The problem of excess heat in the MacBook Pro 2011

[MacBook Pro 123]

Hello:

I have a problem with heat in the MacBook Pro 2011.

13-inch screen size and processor i5.

Is this normal?

Is this a problem with you in the MacBook Pro???

I want to know. Is it possible when it is MAC LION solve the problem of heat???

Thank you all ............

 

[GGJstudios]

How do you know you have excess heat? The processors used in Macs are designed to automatically shut down to prevent damage if they truly overheat (around 100C/212F - 105C/221F, depending on your processor). Your temps are most likely well within the normal operating range. Too many people obsess about heat in MBPs, when there isn't an overheating problem. Most are simply not familiar with the normal temp range in Mac portables and the aluminum casing transfers heat, making it seem hotter than plastic PCs. Install iStat Pro to get accurate readings of your temps, among other things.

You were already told these things in the other thread you started on this issue.

 

[cloroxbleach4]

There are tons of these threads over temperatures with the MBP.

Also, you didn't post your temperatures, so hot is relative.

 

[gorskiegangsta]

Can you specify what your temps are? Here are mine (13'' i5 MBP 2011)

 

[palpatine]

How do you know you have excess heat? The processors used in Macs are designed to automatically shut down to prevent damage if they truly overheat (around 100C/212F - 105C/221F, depending on your processor). Your temps are most likely well within the normal operating range. Too many people obsess about heat in MBPs, when there isn't an overheating problem. Most are simply not familiar with the normal temp range in Mac portables and the aluminum casing transfers heat, making it seem hotter than plastic PCs. Install iStat Pro to get accurate readings of your temps, among other things.

You were already told these things in the other thread you started on this issue.

Exactly. My temperatures are below.

 

[MacsOnAnabolics]

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This is under normal use for me.

 

[gregpod9]

I have no heating issues on my 2011 13" i5 MBP. Below are the temperatures for it.

 

[Crunch]

I was going to post a thread until I saw this poll.

I have the 17" model with the Core i7 Quad 2.2GHz and as I'm writing this, the fans (left and right) are at 3,600rpm each. When I run HD video and have my three browser and their respective 15 or so tabs, my 2010 iMac and its Quad Core i7 2.93GHz never went over 2,000rpm much.

Now, on the other hand, with the 17" 2011 MacBook Pro w/ Quad Core i7 at 2.2GHz, the heat is quite brutal. The keys on the left half of my MBP are too warm for comfort and the palmrest is also uncomfortably hot.

What's worse, however, is that when I run a few more things on top of what I have open now, the fans spin up rather fast right up to 5,500rpm. I have the iStat Menus, too, and the CPU die will not reach above 190F thanks to the fans, but boy, is it ever LOUD!

Anyone have any advice as to what I might do to improve this constant heat?

 

[David-fr]

Ive found that after a day of light use it can go up to 80-85 degrees just with netflix on full screen. After a pram reset and a restart it goes back to 40-60 degrees

 

[maclaptop]

My maxed out 15" 2010 MBP is noticeably cooler running than my similarly configured 2011.

One of many considerations, is that the 2010 models have two fans where as the 2011 only has one.

 

[gorskiegangsta]

My maxed out 15" 2010 MBP is noticeably cooler running than my similarly configured 2011.

One of many considerations, is that the 2010 models have two fans where as the 2011 only has one.

the 2011 15 and 17 inchers have two fans.

 

[David-fr]

My maxed out 15" 2010 MBP is noticeably cooler running than my similarly configured 2011.

One of many considerations, is that the 2010 models have two fans where as the 2011 only has one.

2 Fans bro

 

[daneoni]

I was going to post a thread until I saw this poll.

I have the 17" model with the Core i7 Quad 2.2GHz and as I'm writing this, the fans (left and right) are at 3,600rpm each. When I run HD video and have my three browser and their respective 15 or so tabs, my 2010 iMac and its Quad Core i7 2.93GHz never went over 2,000rpm much.

Now, on the other hand, with the 17" 2011 MacBook Pro w/ Quad Core i7 at 2.2GHz, the heat is quite brutal. The keys on the left half of my MBP are too warm for comfort and the palmrest is also uncomfortably hot.

What's worse, however, is that when I run a few more things on top of what I have open now, the fans spin up rather fast right up to 5,500rpm. I have the iStat Menus, too, and the CPU die will not reach above 190F thanks to the fans, but boy, is it ever LOUD!

Anyone have any advice as to what I might do to improve this constant heat?

Buy a 2011 Quad Core iMac and redo the comparison.

