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Coil whine is the new normal

A

appleincognito

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Dec 11, 2014
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So it seems like since m4, coil whine is now the new normal under load. Very disappointing they designed the chip this way. Hopefully they fix it with m5. Macbooks, especially airs, have been dead silent since m1 so this is a big step back from apple.

Happens on all m4 variants, with the pro and max sounding a bit less high pitched than the standard m4 in the air and base pro. Replacements make no difference, I’ve tested many units.

Anyone who says otherwise cannot hear the frequency due to old/degraded hearing.

You can easily test it by maxing out the cpu temporarily with the command below in terminal, but you’ll also hear it under activities in normal usage where the cpu/ssd is under load.

Code: 
yes > /dev/null
 
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dmccloud said:
I just got my hearing tested and got a perfect score, yet there is NO coil whine whatsoever on my machine. Are you confusing coil whine with fan noise? I can hear fan noise under load, but that is not the same as coil whine.
Click to expand...
No. M4 airs don’t even have fans. If your machine is m4/pro/max, it will exhibit this behaviour. You’ll be able to hear it before the fans kick in immediately after you run that command and put your head next to the keyboard or are in a quiet room.
 
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appleincognito said:
You can hear it on your MBA also?
Click to expand...

I don't. I turned off everything in my apartment. I live in a small city and could hear birds chirping outside. But could not hear the coil whine. I've heard it on other laptops but not this one. My work laptop does it, for example. I didn't leave it for 15 minutes or anything though.
 
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Howard2k said:
I don't. I turned off everything in my apartment. I live in a small city and could hear birds chirping outside. But could not hear the coil whine. I've heard it on other laptops but not this one. My work laptop does it, for example. I didn't leave it for 15 minutes or anything though.
Click to expand...
It should happen briefly immediately after you run the command. I've tested in excess of 5 MBA m4's so would be surprised if yours didn't. Put your head to the keyboard.
 
Looking at your post history, you may want to try to use your equipment for its intended purpose rather than look for problems. A very small scratch on a phone frame or whine only when you put an ear to a laptop case is not really something to get worked up about. Not saying this to be a jerk, but if you look for problems eventually you’ll find them, no matter what it is.

If you use a product normally and there’s an issue, sure, return it. But going through multiple returns over and over is going to accomplish nothing except probably get you blacklisted from Apple, I’m sure they do have some upper limit on individual returns over time. It’s also not a great use of your time.

I also have ‘perfect’ hearing, recently tested at an audiologist, and don’t hear coil whine on an M4 Max. When it’s very quiet, I can hear a very slight LED light noise in lamps mounted on the ceiling for reference. PC power supplies are noisy as hell, even Platinum ones, and I can hear inverter noise from battery backups across a room. My Mac is silent except under load with some slight fan noise.

I haven’t had an M4 air, maybe there is an issue, but… I wonder if the issue might be elsewhere.

That said, as clock speeds increase it is very likely that there will be some background noise without very careful consideration. I suggest you get an air filter and run it on quiet, your air quality will improve and the small amount of white noise might mask whatever you’re hearing, if it really is from a distance.
 
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Hello, is your coil whine same as mine? I am using M2 Max (30 cores) MacBook Pro 14-inch, it will have a clicking noise if I would like to start running some heavy load apps.

 
HuaTaishi said:
Hello, is your coil whine same mine? I am using M2 Max (30 cores) MacBook Pro 14-inch, it will have a clicking noise if I would like to start running some heavy load apps.

Click to expand...
I can hear the faint coil whine in the background but the clicking noise is separate and definitely not remotely normal.
 
I’m someone who would absolutely be able to hear this and I hear absolutely nothing on my M4 MBP.
I heard coil whine when I had an iPhone 7+, I can hear the slight buzzing of my iMac’s LCD, I would absolutely be able to notice and yet I don’t hear anything.
I also don’t hear anything on my M4 iPad Pro, it’s absolutely silent.
 
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coil whine is even audible on the m4 iPad Pro at times, like when using the pencil, depending on the GPU rendering of the strokes.

I can hear this using the default notes app, but not in Notability.
 
Last edited:
I run my M4 max at heavy load consistently, i hear fan but no whine. I know Mac Studio used to have the whine but never had it on my M4 max MBP.
 
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appleincognito said:
You’ll be able to hear it before the fans kick in immediately after you run that command and put your head next to the keyboard or are in a quiet room.
Click to expand...
So, to hear the coil whine, assuming mine does it of course, I should make the room extremely quiet, run this test or something strenuous that likely kicks on the fans, and just before the fans kick on, if I have my ear on top of the keyboard, I will briefly hear it? And this is a really bad problem?
 
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donawalt said:
So, to hear the coil whine, assuming mine does it of course, I should make the room extremely quiet, run this test or something strenuous that likely kicks on the fans, and just before the fans kick on, if I have my ear on top of the keyboard, I will briefly hear it? And this is a really bad problem?
Click to expand...
That process is just an easy way to confirm yours exhibits the same behaviour. In reality, you hear it on an M4 MBA as an example, any time a CPU heavy task is launched or you are copying a lot of files, so lots of times.
 
appleincognito said:
That process is just an easy way to confirm yours exhibits the same behaviour. In reality, you hear it on an M4 MBA as an example, any time a CPU heavy task is launched or you are copying a lot of files, so lots of times.
Click to expand...

For clarification, in your OP you stated "Happens on all m4 variants, with the pro and max sounding a bit less high pitched than the standard m4 in the air and base pro. Replacements make no difference, I’ve tested many units.", but in a later post you stated "I've tested in excess of 5 MBA m4's...". I'm wondering how you extrapolated testing M4 Airs to include all M4 variants if you haven't tested any of the variants.
 
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