That should not be acceptable on a product this expensive. I returned mine 5 times. I’m on my 6th one. Still has the whine. But I gave up because I needed to use it for work. Not a return products job. But actual work.
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Poll: Mac Studio M2 whine noise?
- Thread starter Think77
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No way for me, it was far too annoying and it doesn't look like anything but the fan profile was changed, so basically some of the M2's are going to whine, period, and with my luck, I'd get one of them! The fan profile might make it better, but there's no guarantee it'll change anything and I'm not going through that again. And like a couple posts up said, there's no Apple store anywhere around here to make a quick trade...
I went with a mini pro instead, and I'm about halfway happy with it. But it doesn't have a whine. 🙂
My second M1 Max Studio from Costco whines too, but most of the time it is too low to hear unless I place my head next to the studio. Just like the first studio, I can stop the whine by blocking the rear air vent above the HDMI/USB A ports. My first studio was pretty loud, and I could hear it around 7-8 feet away, so I had to return it.
edubfromktown
macrumors 65816
I totally agree that it is unacceptable and part of the reason there is NFW it could or can fly with Mac's in the production enterprise space for the stuff I do. Worked in a shop with 800+ of ~2500 total end users running Mac's... not servers!
The current day job is primarily ADO/AWS cloud-based (and serverless) with Linux and Windows end user systems. Heavy lifting is on Lambda (along with Red Hat OpenShift and plain old k8s) clusters at work.
Different story at home... my preference since Kodiak beta has been OS X / MacOS. I don't do video editing or gaming so the M1 Base Max is perfect for my needs (and was a nice perf bump from M1 Mini 16 GB). I also use a small herd of RPi 8GB 4b's (acquired before the supply chain debacle) for other things.
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Your comment saying you don't trust people that say their Studio doesn't "whine" because they have a loud room or are incapable of hearing a 2.2-2.6 kHz "whine" (whistle is a better description) is absurd. You ignore the fact that some people, some of us that are engineers that design similar products like myself, have posted spectrum analysis of their own units (not with someone else's recordings off YouTube, or Radio Shack equipment, but calibrated microphones). Saying you don't trust those people, and blame it on their rooms or hearing, is not only absurd, but insulting.
As I said, this is not some new problem. It is a common issue with switching power supply designs. There are known reasons for the problem, one of which is MLCC caps, as this one appears to be. And if so, there are fixes for the problem. I put up a video pulled off the net to show someone diagnosing a similar problem and fixing that problem by changing a cap just to illustrate the issue.
It is obvious some units have had this problem, and some units haven't. That can be explained by the fact there are at least 2 different power supply designs (that I know of) in use in both Mx Studios. One of those designs may have been more marginal with respect to this problem, while the wasn't. There may also be bad batches of caps from one supplier, but not another. There's some anecdotal evidence that the complaints dropped later last year so Apple may have taken steps to mitigate or fix the problem (stopped using one PS design, had changes made to a PS design, changed to caps to a different supplier, or changed their size, or construction).
I don't know with 100% certainty what the problem has been in the Studio. I'm just giving my best guess as someone that has had to deal with the same kind of issue. But I am certain that not 100% of the units have the problem, because mine does not. Now I am forever done discussing this issue.
Thank you so much for contributing. Much appreciate and valued. There are certainly trolls on this forum site so don't let them get to you.
He clearly has no clue what he talks about and does one assumption after another but others surely appreciate your experience and knowledge that you bring to the table. And for that we are grateful.
Thank you so much for your time and effort.
He clearly has no clue what he talks about and does one assumption after another but others surely appreciate your experience and knowledge that you bring to the table. And for that we are grateful.
Thank you so much for your time and effort.
Thanks for the comment. While I agree not 100% have the issue, it is definitely more than 0% which some on this forum act like it's no big deal. I don't know if its based on my location, or like you said I purchased the Mac Studio at launch and exchanged it 5 times.
It left a very very sour taste on the whole Mac Studio lineup. Nobody has posted detailed analysis yet. Even if they did, it would clearly not be 0% occurrence. Luke got SOMETHING. Whether it turns into a permanent whine/whistle is unknown. Whether it is the same issue or not I don't care. I don't think a product of this cost should do any of that.
I have had about 30 different Macs over the years and not ONE of them until the Mac Studio had something like this. So it might not be new, but the percentage certainly seems to be increased.
Nobody does.