 

[GGJstudios]

Anyone have any advice as to what I might do to improve this constant heat?

Use ClickToFlash plugin or ClickToFlash extension to control Flash on websites. If you frequently have 15 tabs open and some have Flash content, that can easily ramp up temps.

 

[dagamer34]

Use ClickToFlash plugin or ClickToFlash extension to control Flash on websites. If you frequently have 15 tabs open and some have Flash content, that can easily ramp up temps.

Ditto. Flash chews up CPU and will instantly cause your fans to kick into high gear with enough tabs open. It's one of the main reasons why Apple doesn't ship OS X with Flash installed (the other being it gives laptops better battery life during testing).

You need only look at these two pages to understand why:
http://www.anandtech.com/show/4205/the-macbook-pro-review-13-and-15-inch-2011-brings-sandy-bridge/9

http://www.anandtech.com/show/4205/the-macbook-pro-review-13-and-15-inch-2011-brings-sandy-bridge/15

Pretty much, if a laptop is getting lower battery life, then by inference, the CPU/GPU is must be doing more work, which means it has to generate more heat, and thus, fans spin faster!

 

[corvus32]

I have the ClickToFlash and AdBlock extensions installed, and my temps never get above the low 40's while browsing. Most of the time they are in the mid to upper 30's.

 

[Crunch]

Buy a 2011 Quad Core iMac and redo the comparison.

ok sure, no problem. lol...What's your point? Are you saying that the new 2011 Quad Core i5/i7 iMac's get hot enough for its fan(s?) to spin wildly under small loads as well? (I doubt that.)

As for the Flash plug-ins, I think you guys are right. It's just too bad that you would have to "calm down" this ridiculously powerful Quad Core i7 MacBook Pro where ALL FOUR cores turbo up to 3.0GHz (unless the temps are sky high lol), 2 cores go up to 3.2GHz and single-core apps take it one more notch up to 3.3GHz. Add another 100MHz to each spec if you have the Core i7 2820QM 2.3GHz CPU.

So we have all this power but can't really use it? I wanted a powerful system, so as to be able to just leave everything open and not worry about getting in trouble with not having enough juice in my notebook.

I don't know whether to or

 

[daneoni]

I'm saying you can't compare an iMac to a MacBook Pro. The two have vastly different thermal envelopes. The iMac will ALWAYS run cooler. bigger space, bigger heatsinks and bigger fans (rev up less) vs smaller space, smaller heatsink and smaller fans (rev up more)

 

[snaky69]

I was going to post a thread until I saw this poll.

I have the 17" model with the Core i7 Quad 2.2GHz and as I'm writing this, the fans (left and right) are at 3,600rpm each. When I run HD video and have my three browser and their respective 15 or so tabs, my 2010 iMac and its Quad Core i7 2.93GHz never went over 2,000rpm much.

Now, on the other hand, with the 17" 2011 MacBook Pro w/ Quad Core i7 at 2.2GHz, the heat is quite brutal. The keys on the left half of my MBP are too warm for comfort and the palmrest is also uncomfortably hot.

What's worse, however, is that when I run a few more things on top of what I have open now, the fans spin up rather fast right up to 5,500rpm. I have the iStat Menus, too, and the CPU die will not reach above 190F thanks to the fans, but boy, is it ever LOUD!

Anyone have any advice as to what I might do to improve this constant heat?

First off, there is no use to having 3 browsers with 15 tabs open, you cannot possibly be browsing all of this at once.

Secondly, you iMac is larger, and has much more air inside it to help it shed heat, and the components aren't as crammed together, of course the MBP is going to get warmer, this is just plain common sense here, not rocket science.

 

[maclaptop]

First off, there is no use to having 3 browsers with 15 tabs open, you cannot possibly be browsing all of this at once.

I find this rather fascinating and a bit odd. It's the first time I've ever heard there is a limitation on how one can use their Mac.

 

[snaky69]

I find this rather fascinating and a bit odd. It's the first time I've ever heard there is a limitation on how one can use their Mac.

There isn't one. It's just useless, having 45 tabs open at once produces heat and doesn't do anything for productivity. I was merely suggesting that the OP shutdown all those websites that he currently is not viewing anyway, hence solving his self-caused "heat problem".

 

[Crunch]

Alright, first of all, yes, I understand all of that regarding notebooks getting hotter faster and staying much warmer than a desktop where air can flow more freely and escape much quicker.

