Integrated GPU causing overheating problem?

Hi Apple Community,


I have been googling my way through a meriad of solutions for the overheating issue many people seem to experience when operating Windows through Boot Camp. Like many, I am hoping to do some occasional gaming on my Macbook while traveling during the summer months. I am currently operating:

Macbook Pro, 13-inch, Mid 2012. 2.9GHz Intel Core i7, 8GB 1600MHz DDR3, Intel HD Graphics 4000 512MB. It's running Mac OS X Lion 10.7.5 w/ a Windows 8.1 Boot Camp partition. I hope to play FFXIV -- And am able to do so w/ fairly high FPS; however, it reaches temps between 95C ~ 100C within 15 or 20 minutes. Gameplay doesn't suffer, but I shut the game down just the same to avoid damage.


Hardware and thermal paste do not appear to be the issue as the idle temperatures on Windows 8.1 and OS X are comparable and generally maintain 42C~55C depending upon the outer ambient temperatures. As for possible solutions, I increased the fan speed using SMC fan control and use a cooling pad to help keep the aluminum body cool as well. I have also adjusted the advanced power options and reduced the CPU power consumption from 100% to 99% for both minimum and maximum power consumption. Reducing power consumption further helped slightly, but after a certain point it did next to nothing for the temperatures. I was able to lower power consumption to 15%. Lowering the CPU power consumption also failed to change the games performance in any noticable manner, maybe a few FPS lower.


Next I increased maximum and minimum power consumption back to 90% and reduced the GPU from High Performance to Increased Battery life. This allowed the game to run at 60C ~ 70C but the FPS rates suffered greatly: ~15FPS ~ 23FPS. Thus it appears that the integrated GPU is causing the overheating issue.


I have heard people mention a Turbo Boost feature being to blame for the excess in temperature; however, have found no way to disable this. I also attempted to boot into the BIOS of windows 8.1 to find and disable the Turbo Boost option but the option to boot into the BIOS menu didn't seem to be available (I assume b/c of running Windows through Boot Camp, though I could have simply been missing something). I was also hoping to access the BIOS so that I could attempt to underclock the CPU or GPU in hopes that I would be able to find a happy medium between temperature and FPS.


Also having an issue w/ the display dimming as soon as I reach the account login screen for windows. Reinstalling the integrated graphics driver fixes this until the system is restarted, where it reverts back to the dim screen. I thought this may suggest a set of out of date drivers which could lead to some inefficiencies and heat generation, but this is speculation.


Any insight or suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Thank you in advance!

MacBook Pro, Mac OS X (10.7.5)

Posted on May 18, 2014 8:33 PM

Reply
3 replies

May 28, 2014 11:11 PM in response to Velathean

Hello Velathean,


i have the 13" late 2013 retina MBP. 2.8GHz Core i7 4558U with intel Iris GPU. When playing Assassins Creed Black Flag, the CPU package temp tops out a 99 Degrees Celsius. I worried me at first, but since T Junction on these CPUs is 105 Celsius, it should in theory be fine. These machines are known to run hot. While it is of course not good to have it run like that 24/7 it should generally be fine as it will not reduce clocks.


When doing CPU heavy tasks and my CPU runs at max, the temps never reach 90 Celsius... I thought that only the new Iris GPU had that problem since they did increase the TDP for that quite a bit.

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Integrated GPU causing overheating problem?

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