Lack of fan a plus or minus?

[drumcat]

Hi all,

No fan on the M1 Air, and presumably the next version will also not be air-cooled. Ironic name that it's the "air" without a fan...

Anyhow, has anyone found this a bad thing? Clearly it's quieter, but is there a downside? Does your M1 run hot?

 

[Woodcrest64]

The only disadvantage is that the M1 in the Air cannot run at peak levels for long sustained periods compared to the MacBook Pro.

The advantages though it is quieter, less wear as there is no moving parts, better battery life for this form factor, less ventilation which means less chance of dust inside the system and less parts means a lighter machine.

 

[JPack]

With the way Apple implemented it on the M1 Air, it's a bit of a minus. Instead of using a finned heatsink, they installed a simple heat spreader with little thermal mass. Ideally, it would have been a heatsink and fan combo with the ability for the fan to turn on during sustained workloads.

 

[RomaM65]

With long loads, I think this is more likely a disadvantage, since the processor will most likely reduce its frequency (throttling) when it heats up too much.

 

[Significant1]

A big plus if you ask me. The main reason for me to choose air. I only second guess my decision, because people say the pro never use the fan at normal use either. However In those rare situations where the fan will start, I still rather want 20-25% longer processing time in complete silence, than a fan spinning up.

 

[sird28]

Huge plus…… People don’t realize if you basically have it sealed and can still have good thermals like the air does, the fans in the beginning will help but in the end they do more harm then good.

They eventually bring in dust to the system from the outside cooling air and then defeats the purpose of the fan, then the fans are running a lot more because dust has insulated the inside of the computer.

The only way IMO that fans are a plus is if you have the workload that it is totally required to run your machine full tilt for a long period of time.

 

[Moyapilot]

I've never done anything where I noticed throttling on the M1 MBA. It's also never too hot on the lap, only warm at most. Mind you I'm not doing crazy workloads, but I do have a lot of tabs open, 4 or 5 programs running including Zoom quite often. Never a slow down. It just barely sips battery.

Like the folks ahead of me mentioned, fanlessness is the main reason I bought it. Being a Laptop repair tech in my last career, I have seen the awful caking of dust and muck that builds up inside the entire ventilation system over time. No fans=no fuss no muss.

 

[xraydoc]

My M1 has never run hot. Not sure if it's because of my lack of stressing it to its peak potential or what, but I've not regretted going with the MBA over the MBP for a microsecond.

 

[dizmonk]

I can't address the technical issues but I can say this is one of the features I LOVE the most on the m1 Air. I didn't realize how annoying a fan was until I didn't have it. It reminds of my Prius which is completely silent at a stop sign... it's an unusual experience but very welcome

 

[zoltm]

Huge plus…… People don’t realize if you basically have it sealed and can still have good thermals like the air does, the fans in the beginning will help but in the end they do more harm then good.

They eventually bring in dust to the system from the outside cooling air and then defeats the purpose of the fan, then the fans are running a lot more because dust has insulated the inside of the computer.

The only way IMO that fans are a plus is if you have the workload that it is totally required to run your machine full tilt for a long period of time.

I have to agree with your points, it is exactly the reason why I end up choosing the MacBook Air vs Mac mini when I was looking for a replacement for my vintage 2009 5,1 Mac Pro. Other than the sorely missed expandability of the cMP, this MacBook Air, runs circle around the cMP with no fan noise! The Retina Screen, the Magic Keyboard with Touch ID, the Magic Trackpad are all nice addition to my old workflow.

 

[zoltm]

"..... No fans=no fuss no muss."

This is exactly the reason why I prefer MBA to the MBP!

 

[Pugly]

There are plenty of upsides, and the only issue is when it throttles. And I can't say I've ever really noticed this. I did do some dvd rips and encodes... so maybe it throttled a little then. But this fanless computer is much better at throttling than the previous airs, even without a fan. It takes a good while at max usage to even get the computer hot.

It could be thought of as the iPadification of the Mac, where it's a computer you never have to worry about if it's capable enough to do what you want it to do. Because it's finally powerful enough to crush all but the most demanding of tasks.

When this new air design was released it seemed strange how they designed the cooling it almost seems like they built this Air with the passive apple silicon chips in mind... and just put rudimentary cooling to barely satisfy the intel chips.

For me the wedge shape is king, so I think the larger design and weight of the 13" MBP is kinda overkill. I wouldn't trade the wedge shape for some marginal cooling at the extremes.

 

[zoltm]

There are plenty of upsides, and the only issue is when it throttles. And I can't say I've ever really noticed this. I did do some dvd rips and encodes... so maybe it throttled a little then. But this fanless computer is much better at throttling than the previous airs, even without a fan. It takes a good while at max usage to even get the computer hot.

It could be thought of as the iPadification of the Mac, where it's a computer you never have to worry about if it's capable enough to do what you want it to do. Because it's finally powerful enough to crush all but the most demanding of tasks.

When this new air design was released it seemed strange how they designed the cooling it almost seems like they built this Air with the passive apple silicon chips in mind... and just put rudimentary cooling to barely satisfy the intel chips.

For me the wedge shape is king, so I think the larger design and weight of the 13" MBP is kinda overkill. I wouldn't trade the wedge shape for some marginal cooling at the extremes.

Indeed, the wedge shape is so much nicer!

 

[trevpimp]

For casual use my M1 rarely gets hot I wouldn't care if it did have fan either way I'm more interested in how the M1 Air is designed I think it's perfect.

 

[shakopeemn]

Hi all,

No fan on the M1 Air, and presumably the next version will also not be air-cooled. Ironic name that it's the "air" without a fan...

Anyhow, has anyone found this a bad thing? Clearly it's quieter, but is there a downside? Does your M1 run hot?

I think it's one of the best ideas in computing. My M1 doesn't get hot on the underside, vents aren't blocked, and the fan doesn't quickly drain the battery.

Great notebook with a great battery life.

 

[jz0309]

A HUGE positive for me… never running hot