Artist Puts Working PC in Old Coffee Maker
An artist and tech guy, Doug McDowell, has made the Coffeematic PC, a real computer put inside an old General Electric Coffeematic coffee maker from the late 1970s. The big thing here is that it doesn't just run programs, but it also makes coffee. That coffee then helps keep the system cool.
How the PC Works
The setup uses parts from the 2000s, like an ASUS M2NPV-VM board, 1 GB of DDR2 RAM, and a 240 GB SSD. He fixed these parts inside the coffee maker with a steel plate and stuff to keep it all in place. You can see all the parts because they are not hidden. The computer uses the Linux Mint OS.
Coffee Keeps it Cool
The cooling part works with the coffee maker like this:
- You put water in and heat it to 90°C.
- This hot water goes through a coffee filter, making coffee.
- The coffee moves in a loop, touching the processor, taking in the heat.
- It goes past two fan-cooled radiators.
- Then, the coffee hits about 33°C and goes back to start over.
Both things, the PC and the coffee maker, work well at the same time.
PC Runs Well
Even with its odd setup, the PC works well and stays stable. McDowell checked the heat every 5 seconds over a 75-minute test, finding the heat stayed at 33°C. His tests show that using coffee to cool it, though it seems crazy, works well.
On Display
The Coffeematic PC was shown at the Sparklines art show, which likes weird and wonderful PC setups. For this work, the creator looked into and wrote on all "coffee computers" known, finding five others including The Caffeine Machine from 2002 and Mr. Coffee PC. He saw a strange 15-year break between the first build and the ones after. He also said the coffee from his PC tastes like the 70s.
