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July 20, 2017 12:39 PM Subscribe
My 2014 MacBook Pro becomes essentially unusable for work tasks in normal summer temperatures. What can I do?
My home office is not air-conditioned and I can't change this. Daytime temperatures here have mostly been in the 80s and occasionally low 90s for the past month or two—hot (and muggy), but nothing really crazy. However, my 2014 MacBook Pro (driving a 27" external monitor) becomes really sluggish in this weather if used for anything as computationally-taxing as watching a video on Youtube. Given that my job involves lots of videoconferencing and also compiling software, this is really doing a number on my productivity. Even when doing none of those things, there are delays of multiple seconds between clicking a button and seeing it "depress," and many characters' lag while typing.
Things I've tried, based on recommendations from the internet:
My home office is not air-conditioned and I can't change this. Daytime temperatures here have mostly been in the 80s and occasionally low 90s for the past month or two—hot (and muggy), but nothing really crazy. However, my 2014 MacBook Pro (driving a 27" external monitor) becomes really sluggish in this weather if used for anything as computationally-taxing as watching a video on Youtube. Given that my job involves lots of videoconferencing and also compiling software, this is really doing a number on my productivity. Even when doing none of those things, there are delays of multiple seconds between clicking a button and seeing it "depress," and many characters' lag while typing.
Things I've tried, based on recommendations from the internet:
- leaving the laptop open
- closing the laptop and placing it vertically for maximum airflow
- pointing a fan directly at the laptop
I had a much more severe version of this problem on a much older Macbook - so old that I never bothered getting it fixed. It would get so hot that it turned off in 30-90 minutes without fail, even in air-conditioned rooms. I'm certain the issue was the internal fan.
What I wound up doing was putting a gel ice pack underneath the laptop. This doubled or tripled my usable computer time.
I have no idea if this is super bad for the computer, it may well be.
posted by showbiz_liz at 12:44 PM on July 20, 2017
What I wound up doing was putting a gel ice pack underneath the laptop. This doubled or tripled my usable computer time.
I have no idea if this is super bad for the computer, it may well be.
posted by showbiz_liz at 12:44 PM on July 20, 2017
Best answer: I've worked in similar circumstances. Things I've done:
- Check & clean out the fan(s) -- a necessary first step.
- Try not to run the computer plugged in if at all possible -- it seems to heat up faster than if you let it run on battery power while not plugged in.
- Use a laptop cooling pad -- these have fans that suck hot air away from underneath the computer where it tends to get hottest .
- Set the computer on an ice pack that I've chilled in the freezer, and rotate it out with cold ice packs periodically.
- Make sure to back up all my work frequently, because the truth is that the heat will definitely drive the computer to an early grave and anything I try is just putting off the inevitable.
posted by ourobouros at 12:48 PM on July 20, 2017 [1 favorite]
- Check & clean out the fan(s) -- a necessary first step.
- Try not to run the computer plugged in if at all possible -- it seems to heat up faster than if you let it run on battery power while not plugged in.
- Use a laptop cooling pad -- these have fans that suck hot air away from underneath the computer where it tends to get hottest .
- Set the computer on an ice pack that I've chilled in the freezer, and rotate it out with cold ice packs periodically.
- Make sure to back up all my work frequently, because the truth is that the heat will definitely drive the computer to an early grave and anything I try is just putting off the inevitable.
posted by ourobouros at 12:48 PM on July 20, 2017 [1 favorite]
Back before I got AC I used to stick my laptop up on a cookie rack like this and point a fan at it. It got more airflow on all sides and kept things humming along much better than without all the floor clearance.
posted by phunniemee at 12:50 PM on July 20, 2017 [1 favorite]
posted by phunniemee at 12:50 PM on July 20, 2017 [1 favorite]
It should not be happening in a laptop that new, but sometimes the thermal grease between the CPU and heatsink/fan breaks down, or maybe wasn't applied correctly. Does the air from the fan seem as hot as it should?
posted by BeeDo at 12:56 PM on July 20, 2017
posted by BeeDo at 12:56 PM on July 20, 2017
I have a retina MBP 2014. It runs extremely hot, to the point where the fans will kick on full blast with just outlook/chrome open. Regular spikes above 60C aren't unheard of if i'm doing strenuous video work. If it can't dump that heat because the room you're in is too hot, it's going to throttle down its CPU, which will give you sluggish performance.
Apple's support website says optimal running temps are 50° to 95° F (10° to 35° C) and you're near the top of that range.
I'd see about installing a window air conditioner in your office or finding a cooler room in your house. There are laptops (like the panasonic toughbook series) that are certified for more extreme conditions, but they get expensive quickly.
posted by Oktober at 12:57 PM on July 20, 2017
Apple's support website says optimal running temps are 50° to 95° F (10° to 35° C) and you're near the top of that range.
