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Macbook Pro Retina runs hot while lid is closed and fans working at full speed

When i open the lid and check the activity monitor a different process runs at 100% everytime. After I open the lid the process goes back to normal, the mbp cools down and fans slow down. It only started happening after few days of use.


Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated!



Thanks!

MacBook Pro with Retina display

Posted on Jun 27, 2012 3:07 PM

Reply
138 replies

Mar 28, 2017 7:03 AM in response to yanz67

I just discovered this problem with my MBPR and it's about 4 years old. I had it fully charged before I commuted. about 2 hours later the fan were on full blast in my bag and the battery was at 22%. Apps running: Safari and Mail. iCloud was enabled.


I checked out the activity monitor. a process called kernel_task has been running for over 13 hours. a process WindowServer has been running for he past 2 hours, about the length of time when the lid was closed. could this be connected to having "wake for WiFi" set in battery settings?


Help! I don't want my computer frying before classes! I'm going to an apple store soon to get it personally checked out.

User uploaded file

May 11, 2017 8:31 PM in response to yanz67

Thought I'd add to this but I'm afraid no solutions. About a month ago I plugged an adapter into my thunderbolt and it sparked. I'd used it a hundred times before but this time something went wrong. My MBP appeared to be fried. I did a PRAM reset and it started back up again. Only problem was the battery was draining when the lid was closed to the point where it was going from 100% to dead overnight. It was warm but not hot. Just today, I packed it up after work and when I took it out at home it was extremely hot. I could barely touch it. I opened the lid and the fans started blasting. I quickly shut it down. I brought it to Apple when this first happened. They said it wasn't the battery or any particular app. They said they'd never heard of a spark at the thunderbolt ports either though there are plenty of reports out there. I reinstalled Sierra as well. Nothing really working so I guess I have to shut it down each time. Like someone else said...I love Apple products but for the $$$ I really expect better. Hope someone finds a solution!

Aug 8, 2017 8:58 AM in response to ev18azn

My BPB 15" is about 4 years old as well and this morning I experienced this for the first time. I closed the lid and put the MBP in my bag and went to a quick meeting (about 45 minutes total) and when I took the MBP out of the bag it was making noise (fan was running) and was pretty warm to the touch. I think I had closed all programs prior to closing the lid. I manually powered the MBP down and then restarted and it is fin, but of course the battery is very low after just 45 minutes. The fan never funs when I am using the MBP so this noise was new to me.


My concern is that in 2017, after 4 years and how many updates Apple has had, why did this happen all of a sudden? Is there anyone that can help me understand what this happens? I see the string for this topic is 5 years old so I assumed the issues were gone.


Thank you for any assistance on this. Heck maybe it will just never happen again.

Oct 4, 2017 4:41 PM in response to yanz67

If I remember correctly, in my case the problem was an external monitor that I connected to the HDMI port. The monitor used to work fine with a Windows laptop, but if I kept it in the MacBook while it was sleeping (the monitor was sleeping too), it caused the Mac to overheat. When I disconnected the monitor, the problem disappeared.

Jun 27, 2012 3:34 PM in response to yanz67

It scared me as well. I closed the lid and put it into the bag. I then picked it out again after half hour cause I forgot to send a file and lucky I did it... It was running like **** and the temperature was so **** hot I could handle it. I am really scare because I'm afraid it can gets on fire so I'm switching it off everytime, intead of just closing the lid-standby. How can we fix it?

Jun 29, 2012 2:46 PM in response to yanz67

I'm having the identical problem... the MBPr is getting hot when I close the lid and put in my backpack. Last night when I pulled it out, the fans were going full blast. I thought it was a result of running VMware Fusion. I shut it down... and then had the same issue this morning. I've had it for more than week, and I just started having the problem. Any hints as to what it might be?

Macbook Pro Retina runs hot while lid is closed and fans working at full speed

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