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New MacBook seems to get really hot

L

lukekarts

macrumors regular
Original poster
Mar 16, 2009
155
0
Hi, I've got a 3 week old Macbook 13 (2Ghz model + 4GB RAM).

I've noticed on occasions - usually while it is on my lap - it gets really hot to touch - is this normal and is there any way I can monitor the temperature?

It is usually when I am doing more intensive things (video editing + various other apps open) and obviously the aluminium frame body conducts the heat well.

If I can monitor the temperature, what are the normal operating temperatures?

I'm new to Macs and there probably isn't a problem, just want to check!
 
Mine gets pretty warm... seems pretty normal. You can use the iStat pro dashboard widget to monitor temperature + other things.
 
Mine gets warm but nothing I would be even close to worried about, only time its gotten more then a little warm is when watching movies and then its still just warm not hot. Just curious what are you using it for? if its just getting hot when browsing internet then maybe you might have a problem but if your using fairly intensive programs then its totally normal.
 
Generally the new aluminum MBs run cooler than the old polycarbonate models. Of course if you are doing processor intense task, all models will run much hotter. It's perfectly normal.
 
The heat dissipation capacity of the white Macbook is pretty poor and I find it to get very very hot as well whenever doing anything other than typing. My temperatures typically hover around 55C idle and then into 60-70C when watching videos or on sites with a lot of flash.
 
johnny13oi said:
The heat dissipation capacity of the white Macbook is pretty poor and I find it to get very very hot as well whenever doing anything other than typing. My temperatures typically hover around 55C idle and then into 60-70C when watching videos or on sites with a lot of flash.
Click to expand...

The heat due to flash is because the Flash10 setup for Mac absolutely blows. It uses way more CPU cycles than should be necessary, even when playing games (15% CPU usage to play bejeweled, I think that's a bit excessive). Hopefully that's addressed with the next major update of Flash Player.
 
lukekarts said:
Hi, I've got a 3 week old Macbook 13 (2Ghz model + 4GB RAM).

I've noticed on occasions - usually while it is on my lap - it gets really hot to touch - is this normal and is there any way I can monitor the temperature?

It is usually when I am doing more intensive things (video editing + various other apps open) and obviously the aluminium frame body conducts the heat well.

If I can monitor the temperature, what are the normal operating temperatures?

I'm new to Macs and there probably isn't a problem, just want to check!
Click to expand...

Is this the new unibody or the lowest end white macbook?
 
Yeah its the unibody macbook.

What operating temps should I be looking for?

Compared to my previous laptop it feels much hotter, but then it is smaller and I think the aluminium case will probably be quite deceptive as it conducts heat really easily.
 
When you use it on your lap do you cover the back of the MacBook? If the vent is blocked in anyway the MacBook gets very hot, for instance having it rest on your duvet makes it too hot to touch sometimes.
 
Mine idles between 30 and 40 degrees C and in use the hottest I've seen it is 71 degrees, this is using smcfancontrol.
 
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