I'd see about installing a window air conditioner in your office or finding a cooler room in your house. There are laptops (like the panasonic toughbook series) that are certified for more extreme conditions, but they get expensive quickly.
posted by Oktober at 12:57 PM on July 20, 2017
Response by poster: Thanks all. I have ordered the special pentalobe driver bits and will take a crack at opening the case and cleaning the fan. I'll also order a cooling pad—I didn't know these existed.
posted by enn at 1:10 PM on July 20, 2017 [1 favorite]
posted by enn at 1:10 PM on July 20, 2017 [1 favorite]
I'm gonna +1 the idea that something may be blocking or interfering with the fan and cooling unit inside the laptop. The components inside the computer are already hotter than any room you work in, so at worst the outside temperature is exacerbating the situation a little. I had a similar problem with an older MacBook that would switch itself off if not positioned tilted off the ground at an angle with a small fan blowing directly on it's base, and that one turned out to have melted thermal paste. Is it covered under Applecare? Depending on when in 2014 you bought it, it might still be under warranty.
posted by The Pluto Gangsta at 1:10 PM on July 20, 2017
posted by The Pluto Gangsta at 1:10 PM on July 20, 2017
Response by poster: The Macbook is out of warranty.
To clarify, it's never shut itself off or otherwise acted like the machines I've had where the thermal paste has degraded. And the behavior is definitely temperature-dependent; I had similar issues last summer, then it worked fine all winter and spring.
posted by enn at 1:17 PM on July 20, 2017
To clarify, it's never shut itself off or otherwise acted like the machines I've had where the thermal paste has degraded. And the behavior is definitely temperature-dependent; I had similar issues last summer, then it worked fine all winter and spring.
posted by enn at 1:17 PM on July 20, 2017
I had (have) that exact same problem and a cooling pad barely helped. What did help was opening the macbook and changing the thermal paste but it was mostly a bandaid since it still happens sometimes, just a lot less. Forcing the internal fan to go as high as possible with iStat Menus helps in those cases but it's noisy.
You may want to check if the CPU is really thermal throttling using the Intel Power Gadget tool. My macbook seems to start throttling at 90ºC, helpful to know when I'm not sure if I'm overtaxing the CPU with too many processes open or if it's overheating.
posted by Memo at 1:38 PM on July 20, 2017
You may want to check if the CPU is really thermal throttling using the Intel Power Gadget tool. My macbook seems to start throttling at 90ºC, helpful to know when I'm not sure if I'm overtaxing the CPU with too many processes open or if it's overheating.
posted by Memo at 1:38 PM on July 20, 2017
When my old laptop started dying, I actually jerry-rigged a water-cooling solution... by which I mean I filled up an old hot water bottle with cold water (from the fridge) and just stacked the laptop on top, although it did take a bit of fiddling to find a relatively stable configuration. I played around with ice packs, gel packs, etc... (like showbiz_liz mentions above) but in my experience, it was hard to beat the heat-absorbing power of 2 quarts of water in (almost) direct contact with nearly the entire bottom of the laptop.
posted by mhum at 2:37 PM on July 20, 2017
posted by mhum at 2:37 PM on July 20, 2017
Is your desktop crowded? I consolidated the dozens of files on mine down to three folders and... things seem to be running better in the LA heat.
posted by Scram at 1:23 AM on July 21, 2017
posted by Scram at 1:23 AM on July 21, 2017
I have that same design of pro, and an air. I dissembled the air and removed the fan, and thoroughly cleaned both the heatsink and fan.
Instant night and day difference. These thin macs seem to get plugged up more easily than any other laptops I've owned. About to do the same service on the pro.
posted by emptythought at 5:06 AM on July 21, 2017
Instant night and day difference. These thin macs seem to get plugged up more easily than any other laptops I've owned. About to do the same service on the pro.
posted by emptythought at 5:06 AM on July 21, 2017
This little USB-powered fan has helped me shave about 15-20 degrees off of the operating temperature of my laptop. Basically, it slides over the vent and has a selection of little silicone sleeves to make sure it's a snug fit. It then increases the air flow out of the laptop, helping it stay cool. It was $13 shipped with Amazon Prime.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 9:24 AM on July 21, 2017
posted by DirtyOldTown at 9:24 AM on July 21, 2017
I would be very wary of using an ice pack. Anything you cool down below the dew point will start to condense, and on internal surfaces where you might not even see it.
That said, it really shouldn't be doing that. I've used my 2012 outside in the shade into the 90s (admittedly not driving an external) and it doesn't skip a beat. You're talking about a maximum ambient temperature of 95F, and your CPU is going to be perfectly happy at 175F. So there's plenty of thermal differential to cool the thing. The kind of cooling we're talking about here is not related to humidity, so even if feels hot and muggy to you, the actual temperature is what matters. One other thing to check, what's your CPU usage look like in Activity Monitor? You might have one or more runaway processes that are maxing it out even when you're not doing anything. But my money would be on some kind of malfunction in either software or hardware.
posted by wnissen at 11:22 AM on July 21, 2017
That said, it really shouldn't be doing that. I've used my 2012 outside in the shade into the 90s (admittedly not driving an external) and it doesn't skip a beat. You're talking about a maximum ambient temperature of 95F, and your CPU is going to be perfectly happy at 175F. So there's plenty of thermal differential to cool the thing. The kind of cooling we're talking about here is not related to humidity, so even if feels hot and muggy to you, the actual temperature is what matters. One other thing to check, what's your CPU usage look like in Activity Monitor? You might have one or more runaway processes that are maxing it out even when you're not doing anything. But my money would be on some kind of malfunction in either software or hardware.
posted by wnissen at 11:22 AM on July 21, 2017
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posted by showbiz_liz at 12:41 PM on July 20, 2017 [7 favorites]