Zhao continues, "In a benchmark test using a telecom system thermal model, the problem cell count was reduced from over 1.2 million cells, to just over 300,000 cells with non-conformal meshing. The smooth transition from high cell density zones within and surrounding electronic components on the printed wire board, to low cell density zones in the free stream region, improves the resolution of solutions and reduces solution time for this test," says Zhao.

Jill Childers, a mechanical engineer with Metro-Optix, reports that "The one board set [simulation] went from a mesh count of 1,799,905 to 407,373 cells… The database that would have taken more than eight hours solved in two hours."

Productivity-Enhancements

Icepak 4.0 also introduces a new and highly intuitive user environment, which features a model manager, advanced object wizards, alignment tools and four-window simultaneous views:

Model Manager manages the creation, edits, replication, and other object functions; assemblies; libraries; and problem/project configurations and settings. Centralized model management allows the user to quickly and easily access different aspects of the model, and is particularly useful when handling large and complex models.

Advanced Object Wizards make it easy to build a complex model from scratch in minutes. The user creates ready-to-use heat sink configurations; IC packages, such as Plastic Ball Grid Arrays (PBGA), Tape Ball Grid Arrays (TBGA), Quad flat packages (QFP) and others; and can also create Printed Circuit Boards (PCBs); and fans with 3D housings and hubs.

Four-Window Viewing simultaneously displays complex 3D models from four viewpoints with on-screen iconic view controls to select viewpoints The user can manipulate the geometry, as well as post-processing views, from different angles since each of the viewports are independently controllable. This powerful visualization tool allows the user to quickly and efficiently view the results of simulations of complex models to make appropriate design decisions.

Pricing and Availability

Icepak 4.0 is available on UNIX, NT, and Linux platforms. It is provided at no additional cost to all current Icepak users who have chosen to purchase upgrades along with their Icepak licenses. Icepak license fees are determined by the number of processes that a user requires. Users may also purchase unlimited usage support.

About Fluent Fluent is the world's largest provider of computational fluid dynamics (CFD) software and consulting services. Fluent's software is used for simulation, visualization, and prediction of fluid flow, heat and mass transfer, and chemical reactions. It is a vital part of the computer-aided engineering (CAE) process for companies around the world and in almost every manufacturing industry. Using Fluent's software, product development, design and research engineers build virtual prototypes and simulate the performance of proposed and existing designs, which helps them to optimize, troubleshoot, scale-up, and retrofit. Use of CFD software reduces time-to-market by reducing the need for costly physical testing and prototyping.

Fluent's corporate headquarters are located in Lebanon, New Hampshire, USA. Fluent's European headquarters are located in Sheffield, England, with local offices in Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, and Sweden. Fluent's Asia Pacific headquarters are located in Tokyo, Japan. Its CFD software is also available around the world through joint ventures, partnerships, and distributors in Korea, Australia, Brazil, China, Taiwan, the Czech Republic, Middle East, and most European countries. Fluent is a subsidiary of Aavid Thermal Technologies Inc. Additional information on Fluent's products can be obtained on the World Wide Web at www.fluent.com or by e-mailing info@fluent.com. More information on Aavid Thermal Technologies is available at www.aavid.com.

Icepak is a joint development of Fluent Inc. and ICEM CFD Engineering.

FLUENT® and Icepakä are trademarks of Fluent Inc.

For more information, contact:

Paul Whalen 10 Cavendish Court Lebanon, NH 03766 603-643-2600 x666 pww@fluent.com