The Fans Are Loud, So What?

[MacBookGamer]

Literally every review I see for the 16" (and every other laptop) has people complaining about fan noise. What did they expect? You cram processors that reach 200°F into a tiny chassis and expect complete silence? That's like owning a supercar and expecting the engine to not make any noise.

Reviewers: "We need desktop CPUs in a laptop."

*laptop fans turn on

Reviewers:

It's like they just complain for the sake of complaining. Loud fans are a good thing. We no longer have to deal with throttling which they also would have complained about.

 

[Velin]

Agree 100%. Fans -- not an issue. At all. Cooling, please.

 

[cap7ainclu7ch]

The 16" MOVES some air. I couldn't believe how much flow I felt by the side vents. I like it. Such a thin powerful device that's eating air to cool.

 

[iemcj]

I'm running a 2011 macbook pro that suits all my needs and it's whisper quiet. The ONLY time I can ever hear the fan is when doing something maxing out the CPU (like a OSX update or doing the occasional lightroom export). I can understand a user "updating" from an older machine and being frustrated that their brand new laptop is getting loud when just doing basic every day tasks when their older laptops never did that.

Personally I can totally understnd fan noise during intensive tasks. Exporting a 4k video from FCPX? Yeah that should make noise. Fans getting audible and kicking in just watching netflix? Yikes that would be annoying.

 

[MacBookGamer]

I'm running a 2011 macbook pro that suits all my needs and it's whisper quiet. The ONLY time I can ever hear the fan is when doing something maxing out the CPU (like a OSX update or doing the occasional lightroom export). I can understand a user "updating" from an older machine and being frustrated that their brand new laptop is getting loud when just doing basic every day tasks when their older laptops never did that.

Personally I can totally understnd fan noise during intensive tasks. Exporting a 4k video from FCPX? Yeah that should make noise. Fans getting audible and kicking in just watching netflix? Yikes that would be annoying.

Most of the reviewers complain about the noise when gaming. My MacBook Pro 13" 2019 never gets loud for basic tasks.

 

[ThisBougieLife]

Unfortunately my 2016 15" MBP does get loud sometimes just from YouTube viewing. That's the kind of thing that annoys me a bit, but it's a laptop, so just have to accept it. I'm glad that Apple has prioritized cooling more in the 16".

 

[terraphantm]

Most of the reviewers complain about the noise when gaming. My MacBook Pro 13" 2019 never gets loud for basic tasks.

Which is such an asinine complaint. If you're gaming, you probably have sound going from the game and might even be wearing headphones. The fans aren't so loud as to be intrusive when there's media playing.

 

[iemcj]

Most of the reviewers complain about the noise when gaming. My MacBook Pro 13" 2019 never gets loud for basic tasks.

Ah yeah well if it's gaming it's unavoidable. Head to r/ps4pro and hear the people complaining that it sounds like a jet engine taking off lol. Even on a liquid cooled gaming rig, there's going to be fan noise when gaming.

As long as it's not making noise during quiet night time netflix watching then I don't see the problem.

 

[MacBookGamer]

Unfortunately my 2016 15" MBP does get loud sometimes just from YouTube viewing. That's the kind of thing that annoys me a bit, but it's a laptop, so just have to accept it. I'm glad that Apple has prioritized cooling more in the 16".

Are you watching 4k video?

 

[turbineseaplane]

To each your own, but I like a silent machine as much as possible.

And if I'm doing basic browsing, office stuff, poking around - I'd better *never* hear the fans.

 

[matty1551]

if you don’t need the performance benefits of turbo boost, disable it off with turbo boost switcher. It keeps my macs significantly cooler and quieter.

 

[hajime]

If Apple could

if you don’t need the performance benefits of turbo boost, disable it off with turbo boost switcher. It keeps my macs significantly cooler and quieter.

How?

 

[matty1551]

If Apple could


How?

Turbo boost switcher does that. That’s the name of the app.

 

[Strangedream]

Between loud fans and melting CPU, I'd take loud fans anytime.

 

[waquzy]

Unfortunately my 2016 15" MBP does get loud sometimes just from YouTube viewing. That's the kind of thing that annoys me a bit, but it's a laptop, so just have to accept it. I'm glad that Apple has prioritized cooling more in the 16".

Hmm. Are you using Chrome and watching 4K YouTube videos?

 

[Falhófnir]

To each your own, but I like a silent machine as much as possible.

And if I'm doing basic browsing, office stuff, poking around - I'd better *never* hear the fans.

On balance I don't tend to care too much if it's getting noisy if I'm doing something like Civ V (just about the only 'intensive' thing I've ever used my MBP for) - It's a performance computer so I'm not really expecting it to be that well optimised for staying cool and quiet... one thing that does get me a bit is the fans in my 2015 seem to spin up (a lot) for google maps/ street view... I guess technically that is 3D work on a Haswell 22nm processor, but I would hope this newer machine could at least do that without really getting loud? ?

 

[Ma2k5]

Unfortunately my 2016 15" MBP does get loud sometimes just from YouTube viewing. That's the kind of thing that annoys me a bit, but it's a laptop, so just have to accept it. I'm glad that Apple has prioritized cooling more in the 16".

This is due to a MacOS/Safari codec issue, or rather they don't like Googles VP9 codec. Youtube generally doesn't cause a laptop to heat up (e.g. try a Windows laptop) - or if you stream on a site other than youtube, you should find the machine stays silent.

 

[weckart]

This is due to a MacOS/Safari codec issue, or rather they don't like Googles VP9 codec. Youtube generally doesn't cause a laptop to heat up (e.g. try a Windows laptop) - or if you stream on a site other than youtube, you should find the machine stays silent.

Same with Flash. Caused Macs to spontaneously combust. Windows and Linux - barely a murmur.

 

[waquzy]

This is due to a MacOS/Safari codec issue, or rather they don't like Googles VP9 codec. Youtube generally doesn't cause a laptop to heat up (e.g. try a Windows laptop) - or if you stream on a site other than youtube, you should find the machine stays silent.

This was the main reason why I ditched Safari and use Chrome instead, as I watch lot of YouTube videos, I need my 4K fix. Unfortunately, my MBP runs very hot while doing so...

 

[Whackman]

I don't have my 16 inch yet but on my 2012 Macbook Pro fan noise always sounded it was having problems.
Now it probably just means "good cooling".

 

[mcvaughan]

My grandfather used to have a saying: My hot water is too hot, my cold water is too cold.

 

[Ma2k5]

My grandfather used to have a saying: My hot water is too hot, my cold water is too cold.

To be fair Mac's in the past were known for their more silent operation compared to some Windows competitors, mainly due to not ramping up the fan until it reached very high temperatures (so at 90c+ while a Windows may have started it at 70-80). The issue is nowadays the CPU's once in turbo boost mode tend to heat up way faster than they did in the past, so fan noise has become universally more noticeable.