iMac Fans not revving up?

[NintendoRev]

So i've had my 27" 2013 iMac for a month now and i'm kind of concerned. The fan never seems to rev up properly when doing something intensive like playing a game (Team Fortress 2). It's consistently at 1200 RPM. Is this normal at all?

My GPU was getting to above 70c earlier when I was playing and I'm kind of worried it's going to damage the system :S

 

[Dreadnought]

Is normal. 70 degrees is normal operating temperature for a cpu. They can go as high as 95 degrees before shutting down. Please note that the back of your iMac is one big cooling element.

 

[joe-h2o]

So i've had my 27" 2013 iMac for a month now and i'm kind of concerned. The fan never seems to rev up properly when doing something intensive like playing a game (Team Fortress 2). It's consistently at 1200 RPM. Is this normal at all?

My GPU was getting to above 70c earlier when I was playing and I'm kind of worried it's going to damage the system :S

Totally normal.

The fan won't even begin to ramp up until well beyond 70 C.

 

[yjchua95]

So i've had my 27" 2013 iMac for a month now and i'm kind of concerned. The fan never seems to rev up properly when doing something intensive like playing a game (Team Fortress 2). It's consistently at 1200 RPM. Is this normal at all?

My GPU was getting to above 70c earlier when I was playing and I'm kind of worried it's going to damage the system :S

My fans don't rev up even during heavy tasks, unless it's Battlefield 4 or heavy video editing.

This is because the iMacs have a very good ventilation system, so the fans don't have to rev up unless the temperatures gets high enough to trigger the fans (85ºC and beyond, usually).

 

[quagmire]

Apple values quiet operation above all else. So the fan won't spin up until it gets really hot. I'm not comfortable with my GPU reaching 80 C so I bought istat menu's and manually ramp up the fan when playing x-plane. Cools it down to a nice 62 C.

 

[MartinAppleGuy]

I have never heard my iMac's fan rev up either. Don't worry about it.

 

[cynics]

Only when the CPU gets hot do I see the fan profile become more aggressive. Not so much with the GPU.

I've seen games run the GPU around 90 degrees.

That seems a touch bit excessive for extended use to me so I manually set the fan to maintain 80-85 degrees (around 1800 RPM for ESO).

If nothing else it gives me peace of mind.

 

[NintendoRev]

Thanks guys! Didn't realize the cooling system allowed for the temps to get up that high before increasing the speed. I'm so used to my old PC when it comes to gaming, which would get insanely loud when doing anything gpu intensive.

 

[joe-h2o]

Thanks guys! Didn't realize the cooling system allowed for the temps to get up that high before increasing the speed. I'm so used to my old PC when it comes to gaming, which would get insanely loud when doing anything gpu intensive.

If you install a fan control app then you can make the fan run at full chat just so you can hear what it sounds like (a gentle whooshing), but during normal operation (even with really heavy CPU and GPU use) it will almost never run that fast on its own.

The iMac is very quiet, even under load.

 

[Th3taJ]

In the few month I've had my iMac, I've played much higher-end games than Team Fortress 2 at peak performance.

I have yet to hear my fan really push and performance has never notably faltered so I've never worried about it.

 

[NintendoRev]

In the few month I've had my iMac, I've played much higher-end games than Team Fortress 2 at peak performance.

I have yet to hear my fan really push and performance has never notably faltered so I've never worried about it.

That's great to hear! thanks man! =D Makes me a bit more confident in my purchase.

 

[Fatboy71]

So i've had my 27" 2013 iMac for a month now and i'm kind of concerned. The fan never seems to rev up properly when doing something intensive like playing a game (Team Fortress 2). It's consistently at 1200 RPM. Is this normal at all?

My GPU was getting to above 70c earlier when I was playing and I'm kind of worried it's going to damage the system :S

Thats perfectly normal. I have the Late 2012 iMac and the fan is nearly always 1200 RPM. I have only heard it rev up once since I got the iMac, and that was on a hot day and when I was encoding some video. Even then, it was only a very brief rev up and it then slowed back down.

 

[h9826790]

That's normal. As long as everything is under it's normal operating temperature range. increase fan speed will only suck more dust into your iMac. That's actually not a good idea, and will decrease your Mac's cooling performance in long term.