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Left side of Keyboard hot while gaming?

S

stooley

macrumors regular
Original poster
Apr 2, 2008
100
0
I have the latest Macbook Pro (Glassbook) and while on the 9600GT and playing games, the left side of the keyboard gets very warm. Most games require the W, A, S, D keys to run around and I have to stop at points because my fingers get too hot.

I was just curious if others are experiencing this? I understand that it could get warm on that side of the board since the video card is located there, but still. I cannot even keep my fingers on there to run around and stuff. I have gamed on the previous version and never had this issue.

2.4 Ghz MBP
 
How long do you play before it gets that hot? If it doesn't take very long then I would be concerned about the cooling of your card...But if the heat increases over time, its simply because the cooling in laptops isn't necessarily very good, and not really meant for long term gaming....I had an ASUS laptop with an 8600M GT in it and it ran very hot on the WASD keys as well, but that was only after an extended time gaming....after they got hot i knew it was time to give it a rest
 
It's funny, I would normally be concerned about this sort of thing but were I currently live is so cold it's an extra radiator :p.
 
5 minutes tops.

I purchased this Thursday. I play for a bit Friday evening and did not notice it. Then Yesterday and now today...it appears to be worse.

It only take a matter of seconds to cool down once out of the game, but it does not take long to heat up either...I just see lots of people talking about COD4 and Crysis and was curious if they experience this as well.

I have only been playing WoW so far.
 
Dias said:
Uhm? It's getting so hot that you have to stop playing? :eek:
Click to expand...

Yea I literally have to remove my fingers from the keys...say I am walking a long distance in a game...It gets hot haha.

First time I noticed it, I was thinking...boy this feels warm...then I put my fingers up to my face and boy the were smoking.

I played for hours on my buddies early 2008 MBP and NEVER had this problem.
 
stooley said:
Yea I literally have to remove my fingers from the keys...say I am walking a long distance in a game...It gets hot haha.

First time I noticed it, I was thinking...boy this feels warm...then I put my fingers up to my face and boy the were smoking.

I played for hours on my buddies early 2008 MBP and NEVER had this problem.
Click to expand...

Jeez, and I'm gonna order 2.8Ghz version in next few days... :eek:
 
I would ring apple if it's so hot you can't play. Several sites including the likes of Ars have had hands on with games and none have commented on it.
 
Red-red said:
I would ring apple if it's so hot you can't play. Several sites including the likes of Ars have had hands on with games and none have commented on it.
Click to expand...

Yea, starting to look like an hour trip back to the apple store.
 
stooley said:
Yea, starting to look like an hour trip back to the apple store.
Click to expand...

I would ring first and just ask if it has been reported and see what they say. You will then know if its something that is happening a lot or it's a over-heating problem.
 
I've noticed this too. The only solution that I have for it so far is to use SMC Fan Control in OS X to bring the fans up to maximum and then restart in Windows. Doing so, I was able to run the entire Crysis demo without burning myself :)
 
therapistfinder said:
I've noticed this too. The only solution that I have for it so far is to use SMC Fan Control in OS X to bring the fans up to maximum and then restart in Windows. Doing so, I was able to run the entire Crysis demo without burning myself :)
Click to expand...

What version are you running of SMC Fan Control? The version I downloaded said it is not compatible.

This is also games under OS X so I am not sure if that makes a difference or not for anyone.
 
stooley said:
Yea I literally have to remove my fingers from the keys...say I am walking a long distance in a game...It gets hot haha.

First time I noticed it, I was thinking...boy this feels warm...then I put my fingers up to my face and boy the were smoking.

I played for hours on my buddies early 2008 MBP and NEVER had this problem.
Click to expand...

Mine was getting hot on the left side too...and I mean HOT, not really warm.

I solved it by turning the Battery Save feature on instead of High Performance, but you would need High Performance for gaming so that's probably the reality.

High, HOT Performance gaming.
 
The GPU is somewhere just under the D key, if I recall from the dissasembly shots correctly, so yeah, a lot of heat there during gaming is expected. smcFanControl is the way to go for now, hopefully something like SpeedFan will be compatible eventually (did you try it?)
 
Yep same here, i posed about this before, the WASD keys get hot to touch, and its hot on the bottom on the left side also.


It heats up in about 5 mins or less, but it isnt as hot as the old MBP would get when gaming, but the keys getting hot is deff a new thing.
 
This happens to our PBG4. It doesn't get hot enough to burn, but certainly enough to be uncomfortable. What a shame that this is still an issue. :(
 
stooley said:
I have the latest Macbook Pro (Glassbook) and while on the 9600GT and playing games, the left side of the keyboard gets very warm. Most games require the W, A, S, D keys to run around and I have to stop at points because my fingers get too hot.

I was just curious if others are experiencing this? I understand that it could get warm on that side of the board since the video card is located there, but still. I cannot even keep my fingers on there to run around and stuff. I have gamed on the previous version and never had this issue.

2.4 Ghz MBP
Click to expand...

I have been playing Spore through OS X, Sam and Max via VMWare Fusion and Portal within Bootcamp using the 2.53 MBP.

No keyboard heat problems, although the base does get quite warm.
 
Yeah, the MBP gets pretty hot when gaming.

After maybe half an hour of Unreal Tournament 3, the area near the WASD keys feels really hot, but it's tolerable.

Why are you going all the way back to the store? I doubt it's a problem with your unit; I think all MBPs get pretty hot under stress.
 
eleven2brett said:
Is there a good way to supplement the cooling? with an extra fan or something?
Click to expand...

You could use a cooling pad. Those can usually reduce temps by a few degrees Celsius.

As someone had already mentioned, the easiest solution as of now is to use smc fan control and bring up the fans to max in OS X, then restart in windows. As long as the computer is not completely turned off, the fan speed will remain the same. By doing this, even when I play Crysis at the maximum playable settings, my GPU's average temperature only gets into the mid 70s.
 
Alright, i just ran Supreme Commander with decent settings and my machine stayed cool through the whole experience. Thanks for the tip!
 
d/l HardwareMonitor (windows) or iStat (mac) and keep track of the GPU and CPU temps. Under 80C is great for a CPU and under 90C is fine for a GPU.

Remember, the heat you feel is being wicked away from the GPU/CPU itself. This is a good thing. Maybe the new alum enclosures are really great heatsinks.
 
The CPU is roughly in the middle, with the GPU on the right hand side. Now on the left hand side is where it charges so maybe....not sure if the CPU would make the left hand side of your computer hot....

Ammend.

And all the above is completely wrong as thats the bottom of the MBP....
 

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