MacBook Air Overheating

Hi Daniel,

It's me again. Since you invited more tests how does she work with an external monitor? As one would use in a presentation. I been telling people the little video cable adapters that come with the MacBook Air are chew toys for their pet. Prove me wrong! I hope!

To the clouds!

Hi barkingmad,

I just hooked up my 17" Sony TFT to my MacBook Air. I let the MacBook Air introduction Video run on it fullscreen streaming from the HD on my Time Capsule while I am surfing the web on the MacBook Air screen. The fan slowly speeded up to maximum and the temperature is steady at 63°C. No core shut downs or system freeze 🙂

Daniel Drogies,

Sounds like the MacBook Air is a very practical lap top if it is put together properly. Also seems the external monitor is the "redline" for the Air. Some day I am going to open mine. Just to see what the grease and fan situation is in mine.

I heard a story the other day about a nonmac lap top that was over heating. They took it to one computer repair place that said nothing could be done; they would have to buy another machine. At a second opinion the person came to their house, opened the machine and found that the person who inspected the computer at the factory put their "inspected by" sticker on the fan blades and this was causing the fan to jamb ! Pealed this off and the machine has been fine since. Total charge for the "repair" $35.

Thanks again

hi everybody

I has same problem with my Air laptop, when you looking streaming video, or sampling music on it, or running some like Entourage, Firefox, Adium, Skype, and Remote desktop, laptop stop freeze and mouse move so slow. What's problem I think on most of 90% MacBook Air laptops. Resolution only external Cooler on bottom laptop, but for you need after this Air "THIN" laptop if you need using external cooler. With MacBook 2.0 Ghz never happens something like that.

If somebody found any resolution, what users Air can do with this freezing this nice laptop, it will be great.
Thank You.

http://www.apple.com/downloads/macosx/apple/macosx_updates/macbookairupdate.html

try that guys hope it helps

OR you can just do the update from your computer :P

@ barkingmad

Wow that's an interesting story about the sticker on the fan. It seems to be little things that make the big difference in the heat development in a laptop. Like I believe that MBA real problem is actually just the wrong use/dose of thermal paste.

@ X-Pulse

Read my posts in this topic. I had mine fixed, new fan and new logic board. Since then it works just fine without stuttering, freezes or core shutdowns.

@ ace101

very interesting. I'm curious to hear from the others if the update changed anything for them. For me a hardware fix was the solution already.

anyone has a solution for the noise/extreme heating issue? we don't have workds from Apple!!!

I have two Mac Book Air computers and one was overheating with loud noises. It sounded like an airplane about to take off. I bought an iphone and accidently synced my contacts from the phone into the computer. I noticed the contacts from phone I didn't want in my computer and deleted them. For some unknown reason the noise and the overheating vanished. I don't know why or how the the contacts could make the computer over heat or is related to the problem. Hopefully, the problem is gone.

I no longer have overheating issues with my MBA.

CAUSE : User not design.

On the occasions it did overheat : 100 % of the time it was because he couldn't breathe, usually from sitting on my lap, esp. with shorts on and therefore the vents stuck firmly against the skin of my thighs. Otherwise it was being suffocated by fabric, be it my bedding or otherwise lounging around watching t.v. etc.

Usage applicable with a laptop (not a desktop) should not see any overheating issues, installation of the temperature gauge widget (which i suggested sometime ago and may have been my idea originally ? ) should see even those determined to run it as a desktop never overheat the little trooper.

SOLUTION : *without having to re-boot

Let him chill out in the refrigerator for a few minutes (the chip responsible for the code in vechile sound systems resets in the freezer if kept below a certain temp for a period of time). It will then restart as though put to sleep (in my experience anyway).

DESIGN :

An increase in the angle of the vents / a raised ridge just in front of the vents would increase air flow in some circumstances but distract from its slim design.

b

Right this is ridiculous..
Im typing this after trying to go through an episode of the daily show ( http://www.thedailyshow.com/full-episodes/index.jhtml?episodeId=186774, it's pretty good :P) without the machine dying. To do that I've had to get the machine propped up AND sit it on top of a bottle of Smirnoff straight from the freezer.
This Air is definitely going to the shop on Monday. Im keeping my fingers crossed that the Hong Kong tech support is as helpful as the guys in Birmingham I've talked to before.

i had that overheating shutting down program frequently. the firmware update helped, but you got to look at ventilating the mba while you use it aswell.

beware of condensation due to extreme heat. my mba recently died and apple refused to fix it due to rust internally which they put down to water damage. i have never spilled anything on the mba and think its most likely due to condensation from it overheating and me cooling it down in front of the air conditioner

buy a new macbook instead, they run cooler at faster clocks and dont weigh that much more than the mba

In a new review about second generation MBA, the author acknowledge the overheating problems with first generation MBA

As I’ve written about on more than one occasion, my original MacBook Air suffered from serious >overheating problems on a regular basis. (What good is a laptop when you can’t play back videos if >you’re in a heated room?) Whatever Apple has done to these new models, the problem appears to be solved or at least greatly mitigated—though, sadly, Mother Nature didn’t cooperate with me and >allow me to test the Air on a brutally hot day just to see what would happen.

http://www.macworld.com/article/136760/2008/11/macbookairreview.html

Interesting. Even the editor of MacWorld had overheating problems. I do hope Apple will solve the problem for those of us who bought generation 1.

In a new review on the MBA also the Engadget author acknowledge the overheating issues of generation A of MBA.

http://www.engadget.com/2008/12/01/macbook-air-rev-b-mini-review/

That review describes it very well. I have also had to learn how to manage the MBA to avoid overheating, constantly checking activity monitor to make sure nothing runs high on cpu, closing Safari, other applications; and if I need to run anything intensive, doing it at my desk with a fan behind the MBA. Mostly I can then avoid the issue, but sometimes it happens anyway. I wish Apple would come up with a solution.