As for my 3 browsers and the dozens of tabs that I like to keep open, that's something I simply got used to with my iMac. I had the space and it's super convenient and the "why not" factor applies too. And yes, I AM using all THREE browsers because I enjoy the different features in Safari, Firefox and Chrome. I use all three of them all the time and I constantly switch between them. I was even thinking of adding Opera. lol...

At any rate, I didn't know this would become an issue when I switched from my last iMac. I haven't mentioned this one until now but I'm NOT referring to the Quad Core i7-870 2.93GHz, because I sold it for a lot of bling but that's a story for another day. Before my 17" MBP, I actually had the entry level 2010 27" iMac w/ 10GB of RAM, which was an experiment on my part to see how I would do with a dual-core with a higher clock, but still hyper-threaded, i.e. the Core i3-550 3.2GHz. I feel ridiculous typing this, but in some ways, the iMac with the Core i3 sometimes felt a bit "snappier" than the high-end Core i7-2820QM Quad that I have now. And, mind you, that particular silicon will turbo ALL FOUR cores all the way up to a full 3.0GHz, temperatures and couple of other conditions permitting. When there is an app that uses only two cores, it turbos even higher (up to 3.2GHz) and single-core apps can run at a staggering 3.3GHz with the i7 that's in the new 2011 17" MacBook Pro as well as the high-end 15" one. And that's not to mention the higher-end graphics card. The 17" MBP has a full 1GB of GDDR5 discrete memory and the i3 iMac only had half that!

Having said all of that, I have to wonder that when, let's say, I wanted to play one of those highly intensive games that actually needs and uses all of this horsepower (i.e. a Core i7 Quad w/ Turbo Boost as well as a full 1GB of AMD's latest generation (6000 series) graphics card). What good will all this power do when temperatures won't even allow it fore more than a few seconds anyway and I do mean seconds because this baby heats up really fast! Maybe a Core i7 Quad is "too much" of a good thing here?

What say you? Am I totally missing something and if do, what is it?

 

[grahamnp]

I want to know. Is it possible when it is MAC LION solve the problem of heat???

If there is excessive heat it is either a design defect or manufacturing issue. Even if you CPU is running at full load all the time, there should not be a cooling problem. So, if you are not satisfied with the MBP's temps right now, Lion will not fix this.

 

[snaky69]

Alright, first of all, yes, I understand all of that regarding notebooks getting hotter faster and staying much warmer than a desktop where air can flow more freely and escape much quicker.

As for my 3 browsers and the dozens of tabs that I like to keep open, that's something I simply got used to with my iMac. I had the space and it's super convenient and the "why not" factor applies too. And yes, I AM using all THREE browsers because I enjoy the different features in Safari, Firefox and Chrome. I use all three of them all the time and I constantly switch between them. I was even thinking of adding Opera. lol...

At any rate, I didn't know this would become an issue when I switched from my last iMac. I haven't mentioned this one until now but I'm NOT referring to the Quad Core i7-870 2.93GHz, because I sold it for a lot of bling but that's a story for another day. Before my 17" MBP, I actually had the entry level 2010 27" iMac w/ 10GB of RAM, which was an experiment on my part to see how I would do with a dual-core with a higher clock, but still hyper-threaded, i.e. the Core i3-550 3.2GHz. I feel ridiculous typing this, but in some ways, the iMac with the Core i3 sometimes felt a bit "snappier" than the high-end Core i7-2820QM Quad that I have now. And, mind you, that particular silicon will turbo ALL FOUR cores all the way up to a full 3.0GHz, temperatures and couple of other conditions permitting. When there is an app that uses only two cores, it turbos even higher (up to 3.2GHz) and single-core apps can run at a staggering 3.3GHz with the i7 that's in the new 2011 17" MacBook Pro as well as the high-end 15" one. And that's not to mention the higher-end graphics card. The 17" MBP has a full 1GB of GDDR5 discrete memory and the i3 iMac only had half that!

Having said all of that, I have to wonder that when, let's say, I wanted to play one of those highly intensive games that actually needs and uses all of this horsepower (i.e. a Core i7 Quad w/ Turbo Boost as well as a full 1GB of AMD's latest generation (6000 series) graphics card). What good will all this power do when temperatures won't even allow it fore more than a few seconds anyway and I do mean seconds because this baby heats up really fast! Maybe a Core i7 Quad is "too much" of a good thing here?

What say you? Am I totally missing something and if do, what is it?

I'd say it doesn't matter since the CPU definitely isn't a bottleneck in today's games, the HD and GPU being the main things solicited. Most games aren't programmed to run on multiple cores anyway.

 

[dagamer34]

I really hope people can tell the difference between Fahrenheit and Celsius.