Cleaning the dirt from fans?

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Level 1

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Cleaning the dirt from fans?

How do I clean the dirt from my Macbook Pro's fans?

I've had my laptop for about 2 years now and I try and clean it on a regular basis, and it never really had any fan or overheating problems, but the past few months the notebook gets really hot and the fan sounds like it's going nuts whenever I try to stream or view videos.

I've reset the PRAM already so it isn't that, I was thinking that the fans might be dusty, as someone I know had a similar problem with their HP laptop and they cleaned out a 3/8" piece of dust/dirt from the fans and now it runs smooth.

MacBook Pro 15" Unibody (Late-2008), Mac OS X (10.6.7)

Posted on Mar 22, 2011 6:15 PM

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Answer 1

rkaufmann87

Level 10

148,494 points

Mar 22, 2011 6:53 PM in response to Afterlife07

Reset the SMC, a PRAM reset doesn't do anything for the fans. The correct process is:

_SMC RESET_

• Shut down the computer.
• Plug in the MagSafe power adapter to a power source, connecting it to the Mac if its not already connected.
• On the built-in keyboard, press the (left side) Shift-Control-Option keys and the power button at the same time.
• Release all the keys and the power button at the same time.
• Press the power button to turn on the computer.

If that still doesn't work then remove the back cover of the computer and use a vacuum to remove dust from the fan area. This is easily done if you have a unibody MBP.

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Answer 2

hhttown

Level 1

0 points

Aug 21, 2011 5:36 PM in response to Afterlife07

The last month or so I noticed my fans (late 2008 MBP) working harder and one has a bad/noisy bearing at speed. So I took the back off to look and didn't see much dust. Then I actually removed the fans and the exhaust ports were completely clogged. It came off like dryer lint. It was easy to clean and solved my problem. Fans stay around 2000 RPM again and no noise. CPU runs cooler too.Though I may still order a new fan for the bad one.

I read a lot of posts online about just blowing compressed air to clean. But unless you actually remove the fans I can't see how that would work well.

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