GordonThree, thank you! That rule of thumb you quoted is going to help me. I am considering buying a copper CPU heatsink and mounting as many (6 max) chips on the CPU pad. I purchased some thermal adhesive but I do not know how it compares thermal transfer wise to old-fashioned zinc oxide past and drilling micro holes for #2 screws.
I also need to conjure up somewhere a micro 12 volt to 5 volt DC to DC converter for the CPU heat sink fan. Yeesh, if I end up throttling back on watt/minutes with an LED dimmer I wonder how this is going to affect the DC to DC converter. Will it throttle back as well or end up cycling.
Availability and the Oops factor inhibit full scale tinkering. Fifteen hundred mile journey to fetch packages is a bit daunting.
