2012 Macbook Pro "Heat Issue"

Here are the facts: your fans can go up to 6000 RPM. 2000 RPM is quite low. They should be running faster to keep your system cooler. You can use smcFanControl to achieve this, but be careful because it can make your system's preferences get corrupted and then if you're not running it, your fans will not behave correctly until you reset your SMC.

Your fans should blow quite loudly when the system gets hot to the touch. If they are staying quiet while the system is pretty hot, I would recommend resetting your SMC controller, and if that doesn't work, then take it into Apple for diagnosis. It should never become hotter than like, 180°F even when running games. It will automatically shut down if it gets past 210° to avoid damaging the computer.

I had a 2010 Macbook Air and could run it forever even video and it would not heat up. I just bought a 2012 13" Retina Macbook Pro and I was watching streaming video for about 5 minutes and it got so hot I had to take it off my lap. It's ridiculous. The 15" is the same way. I downloaded SMC fan control and it showed it running at 220 degrees F and so I ramped up the fan speed and got it down to 168 degrees F but **** way too hot.

I went through the whole process with Apple. They even did diagnoses over several days on my rMBP. It runs very hot. They told me this was normal and that the retina had been engineered to deal with it. At that point I decided to stop watching the temp or playing with the fan speed. They've blessed it, and I've got Apple Care. I'm going to just use it hard as I need to, and deal with a problem when it arises. Do I think there's still an issue. Absolutely. You can touch the rail between the function keys and display and almost burn your fingers sometimes.

Hello all ... I am using Macbook Pro 13', non-retina and it was getting very very hot at the left bottom side. I am using the macbook only on table in my office. I noticed that it was getting extremely hot when I am using apps like Firefox or Virtualbox for virtual machines. Everything else seems to be OK. I recommend you to install the free application for monitoring of temperature of your battery "The Battery". If the battery temperature is below 80 C, then everything is OK.

My MacBook Pro is about two years old. Occasionally runs a bit hot. For the last two mornings it has been hot, hot, hot - I can hear the fan running.

And this is what we find on the website? Did anyone out there ever get an answer? I have been looking at the Activity Monitor and would set it to default (as suggested on another site) if I could see how to do it.

My Macbook Pro 13" (mid-2012) not only started heating up the point where it couldn't sit on my lap comfortably without being too hot, but then the fan kicked in as soon as I started visiting just one web site. At first, I blamed it on the browser so I stopped using Firefox. I then read a posting that the "Hardware Acceleration" on Firefox needed to be disabled. That didn't work. So I started using Google Chrome and its been fine. I use it interchangeably with Safari. i installed the SMC Fan Control app to keep an eye on my laptop temperature. My fan still kicked into high gear (6000+ rpm, normally 1900+ rpm).

I've been contemplating buying a laptop cooler off of Amazon but decided to search more postings for possible solutions. Some were to run AHT (Apple Hardware Test) and some errors resulted but the solutions were to take it to the Apple Store. So I decided to check ALL software installed on my macbook since the heat-up started. I decided to do some "house-cleaning" on my macbook by uninstalling under-used, rarely-used, or unused apps. The one app I forgot ***** up resources whether you're on a PC or Mac........Norton! I installed Norton Internet Security when I used to have Comcast. Once I uninstalled it earlier today, I launched Chrome with 4-5 tabs of sites loaded like usual. My RPM has hovered around the 2000 rpm ever since. PROBLEM SOLVED!

I have a 2012 i5 and a 2012 i7 and they are both way hotter then my 2011 i7 - the fun runs way more. I think this ivy processor has some heat issues. Apple help....

Your MBP can run up to 80degress Celcius without causing damage. anything above 80C is dangerous. If you want to cool your MBP down run as few applicaitons as you can.

Hmm...I thought the rdMBP is the coolest MBP ever. The Powerbook was hot, the early 2008 MBP was hot, but I've used the rdMBP for a few days now and it's only warm at the charging area when plugged in. Otherwise it's just cool to touch!

I agree with you Douglas. However, I also think some people are having heat issues that need to be addressed. Something is causing the heat in their macbook pro's. I hope this issue gets resolved.

I wonder if the heat issues are more apparent due to the metal body compared to a PC laptop which usually has a plastic body. Isn't plastic less conductive than metal?

Hello -

Thanks very much for your response. I agree with you and am certainly taking everything into consideration!

Probably right - but also may have to try a different Genius and show them that I can shut the system down by running "too many applications."

I'm brand new 2012 mac pro user, i'm getting very hot with my lap which is unusual, istat says fans are above 2003rpms. please help. Thx.

Well your Mac Notebook is Not a Laptop and is not meant to be used on or in your Lap.