CPU Whine

Question

CPU Whine

Hi,
I bought my MacBook early January and quickly noticed a high pitched screaming noise. Its loud enough to be noticeable and bothersome in a quiet room. After some research it turns out to be the CPU whine which plagued MBP till apple fixed it. Details on it can be found easily on google by searching for 'CPU whine macbook'.

The whine on my machine changes frequency and quietens down by using Photo Booth and I can make it totally go away by running something which take 100 % of one of the core CPUs. The simplest example would be a while(1==1) {} loop.

I just wanted to know if other people are facing the same problem. I know for example some MBA users have reported this problem recently

http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=2295674&tstart=15

If its widespread enough then there is no point exchanging the MacBook and I could just return it.

MacBook, Mac OS X (10.6.2), MacBook Unibody 6.1 Late 2009

Posted on Feb 12, 2010 6:07 AM

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Answer 1

Jun 12, 2018 5:46 PM in response to CrouchingTigerFlyingDragon

I know that some Intel CPU's that have the Speedstep technology indeed make a whining noise when they switch between speeds/voltages. This is considered normal ( I have had it with all my non-MacBook laptops).

I have not noticed this with my brand new MacBook (Late 2009) yet.

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Answer 2

JasonFear

Level 5

4,965 points

Feb 12, 2010 3:09 PM in response to CrouchingTigerFlyingDragon

Hi CrouchingTigerFlyingDragon,

I'm not aware of any formal way to fix the whine. I do recall the update that Apple released to fix the CPU whine and my understanding is that the update was applied to all other machines in subsequent combo updates.

What's interesting, there's no consistency (from what I've seen) across machines. For example, I received about 15 new MacBooks (unibody) last week and I noticed some CPU whine on 3 of them. The other 12 were perfectly fine. Even after a clean install of the OS and all available updates there was no change.

I'm not convinced that even upon replacing the logic board (which I'm not going to do on a brand new machine) that the issue would resolve it. Interestingly enough, the owners of these three machines absolutely love them (none of them have commented on the audible "whine" even when identified to them).

If you're not happy with the machine, I agree with your decision to contact Apple and ask them what available options you have regarding the product.

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Answer 3

Feb 12, 2010 5:26 PM in response to JasonFear

Thanks JasonFear,

On a slight tangent. I would hate to switch away from OS X. What if I don't return the macbook and instead run some computationally intensive task all the time. The CPU will get heated so I can also run smcfancontrol. Will this be bad for the CPU? What about the fan (supposing I run it at 4000 rpm all the time)?

Its not an ideal solution but I have been a fan of Mac too long to stop using it. However I am pretty disappointed by apple lack of consistency in hardware from what you say.

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Answer 4

Bart1977

Level 2

287 points

Feb 13, 2010 12:09 AM in response to CrouchingTigerFlyingDragon

It doesn't seem like a good idea to be running the CPU at full capacity all the time.

Your other proposal of using smcfancontrol also doesn't seem like a good idea, but less so.

Ideally, you'd just bring it back and get another MacBook. Or at least make an appointment with the Genius before resorting to DIY-solutions.

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Answer 5

Feb 25, 2010 7:02 PM in response to CrouchingTigerFlyingDragon

Download and run QuietMBP. Adjust the setting until the sound disappears. It is a CPU usage program that will stop the whine. Beware that it obviously impacts battery life and is just a superficial fix. I've not yet otherwise gotten resolve from Apple regarding this issue. In a quiet room my machine gives me a headache within 10 minutes. Apple hasn't officially recognized it (I've called and been to the Genius bar) so the options available are limited. You can give up your machine for a few weeks while they poke around and try to see if there is something wrong but they aren't admitting defect.

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