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calling 2011 mbp 13 owners who use netflix

K

kettlecorn

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Jan 21, 2011
284
0
Okay i posted a heat issue before and i think this simple "test" will let me know if i'm the odd man out here.

For those of you who have the core i5 mbp 13, and use it to watch netflix instant streaming, does your fan go on during the ENTIRE duration of watching ANYTHING?

I have posted that anything more than 1-2 videos on youtube, anything 720p and above, and any form of video gets my computer so hot that i cant keep it on my lap. And I just signed up for netflix and started watching some stuff streaming and found that THE ENTIRE DURATION of watching anything the fan is running at 6000 RPM and the bottom gets SO incredibly hot that even when I lift it up and put my hand/fingers on it, I have to pull away real fast. It's not placed on a bed either.

Basically, i did a dexter marathon today and watched back to back episodes for about 4 hours straight.. yeah.. anyway the entire time my computer was running at 6k.

Normal?
 
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Watching a 1080p video from youtube take my CPU temperature to 85 C. Fan kicks in and spins @ 3.5k RPM keeping the temperature around 80-85 C. Fan also steady

Watching a 1080p video trough VLC take my CPU temperature to 70 C, and the fan never kicks in.

I believe MBPs have some sort of issue with java (nothing new tho), that makes them run hotter than normal.

Try watching some HD videos through quicktime or VLC, if your computer still gets to hot, and your fan starts to spin like there is no tomorrow, then odds are you have some faulty components.

But if it only happens when watching streams, then it is something fairly normal. And would suggest you to get one of this laptop cushion, to protect yourself from heat
 
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I don't have my 13" 2011 anymore so I can't directly answer your question. I did spend some hours in Netflix recently while using the Intel GPU on my 15" and it ran pretty hot the whole time. It seems the Silverlight plugin that Netflix uses isn't optimized in anyway. Other videos don't kill the battery the way Silverlight does.

I wouldn't sweat it.
 
This is a great thread. I have two first gen intel based mbp's and the fans can be really loud when watching videos on YouTube.

I am wondering how the fan noise level compares to the new 2011 models? Is the noise level annoying?
 
damn, maybe i should just take it in. it's such a bitch backing everything up for the possibility of getting a new replacement. I'll have to try watching something HD on quicktime or VLC but as far as netflix and youtube is concerned, or ANY streaming (megavideo, vimeo, etc.) even content that's not HD sometimes will make the fan spin up to 6000k rpm. during netflix though, a movie on a lap is impossible unless i want to cook my legs. :/
 
jason221 said:
It's because of Flash/Silverlight.
Click to expand...

I was searching for some battery info while streaming, as my MBP 8,1 gets lousy battery life while watching Netflix (SD episodes of Battlestar Galactica). I've contributed it to Silverlight - it absolutely crushes the battery. Battery was dropping % points pretty quickly during the stream.
 
I know this is only partially relevant but, don't be so fast to blame it on Silverlight. I don't own a TV and live in europe so I watch a lot of netflix (w/VPN) and the problems you guys are describing just don't happen to my 7,1..
 
kettlecorn said:
damn, maybe i should just take it in. it's such a bitch backing everything up for the possibility of getting a new replacement. I'll have to try watching something HD on quicktime or VLC but as far as netflix and youtube is concerned, or ANY streaming (megavideo, vimeo, etc.) even content that's not HD sometimes will make the fan spin up to 6000k rpm. during netflix though, a movie on a lap is impossible unless i want to cook my legs. :/
Click to expand...

Or nueter yourself. :D
 
This is probably a stupid question but why can I watch hours of Netflix on my iPad without it getting hot or crushing the battery? Whatever the different parameters are, why couldn't they be ported to the Mac version?
 
Bob Coxner said:
This is probably a stupid question but why can I watch hours of Netflix on my iPad without it getting hot or crushing the battery? Whatever the different parameters are, why couldn't they be ported to the Mac version?
Click to expand...

Hardware acceleration. AFAIK, Silverlight decoding is done entirely on the CPU at the moment on OS X which is highly inefficient compared to decoding it on the GPU. Flash appears to be the same at the moment (unless you're using an nvidia GPU, though I may be missing something).

The iPhone/iPad play the video directly and not through a wrapper like Silverlight or Flash, both use GPU decoding.

I think the next version of Silverlight will have decoding on the GPU, but whether that is actually true for OS X or just limited to the Windows client I do not know.

Edit:
A good analogy would be this: Currently MacBooks transport people across the ocean in a huge cruise ship, even though they only need to send 2 or 3 of people. On the other hand, iPads transport people in a reasonably sized 5 man yacht. Even though they are doing the same thing, sending a small group of people across the ocean, the MacBook expends a lot more energy into the process because it is far less efficient than the iPad.
 
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Yep, same thing here. The fans are up from 5500-6k the whole time. A little distracting during quite scenes, unfortunately.
 
This appears to be the norm for all 13" Mac notebook owners, not just MBP owners. I have an old 13" MB and the fans are constantly on while on any flash site and even while watching some videos in VLC and iTunes.

I then go on my 15" MBP and I can use a flash site for an hour without the fans kicking on and same with VLC and iTunes.
 
I'd love to hear the answer to this, why do you guys have this problem and I don't. Obviously flash will make the fans spin up after a bit, but not silverlight.
 
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the fans kick in within a few minutes of watching a netflix movie on both my new 15 and my new 13". my 2.66 i7 and core 2 duo 2.53 never did this at all. i could be in my bed with the laptop on the mattress and i'd still never get the fans kicking on so loudly.

because of the fan issue, i just don't feel like watching netflix movies on my macbook pros anymore....its just too loud.
 
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