I just don't see how partially blocking airflow would effect coil or capacitor whistle. And I'm just guessing it's airflow in the cooling system causing a whistle.
I suspect not all do either or a heck of a lot more people would complain as it is REALLY annoying. It's in a hearing range not usually affected until you are MUCH older. I myself have high frequency hearing loss, but up over 12KHz, not way down at 2. 2000Hz is in the speaking range!
klky
macrumors 6502a
I feel for those that are particularly sensitive to such frequencies and noises. I'm sure these annoyances are very real.
As far as I can tell, my M2 Ultra Mac Studio is silent. I have no idea if Apple took heed of the feedback regarding last year's model but mine seems to be fine. It sits next to my two G-Drive Pros which tend to gurgle quite a bit so it's not like my environment is super quiet to begin with. In any event, it doesn't bother me too much.
Hopefully those that decide to pick one up get a good one.
As far as I can tell, my M2 Ultra Mac Studio is silent. I have no idea if Apple took heed of the feedback regarding last year's model but mine seems to be fine. It sits next to my two G-Drive Pros which tend to gurgle quite a bit so it's not like my environment is super quiet to begin with. In any event, it doesn't bother me too much.
Hopefully those that decide to pick one up get a good one.
The poll sits at around 20% reporting that they have the whine on the M2 Mac Studio, and 80% reporting that they do not have the whine. However, as far as I can see (other than Luke Miani's short sound sample), in this discussion thread itself, no-one has actually reported any whine noise, as opposed to the looong thread about the M1 whine noise with multiple reports of whine noise. So, I'm not sure if the fact that we hear almost no qualitative/elaborating reports confirming the whine means that Apple has solved (or at least to some degree addressed) the problem? That, of course, would mean that the 20% 'yes' reports are inaccurate, which I'm not sure is the case. So, could the 'yes' M2 owners elaborate a bit on their whine issues? I'm still waiting for mine to arrive, so crossing my fingers that it's perfectly fine 🙂
transmaster
Contributor
I have been listening to the inductor coil whine of Nvidia, and Radeon GPU's. The sound I am hearing there does not match at all what I am hearing in the recordings of the MS. I have radios, and HF amps with cooling fans. I have had high pitched fan noise from some of them. I have fixed it buy replacing the very old all metal tube axial fans with modern magnetically suspended Corsair computer case fans. This is not an option on the Mac Studio of course. Remember there are 2 kinds of computer fans, low pressure and high air volume, and high pressure and low air volume. I think Apple has opted for High Pressure low volume in the Mac Studio's centrifugal fans but like so many other spec's the CFU of the MS's fans are not published.
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I bought one of the original trashcan macrpros and returned it due to the coil whine. I have MBP 13 M1 and MBP 14 M2 pro and no whine. I work in IT and we have several Dell 5330s that have coil whine. Id expect it from Dell as their machines are Fisher Price compared to Apple but I would not accept any machine from Apple with Whine esp at those prices. Once its heard it can't be unheard.
transmaster
Contributor
A suggestion. I just loaded "Audio/Spectrum Analyzer app from Loop-Sessions LLC, onto my iPhone. Been playing it with on some of my bench instruments and it looks pretty good. Free to use .99 Cents to get rid of banner ads, I would have gladly paid more than .99 cents for it. With this App you can look at the screen on you iPhone/iPad and see just what sort of noise is emanating from your Mac Studio.
Loop-Sessions
www.loopsessions.com
Feek
macrumors 65816
Expert? The fans on the 1K are absolutely awful and ridiculously loud when they fire up.
My Acom 1500, on the other hand is just a constant low whirring that I find quite comforting.
Well said. But you'll still get ignored by those who 'know better' and who continue to insult us, while denying they're doing it.
I've got the other threads regarding this subject on ignore, am about to do the same with this one.
I just set up a M2 Studio Max with a companion Studio Display in a quiet room.
Background: I'm extremely sensitive to noise, especially higher pitched sounds such as coil whine. I went so far as to put my linux box (and my ancient Mac Pros) behind a wall to silence them. And I hacked my previous 27" iMac from 2017 to reduce the idle fan speed to 850 RPM to quiet it down. So you know I'm serious!
Now, the Studio Max: Rest assured, folks, it's neither loud nor annoying. That includes the Studio Display, which also has fans that run full time. I would say the combined noise from the two is a little less than the 850-RPM hacked iMac, and a little more gentle in tone, too.
