Coil whining(?) MacBook Pro 16" (2021) M1 Pro

Question

Level 1

9 points

Coil whining(?) MacBook Pro 16" (2021) M1 Pro

Hi!

I recently bought a new 16” MacBook Pro with the M1 Pro. Most of the times the fans are simply off.

But I wanted to try a stress test to see when/how long it would take to turn the fans on.

So when I did a multi-core test in Cinebench, a weird noise comes out of the keyboard ( seems to be coming from the SoC).

It’s not loud at all but it’s definitely something you can hear if you’re in a really really quiet room.

It’s like a crackling noise and some weird really soft cracks. It’s really not loud at all you have to put your ear closer to the keyboard to hear it. (it's also in intervals, so not during the whole stress test.)

The sound then immediately stops right after the fans kick on.

Any idea if this is normal? It literally only happens when I do the stress test (or something else that requires a lot of CPU load).

Maybe it’s the heat from the SoC pushing against the heat sink? Or coil whining?

Thanks a lot!

Any thoughts?

MacBook Pro 16″, macOS 12.0

Posted on Nov 9, 2021 3:21 PM

Reply

Answer 1

zarathu

Level 3

622 points

Nov 9, 2021 3:25 PM in response to mikafrombe

I agree that its heat put out by the SoC that you hear right before the fans cool it down. I did not hear it when I ran Handbrake for 15 minutes straight according the Activity Monitor has the CPU running at 97% for 15 minutes. I didn’t hear that noise, no did I hear the fans come on either, and had to listen at the vent to even know they were on.

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Answer 2

leroydouglas

Level 10

202,560 points

Nov 9, 2021 4:04 PM in response to mikafrombe

mikafrombe wrote:

Thanks for your reply! And sadly the noise is there whenever you do an

activity that requires a lot of CPU recourses. So whenever I open a VM

it's also there, but as I stated before it's not loud at all. So I'm

kinda debating if I should contact Apple Support for it or not.

If you have any doubt, there is a 14 day return period on a new purchase for any reason a full refund or exchange

https://getsupport.apple.com/

Stress test CPU:

http://osxdaily.com/2012/10/02/stress-test-mac-cpu/

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Answer 3

caedmon65

Level 4

2,506 points

Nov 9, 2021 3:24 PM in response to mikafrombe

If it doesn’t happen unless you do a stress test, then just don’t do a stress test. If it isn’t noticeable ever, then it probably doesn’t matter.

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Answer 4

mikafrombe Author

Level 1

9 points

Nov 9, 2021 3:42 PM in response to caedmon65

Thanks for your reply! And sadly the noise is there whenever you do an activity that requires a lot of CPU recourses. So whenever I open a VM it's also there, but as I stated before it's not loud at all. So I'm kinda debating if I should contact Apple Support for it or not.

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Answer 5

mikafrombe Author

Level 1

9 points

Nov 9, 2021 3:44 PM in response to zarathu

Could you try testing with Cinebench as well? And hear closely to the middle of the keyboard that's where the noise comes from in my case.

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Coil whining(?) MacBook Pro 16" (2021) M1 Pro

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