Overheating Mac advice

[plaamook]

Does anyone have any experience cooling down MacBooks/Laptops?
It's getting up to about 38c here in the sunny south of Spain and It's basically too hot to run Reason. Even relatively simple tracks have got the fans screaming.
I actually need air con just to make music now.
Great...

So I've been thinking about things like cooling pads or whatever.
Anyone have any experience with such devices?

Cheers

[selig]

Takes me back to the early days of RE design/building where when I was rendering stuff I'd need to get an ice pack from the freezer to not overhead the poor little laptop. Only needed it rarely, so never looked into "actual' solutions, but the ice pacs worked great! The ice packs were flexible, thin/rectangular sized so fit under the laptop perfectly, covered in cloth IIRC to keep things dry. Pro tip: these things are also great for pulled muscles etc!!!

[plaamook]

Not a horrible idea.
Need to think about how to find or make something that’s about the right dimensions.
Like maybe freezer bags doubled up or something.
Hmmm….
Thanks Selig

Yeah the only time I spent doing a lot of video rendering on it was in the winter in Norway so over heating wasn’t really a problem.
More like using it to warm my hands!

[dioxide]

Are you running R12? There was a point I was having a lot of problems with Reason being very processor intensive (maybe R10?), or perhaps it was an macOS thing. Either way my laptop would overheat and act weird with audio drop outs and visual glitches. Now on R12 – on the same Mac Intel laptop – I have much less problems as it is much more efficient. 38 degrees is pretty crazy though, we top out at about 32 here on a normal year.

Note that laptops have an operating temperature range and 38 degrees is beyond that. I'm not sure if it differs between the Mac Intels and newer M series chips but it looks to apply to both. So yeah, get a fan pointed directly at your laptop.
https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201640

[crimsonwarlock]

https://www.amazon.com/laptop-cooler/s?k=laptop+cooler

[hamsterfactor]

I used to experience this before I upgraded to Apple silicon.

I propped up the MacBook in the back with an eraser, so that air would be able to flow underneath. No issues after that.

[BRIGGS]

I repaste to cpu/cooler when things get too hot.

Thermal paste dries out over the years, and can make your cpu run too hot.

[plaamook]

This isn’t like there’s a fault. When it’s cooler there’s no particular problem besides having an old comp. 2012 mbp. It’s getting on.
It’s not 38c in my house but it’s still warmer than usual.

But every little advance eats more cpu. Vsts, R12, etc.
I’m sure if I could buy a new Mac it would fly along.

Ill check the thermal paste. It’s prob shot.
Mostly I was wondering if the fan cooling pads were worth the money.
I used to point a normal fan at it. That kinda worked.

[plaamook]

Or not…that thermal paste job isn’t something I’m happy doing w my single and only comp.
Hmm…

[joeyluck]

You could start with doing what hamsterfactor did and see what difference it makes. I had a roommate who would set his laptop on a kitchen cooling rack. Sometimes the first solution is just getting it directly off a surface to allow a little more airflow around it.

I have a cooling pad with fans that my laptop sits on. I haven't used the fans in years. I had bought it for my previous MacBook Pro for when it would get really hot. It never overheated, I just wanted to keep it cooler. It certainly helps. Now I just use it because I like the slight angle and having my MacBook Air slightly raised.

[dvdrtldg]

There's an Intel Macbook Pro that was known for chronic cooling problems, I think it was the 2019 model. I had it for a year and the fucking fan just ran constantly

[Floyd42]

This isn’t like there’s a fault. When it’s cooler there’s no particular problem besides having an old comp. 2012 mbp. It’s getting on.
It’s not 38c in my house but it’s still warmer than usual.

But every little advance eats more cpu. Vsts, R12, etc.
I’m sure if I could buy a new Mac it would fly along.

Ill check the thermal paste. It’s prob shot.
Mostly I was wondering if the fan cooling pads were worth the money.
I used to point a normal fan at it. That kinda worked.

If a ten yoar old laptop overheats - clean it. you will be surprised, how much dust you will find...

https://www.makeuseof.com/tag/fix-overheating-laptop/

[plaamook]

Actually it’s more surprising how clean it is.
It’s not bad but it’s been cleaned here n there during things like changing out ssd’s etc. and I look after it best I can. Keep the dust down around it.

I’ve got it up on some metal bars again. See what we get. Got the fan queued up.
I wish I could just hose it down.

But actually I was wondering if you could wire the cpu to a tray that pops out like the old pc optical drives. Then you could literally set up your comp and pop the cpu out to get it away from everything else to cool it.
Kinda like a scrotum….

[motuscott]

Kitchen cooling rack under my MBP helped, but curious about the scrotum approach...

[PhillipOrdonez]

Tío, I would hook it to a very long HDMI cable and use Bluetooth keyboard and mouse, so the computer could be in another room where it is cool like near the ac, better if it has room to breathe underneath, while my studio is noise free.

[plaamook]

Well at the mo the cheap fix is still the two steel bars to lift it and a (sadly) noisy fan blowing at it. It works but I need to work w ear buds because the Senn HD25’s are too hot.