In a very quiet room, from a normal position, you can hear a little relatively-hushed air movement, with just a hint of mechanical noise from the Studio Max if you listen really hard for it (and basically nothing but air movement from the display). Press your ear right at the air outlet, and you can hear a mechanical noise, but it's still pretty quiet.
I'd prefer no fans at all if possible, and someone somewhere is likely to still complain about any noise at all (that's me, typically!). But yes, it does appear that Apple has made this version substantially quieter. Even with my extraordinarily easily-bothered ears, I'd say this computer is eminently livable in a quiet room.
(Haha - as a backup plan, I got a 3m Thunderbolt 4 cable so I could place the Mac Studio farther away, or behind a wall again, if it bothered me. But I don't feel the need for that.)
So all you finicky golden-eared worriers like me: I hereby bless the M2 Mac Studio Max as an audibly-safe buy! 🙂
Background: I'm extremely sensitive to noise, especially higher pitched sounds such as coil whine. I went so far as to put my linux box (and my ancient Mac Pros) behind a wall to silence them. And I hacked my previous 27" iMac from 2017 to reduce the idle fan speed to 850 RPM to quiet it down. So you know I'm serious!
Now, the Studio Max: Rest assured, folks, it's neither loud nor annoying. That includes the Studio Display, which also has fans that run full time. I would say the combined noise from the two is a little less than the 850-RPM hacked iMac, and a little more gentle in tone, too.
In a very quiet room, from a normal position, you can hear a little relatively-hushed air movement, with just a hint of mechanical noise from the Studio Max if you listen really hard for it (and basically nothing but air movement from the display). Press your ear right at the air outlet, and you can hear a mechanical noise, but it's still pretty quiet.
I'd prefer no fans at all if possible, and someone somewhere is likely to still complain about any noise at all (that's me, typically!). But yes, it does appear that Apple has made this version substantially quieter. Even with my extraordinarily easily-bothered ears, I'd say this computer is eminently livable in a quiet room.
(Haha - as a backup plan, I got a 3m Thunderbolt 4 cable so I could place the Mac Studio farther away, or behind a wall again, if it bothered me. But I don't feel the need for that.)
So all you finicky golden-eared worriers like me: I hereby bless the M2 Mac Studio Max as an audibly-safe buy! 🙂
transmaster
Contributor
HF Amp as in high frequency radio transmitter. 3-500Z transmitting tubes glowing almost white hot, 1500 watts input and 4,000 VDC at the plates. Please I am not doubting anyone. If you want to be driven out of your mind deal with microphonic vacuum tubes (valves to you Brit's 🙂)
Thanks, but with coil whine some sound louder than others depending on quality control etc of the coils used. I have several laptops in my office with CW and some are louder. May have to cherry pick to get a good one.
Feek
macrumors 65816
Aye, sorry, I wasn't asking if you were an expert, I wondered if the amp was an Expert 1K-FA because the noise on that is awful 😉. My Acom has a single 4CX1000A.
Apologies for the off topicness. I'm outta here now.
I don't think you're that far off topic 🙂 Your point does speak to the possibility that Apple may have solved the whine issue even though their board/electronics design hasn't changed as such – maybe it was just a certain component (maybe from a sub contractor) that hadn't undergone the necessary quality control during the M1 "era". That could be fixed now, so that the component type as such hasn't been swapped for a different one, but it's now up to par on the quality control? Maybe...
Shazaam!
macrumors regular
Hopefully a future YouTube video teardown of the M2 will show different capacitors from the M1 as the culprit.
Just picked up a base M2 Max. Quiet as a church mouse.
I've had mine for a week now and it's completely silent. M2 Ultra. Fans usually are sub 1000 rpm when I'm just using Discord or Safari.
Just received my base Mac Studio (M2 Max), and during initial setup and playing around with some basic stuff it’s been VERY silent! No whine at all! Only when I put my ear within 5-10 cm distance to the backside of the machine can I start hearing a subtle fan sound (again: not whine noise!). As soon as I move my head further away, the fan sound completely disappears. And I do have a pretty sensitive hearing, so this is extremely promising! And, just to mention the real reason I bought this machine: the performance appears to be an enormous step up from my old M1 Mac Mini. Wow! In Logic Pro it seems to use less than half the CPU ressouces. This will probably last me at least 3-4 years. I will report back if anything changes on the whine front.