New 2011 MacBook Pro Heating Issue?

Simply running PLEX on my 2011 13 in i5 (No movies playing) makes my MBP run @ 95C. I also get a 2fer.... Fan's are screaming with 5000K ROM

I am so glad I decided not to upgrade..not to sound callous but thanks for guinea pigging these, the 12 MBP ought to be just about perfect!

Some more testing.

Watching this movie at 1080p: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XITHbsUUlYI
using FlashPlayer and only one processor core, also w/out hyper-threading, yields temps around 74ºC, and fan at 2500 rpm.

Same movie, standard processor mode (2 cores + h-t) and temp is 87 ºC, fan screaming at 6200 rpm.

Again, no high temps whatsoever with HTML5 version of Utube.

Now I WANT the * software update!

I wonder if this problem will be fixed with the release of "Lion", that is if a software update is the answer. My brother has an i7 CPU Windows 7 laptop which has no heat problem. Could be the MBP has poor cooling and the air flow from the fans is not enough or does not reach the cpu.

Well, I think its exactly why a software patch might help solve this issue. Its clearly a case of how resources are managed. I think, more than i7 upgrade, its the upgrade to AMD graphics card which might be causing this issue. The heating problems are more severe and occur more while anything video related s/w is run. A simple program like skype video or netflix or even youtube will cause the temp spike and battery drainage.

For me that movie kept my cpu in the mid 70 c/2500 rpm for all but the last minute and then they jumped up to low 80'c/4000 rpm suprisingly.

HD is a linear thing isnt it, eg. the content doesnt vary the cpu usage?

Anyway, another example of why the newer 'portables' arent what they should be if one nearly 5 years older can do the same thing with less heat/noise.

I wonder if apple think its a problem, I know Im sitting on the money to buy one (Ive actually been waiting over a year for sandybridge) but have held of on buying even tho my core2 is really starting to show its age.(like me:)

Well, it might have to do with the GPU update, but I've got no AMD, I'm on a 13 inches i7 with the Intel HD3000 chip.

Mmmmh, do you guys know whether is possible to tweak the graphic GPU (that is, underclocking and that sort of stuff). Who knows, maybe the poor sandybridge is not responsible for all that heat...?

I thought the same thing so went and looked at some sandybridge reviews/tests and surprisingly the integrated gpu doesnt contribute much heat at all to the cpu when under load or idle.

So while Im sure its not helping having them on top of each other its likely not going solve the problem.

However the underclocking is something that could help thru turbo mode id say if apple of someone ever make it happen like with coolbook (unfortunately that doesnt work with these cpu's). They are so powerful that most wouldnt notice the underclocking under 'normal' usage.

Pity apple hasnt thought it important enough to give us such an option.

So the option I will likely take is not to buy until Ivy bridge as I already own a dust buster and heater thanks 😟

I was hoping for a fix before my return date was reached. I returned the MBP 17" yesterday. The Apple store didn't know there was a problem or wouldn't admit they knew about it. They wanted me to exchange it for another one. I decided to to get my money back and reorder when the problem was fixed, if it can be. Back to Windows PC for now.

Hello, My new MBP 17" i7 having a hot to touch, while I play the Facebook games (heavy loaded flashplayer game). I feel left palm pad little warm and I checked to touch the bar above of keyboard. Oh boy does that very dangerous hot to operate it or let close the Facebook flashplayer game to cool down?

That I bought new MBP last week at Best Buy with Geek Squad's warranty service.

@dkaechler Did you have to pay a restocking fee? Did you say it was defective? Did you have to show the guys at the Apple Store?

I have a 13" i7 that uses the fan consistently, even when watching Netflix and YouTube, reaching up to the low 6000's in RPM and around 92c in temps. I want to take it back and wait on purchasing a Mac. I wanted one so bad and I want to love this one, but this flaw is holding me back.

Do you notice battery drainage when playing netflix? Tell them battery is not working as expected. Within the 14 day period, you can return it safely.

I too am facing a similar issue. My Macbook Pro 13" heats up if I open up only a few web browser windows, nothing fancy! I had bought it from Amazon, so had the 30 day return policy that I availed of. Got another one but facing the same issue 😟
Apple better do something about this. Now, I understand what Jobs "distorted reality" is all about . I am a student and had spent a fortune on it 😟
Extremely disappointed with Apple.

For the most part, I believe the high temperatures are related to the elevated CPU usage when people use certain apps. I could run a 3GB VMware virtual machine and the CPU usage would never go high enough for it to be worrisome. However, I tried to stream a simple video off SopCast, my CPU would rise to 16% or so and make the fans go crazy with the temperature. I haven't tried gaming on my MacBook yet, but it will probably spike the CPU anyway.

Some of the CPU spikes can be explained down to shoddy coding. As for the 1080p YouTube video posted above, I blame it on shoddy coding on Adobe's part when programming flash. I could run a BluRay quality 1080p video no problems on VLC and the CPU usage never got above 8% and temperature around 50C-60C whereas the CPU usage when running the YouTube video hovered around 16-17% and temperature of 70C-80C.

Wit hall these ppl having heat issue with the early 2011 MBP, I am not tempted to upgrade my late 2008 MBP at all 😟

I play world of warcraft as well with my Apple LED Cinema display 27inch hooked. Without my laptop cooler, my MBP shutdowns in less than 10 mins for being over 107C.
With the laptop cooler, the temp keeps below 90C.

I am really afraid to upgrade to the new MBP for that reason