MACBOOK PRO & SNOW LEOPARD - OVERHEATING

In the case of my model A1150, the issue was poorly applied cheap thermal compound (nice work, Apple). I carefully applied better compound and the temperature of the CPU under load went from 120 degrees celsius to 55 degrees celsius!

http://www.ynform.org/w/Pub/MacbookProA1150OverheatingProblem

If anyone is interested in having me try this on their computer, get in touch with me. I think it's lame that Apple can't take care of this themselves.

My MacBook Pro has ben overheating like mad since upgrading to snow leopard. I purchased the external Moshi Zefyr fan and cooling plate and still not good - helps a little. If you leave it alone it gets to 6000 rpm fans and 70 Deg C if you use too many programmes at once then it gets above 80 Deg C not long after that it will crash with kernel panic and shut down. Checking logs shows that one CPU has shut don. Cant be god for the Mac Book. It was fine under leopard. Also constantly running out of free RAM I have 2GB and it is not enough under snow leopard. Ifreemem hels to clear that problem and stop the beachball spinning.

There is a real issue here APple - why not tell us what the cause is?

Simon

Just an FYI on how I solved this on my MBP core duo (1,2). I downgraded from Snow Leopard to Leopard 10.5.8 via TimeMachine. everything works great now. Dont know if its the older hardware or SL trying to push the CPU like its a Core Duo 2 (or what) but....

I still use smcFanControl but my comp rarely gets over 60 C now and I run World of Warcraft with max settings. thanks!

I just wanted to chime in on this, since I recently acquired a used Macbook Pro 17" 2.4 Ghz. I swapped out my hard drive from an older MB Pro 15" 2.16 machine, and for about the last week, the fans would run very loudly, even without anything open or me using it. Finally I got fed-up, and decided I would try fixing it, or failing that reinstall SL from scratch.

Like me I'm guessing many users have probably upgraded their OSes over time, instead of a new install. I think I've done this since 10.2. What this means of course is that stuff that's been installed over time into your OS, has probably polluted the upgrade.

Anyway, this was my guess, and I started with Activity monitor and tried to determine which processes weren't sleeping. Saw Launchd kept restarting and dying. Next took a look with Console, and looked at all the errors; and noted a number of things were generating errors.

In my case, I had things like Frontbase, Primebase, MySQL, and Adobe's VersionCue (part of CS3) that weren't starting up properly. Some of these apps aren't compatible with SL, others like VersionCue I don't use. Next, I determined there are various directories /Library/LaunchDaemons, /Library/StartupItems, /etc/mach init_peruser.d, that other applications can install their services too.

I copied all these files and moved them out of the above directories; restarted, and after monitoring for a day - my cpu usage is still 98% idle.

Keeping a small story short ..

Since then my fans have not come on at all, and though my cpu spikes normally while doing intensive tasks, but drops right back down, even though I have numerous apps like Lightroom 3, Photoshop, XCode, the iPhone Simulator, Mail, Safari (with Flash sites), running simultaneously.

My problem is solved, and I'm happy once again.

Good luck

My late 2008 MBP has been idling around 70C since upgrading to Snow Leopard. Two round trips with AppleCare didn't help. I've had some temporary success periodically resetting the PRAM and PMU, but even that hasn't worked in a while. Yesterday I booted into the 64 bit kernel to see if it made a difference and BOOM! Just like that I'm idling at 45C. The CPU used to idle around 6.5W and now it idles around 1.5W. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that this lasts.

Tim, can you tell me what program you used to show your wattage? The only one I have found is CoolBook (unpaid just to monitor), but am afraid to install, and that supposedly monitors voltage. I have never had constant heat problems, but I have identified that after I use an intensive program, sometimes my temps stay ramped up after I quit the program, and it takes a restart to reset the temps back to normal idle approx. 40-45 C. I have attributed this to the "Penryn" T9600 chip that is in our MBPs having SpeedStep technology issues. No one has been able to confirm, but I would like to monitor more than just temp. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated. I have not tried 64 bit kernel yet, as I am waiting for 64 bit updates. Thanx (and this all happens when CPU at 98% idle)

I'm using iStat Menus. Still running cool here in 64 bit.

I've had this problem ever since installing Snow Leopard. Tried un-checking Safari's 32-bit mode checkbox in "Get Info," which helped a little. Tried removing the battery, unplugging power, and pressing the Power button for 5 seconds. But this is only a temporary fix.

