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Little Jim

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Nov 13, 2020
11
4
Hi guys, my macbook usually get very hot when it run heavy tasks. To deal with it, I often put a frozen wet towel underneath. Thought it will always get a certain amount of water to contact the MacBook underneath, I m believe it don’t have any bad effect since none of the water can come inside the macbook. But my question is: what happen if I also plug the charge in? Does the amount of water contacted underneath Aluminum and the current of electric somehow have a negative impact to machine components?
 

casperes1996

macrumors 604
Jan 26, 2014
7,483
5,648
Horsens, Denmark
I would very much advice against doing this whether you’re charging or not. Even keeping the device in too humid an environment can make Apple consider your device water damaged from sensors inside that notice humidity levels. You could also damage it from very high levels of humidity in the air it takes in. Further more water could accidentally come in through the vents.

And even if we ignore all that, inconsistent temperatures are much more dangerous to the silicon inside than high temperatures. Going up and down and up and down in temperature is way worse than being at 100°C, which btw is within spec for the chips. If you get to dangerous temperatures the fans can go far above their normal maximum and should it get real bad the computer will just turn off entirely and immediately to protect itself. Once that happens once you can worry about thermal, until then all is running as it should.

But if you do want to do something I’d recommend a fan. A surface to hoist it up and a fan underneath it can significantly reduce temperatures without involving any electricity disturbing liquids
 

ght56

macrumors 6502a
Aug 31, 2020
839
815
I agree - in my opinion, this is not a good idea to do whether you are charging or not. The bottom case is not water tight and there are vents on the bottom. I also agree a cooling fan is a better solution that avoids both water damage and cold shocking.
 
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