Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

Safe temps

Commy1

Commy1

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Feb 25, 2013
728
73
Hey guys
So I just picked up an iMac 2011 21.5" with i5@2.53Ghz, the lowest tier iMac from 2011.
I bought iStat for my Macbook and am using it on this computer now as well, I need feedback as to what safe temps are for an iMac. Coming from a PC desktop with liquid cooling and 8 140mm fans... Case heat was never an issue.

For reference these are the temps I'm getting under light load with fan on Medium, they seem high to me:
CPU: 40-50C
GPU: 40-45C
LCD Prox: 45-50C
Power Supply: 50-70C

Hopefully you can get a rough picture of what these mean. I haven't stressed the computer too much yet, the most it's had to do was transfer a huge file of 300GB, but I wasn't paying attention to the temps then.

I ask this question because last night I attempted to install Windows through bootcamp, but somewhere along the line it corrupted everything and I had to do a complete reinstall of OSX and Time Machine Restore. I don't know how... This is a first for me, I followed all the instructions but it didn't end well.
After this ordeal the Mac started shutting down randomly, I reasoned it was temperature based as the hard drive is clean, there can't be anything on it to cause this.
In PC land, anything over 80 is dangerous but the product will still function. What is it in Mac world?

Edit: I'm guessing this is a stupid question as 500 people have seen this and had nothing to say XP
 
Last edited:
Dadioh

Dadioh

macrumors 65816
Feb 3, 2010
1,123
36
Canada Eh?
Commy1 said:
Hey guys
So I just picked up an iMac 2011 21.5" with i5@2.53Ghz, the lowest tier iMac from 2011.
I bought iStat for my Macbook and am using it on this computer now as well, I need feedback as to what safe temps are for an iMac. Coming from a PC desktop with liquid cooling and 8 140mm fans... Case heat was never an issue.

For reference these are the temps I'm getting under light load with fan on Medium, they seem high to me:
CPU: 40-50C
GPU: 40-45C
LCD Prox: 45-50C
Power Supply: 50-70C

Hopefully you can get a rough picture of what these mean. I haven't stressed the computer too much yet, the most it's had to do was transfer a huge file of 300GB, but I wasn't paying attention to the temps then.

I ask this question because last night I attempted to install Windows through bootcamp, but somewhere along the line it corrupted everything and I had to do a complete reinstall of OSX and Time Machine Restore. I don't know how... This is a first for me, I followed all the instructions but it didn't end well.
After this ordeal the Mac started shutting down randomly, I reasoned it was temperature based as the hard drive is clean, there can't be anything on it to cause this.
In PC land, anything over 80 is dangerous but the product will still function. What is it in Mac world?

Edit: I'm guessing this is a stupid question as 500 people have seen this and had nothing to say XP
Click to expand...

Those temps look fine. I used to be an avid modder/builder in the PC Gaming side including lapping heat sinks, experimenting with different thermal pastes, water cooling, installing after market cooling on video cards etc... in the search for ever lower temps on my highly overclocked hardware. In those days if I saw the CPU cores running over 60C I would start looking at bigger heatsinks, higher flow rate fans... you name it.

Since those days I have moved away from that and standardized on Apple HW (Mac Pro, iMac, Macbook Pro) and, although I still pay attention to temps I don't get nearly so excited when I see silicon running over 70C. Now, I do run my iMac 27" fans higher than normal (1600rpm) using fan control SW because I feel more comfortable with GPU temps and hard drive temps lower than what Apple does. But it does come at the price of higher fan noise (I can't hear them anyway... old ears :)

Sounds to me like the issues with the Windows install are not temperature related.

But to say it again... I think your temps are fine.
 
C

COrocket

macrumors 6502
Dec 9, 2012
485
12
There isn't really a difference between Mac and PC "worlds" in terms of hardware since intel processors and other components can take a certain amount of heat regardless of what OS they are running. Intels website has maximum temps listed for each processor model. Regardless, OSX fan control will keep temps within limitations automatically.
 
Dadioh

Dadioh

macrumors 65816
Feb 3, 2010
1,123
36
Canada Eh?
COrocket said:
There isn't really a difference between Mac and PC "worlds" in terms of hardware since intel processors and other components can take a certain amount of heat regardless of what OS they are running. Intels website has maximum temps listed for each processor model. Regardless, OSX fan control will keep temps within limitations automatically.
Click to expand...

I agree. The point I was making was that in the overclocking world temps can play a role in eeking out that last bit of OC. But not required in the Mac world since we are not overclocking so they run stable at high temps.

There is a whole other debate around how hot should one run for reliability. Even though it will run at 100C (with Intel starting throttle at 105C) doesn't mean it is a good idea to run there on a continuous basis. Every 10C rise in temp doubles failure rate of a device. But the failure rate is very very low so I am not trying to be an alarmist. I personally choose to drop my iMac temps by about 10C by upping fans from 1200rpm to 1600rpm. I don't suggest everyone has to do that. Tradeoff between fan noise and component temps.

The high failure rate of certain Seagate drives in the 2009 iMacs was at least partially due to the high temps that they tend to run at. At 1600rpm fans my aftermarket Western Digital Black in my iMac runs about 40C idle but can get up over 55c at times. Max temp according to WD is 60C. Running at 55C continuous is not a good idea IMHO. But I am happy at 40C.
 
Commy1

Commy1

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Feb 25, 2013
728
73
Thanks guys, I thought they were safe enough but thought I'd ask. I was of the thinking that in the ever smaller spaces we put hardware, like Macs in general, a lower amount of heat would effect the all of the parts differently.

I've shelved the idea of Windows for now, I only wanted it to be able to play some games, but the point of my Macs are for productivity in school so it's probably better than I don't have it.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom