Samsung Galaxy Note 20 teardown reveals a big surprise

Samsung's Galaxy Note 20 is a beast of a phone.  But a new teardown by iFixit's experts — who tore down both the Note 20 and the Note 20 Ultra — reveal a "multi-layered graphite thermal pad" instead of the expected copper heat pipes.  Now, this wouldn't be so odd if it weren't for at least one earlier teardown of the same device, which revealed — you guessed it — copper heat pipes. It appears that Samsung is either testing out different cooling designs for the Note, or perhaps shipping slightly different Notes depending on the market.  No heat pipes to be seen. Image: ifixit In any case, there's no reason to believe that the graphite thermal pad-based cooling is any worse (or better) than a vapor chamber design with heat pipes. It's an interesting anomaly that we don't often see on high-profiles phones such as the Samsung Galaxy Note 20 and Note 20 Ultra.  Read more...More about Samsung, Samsung Galaxy Note 20, Tech, and Smartphones