I've had no heat problems since installing several recent OS X updates though. I've installed the "ProKit 6.0.1 (SnowLeopard)" update and the "Java for Mac OS X 10.6 Update 3", but NOT the "MacBook Pro SMC Firmware Update 1.4" since my MBP doesn't qualify. Seems to be fine now.

If that doesn't hold, I'll try booting in 64-bit mode. Not sure if the MBP is already doing that.

Did anyone ever get a fix for these issues?
I have a Mac PowerBook Pro laptop from 2007 and I have not had too many probs with it until I upgraded to Snow.
My reason for the upgrade? 2 children in the home that run on newer systems that had snow pre-installed. Since we are a tech savy fam and both kids are in online virtual academies, and both run on mac os... one for music needs, one for art needs... I had to upgrade for cohesive purpose.
I'm starting to seriously regret my choice.
Since the upgrade, my battery has become pregnant and had to be tossed (fairly new battery but about 60 days past warranty-go figure), I have had to buy a fan table for my machine (never needed that before), and so many programs seem to run choppy or slightly interrupted.
I've spent about $200 over the last 6 months trying to get things fixed but I keep hearing the same response, "I think your just expecting more from this laptop than it's capable of".
???? I never had these probs before snow moved in and Apple has been cold as ice about helping me fix the issues.

Hello.
I've had similar problems with my MBP Core 2 Duo 2.4GHz. CPU temp was on an average of 15C more than it used to be e.g. in normal use (internet, itunes, maybe some Lightroom) I was rarely over 50C but now it was heating up to 70s very often, without any intensive tasks running. Minimum was: 61-62C
For a moment I thought it was caused by the RAM upgrade (2->4GB) but then I realized it was SL.
I followed what other people said and I booted in 64-bit mode. I'M BACK TO UPPER 40s and it feels really nice!
For now, I haven't noticed any incompatibilities with the 64-bit mode and I hope I don't.
Cheers!

I experience the same original behaviour of my macbook pro in regards to having a higher CPU A Wattage (above 5.00W) displayed in iStat menu together with higher temperatures. Whenever it happend a cold(!) reboot fixed it until the next time.

Tim Moose wrote:
I'm using iStat Menus. Still running cool here in 64 bit.

@Tim: Do you have another update in regards to the 64bit mode? On my machine it happens rarely (sometimes not in one month, but sometimes on three days in a row), so I would like to ask you how often it occured on your machine before the 64bit startup.

On my SL there are still some kernel extension without 64bit support (from Apple), so wouldn't this impact the systems' operation?

@4marcus

No. Unfortunately, my MBP ran in the 1.5W range for a few weeks and then jumped back to the 6W range. As far as I can tell, it went back to running hot after connecting an external monitor for a few hours. My initial success must have been due to some of the other remedies I had tried. Latetly I've gone back to resetting the SMC, which keeps me cool for a few days.

I have an early 2009 model 15" MBP and upgraded to SL on release. I had a lot of overheating issues and the battery would run down within minutes. At the time there was very little discussion about it and certainly no solutions. I reverted back to Leopard using Time Capsule and everything was OK again. I haven't missed SL at all but I now read that the new App Store requires SL. I'm very reluctant to reinstall SL and am hoping that Lion will resolve everything. I believe it is due out in the Summer (2011).

Unfortunately, there is a solution.
The battery I had bloated and became huge, so I removed it.
I can not afford to replace the battery so I am plugged into the wall.
No problems since. Guess what Apple... the batteries suck! This is my second one in 3 years.
I care for them well, I prime them, I recharge then use, then recharge, as instructed.
My Cannon G3 camera has had the same battery since I purchased it. My cell phone has had the same battery since I purchased it. My iPod... dito. What's the deal Apple?
Usually I'm so proud to post: "Free from wires, free to roam!"
Now I'm bound to an outlet!!!!

Hi

My solution:
downgrading back to Leopard!

My issues:
I have a Late 2008 Macbook and always had Leopard on as I didn't see the point or need to upgrade to SL. When the App store came out, I decided to upgrade to Snow Leopard. Since that day and for the past month, my Macbook has been running with fans at 6200rpm and CPU heat about 70 degrees all the time, within 10 minutes of start up even though my CPU was idle at 90% or more, even without running any applications.

I decided to downgrade to Leopard so I did a clean install back to Leopard and now my Macbook CPU heat is at 49 degrees with fans running at 2000rpm. It is back to normal and only heats up and fans start spinning when I watch youtube's videos or something that use my CPU.

I recommend this solution to others that have this problem. I guess there is a heat problem and fan issue with older macbooks when upgrading from Leopard to SL. That is a shame but at least this solution worked fine for me!