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When do your fans kick in?

Hey,


So basically I have this issue with my MacBook Pro (it seems to be an issue) that my fans kick in pretty late. At about 200-210F is when my fans kick in no matter what ever I do. I can play a game, or do whatever I want but my fans seem to run at 1996-2006 RPM speed the lowest default speed.


I have the MacBook Pro Mid-2012 2.9Ghz, i7 Processor with 8 GB of ram.


I'm wondering if I can get different results from different people regarding when your fans kick in and at what temperature.


I used iStat Menus to determine my RPM speed and temperature.


Thanks!

Posted on Jul 10, 2014 6:25 PM

Reply
24 replies

Jul 11, 2014 11:15 AM in response to JaiJethani

Take it to an Apple Store or AASP for diagnosis. If you're feeling 200°F it's going to hurt.


Is there a way to trigger fans to turn on automatically besides controlling them using a third party program?


I missed that earlier question. Other than AHT, no, they should be controlled by the SMC. I don't recommend attempting to manually control the fans because that would only hide a symptom of a problem that should be fixed.

Jul 11, 2014 11:17 AM in response to John Galt

Yes, Apple Store did a diagnostic of my MacBook Pro and all results passes hence they said "You're good to go and there's no more need of assistance".


I did expect to be able to a little bit of gaming so I did install iStat Pro in order to check temps and fan speeds and to control the fan speed for a certain period because I don't have a choice.

Jul 11, 2014 3:17 PM in response to JaiJethani

Gaming will demand maximum performance from your Mac, but it won't damage it. As its temperature limit is approached the system will throttle the CPU so as not to exceed it. If that doesn't reduce its thermal load the Mac will simply shut down.


I still think 200°F is too high but I'm not much of a gamer and have difficulty getting my MBPs to get anywhere near that temperature, but if Apple says they examined yours and determined it to be OK then I'm inclined to believe it's OK.


It's normal for the case to feel warm, but not excessively hot. Don't impede the Mac's heat dissipation by using cases or "skins" because the entire aluminum housing serves as a heat sink.


If you are interested in extracting meaningful data, consider the following. While the game is running and the MBP is hot enter the following line in Terminal (triple-click to select the entire line, then copy and paste it into the Terminal window):


clear; printf '\e[3J'; P='pmset' S='\n####' Q=(Thermal Load Events Assertions Preemptions) R=(therm sysload 2 3 4) ; printf $S\ ${Q[0]}'\n'; $P -g ${R[0]} ; printf $S\ ${Q[1]}'\n'; $P -g ${R[1]} | tail -n 4 2>&1


Select All that Terminal window's contents, copy and paste the results in a reply. It may or may not reveal anything noteworthy.


Delete or obscure any information you might consider personal, such as your Mac's name or your user name.

Jul 11, 2014 9:30 PM in response to John Galt

So here are results,




#### Thermal

Note: No thermal warning level has been recorded

Note: No CPU power status has been recorded


#### Load

combined level = OK

- user level = OK

- battery level = Great

- thermal level = Great



So these are the results when playing the game. I'm at 99C, reached 100C at one point. And then my fans finally spun and now are at 2567 RPM instead of default 2000 RPM, with temp lowered to 98C.

Jul 11, 2014 10:00 PM in response to JaiJethani

Jai,

2000rpm is pretty much silent and the fans are always running at this speed when the computer is on.


When the Mac heats up from more intense processing, it can reach up to 6000rpm which is very audible and sounds somewhat like a jet engine.


So, if you can hear the fans while processing, they're working properly, just at a bit higher RPM than reported.

Jul 11, 2014 10:29 PM in response to JaiJethani

Everything confirms what AHT reported and what the Apple Store determined - your Mac is loafing. The i7 is very capable in that regard. I've tried and failed to get mine to get anywhere near the speed at which AHT will exercise them, at least as far as I have been able to determine audibly.


The only piece of this puzzle that doesn't make sense is the iStat Menu value, and I'm inclined to disregard it.

Jul 11, 2014 10:41 PM in response to John Galt

Yeah, everything "appears" to be normal with all the tests conducted.


What do you exactly mean by "My Mac is loafing"?


Now, regarding to how hot it gets, I do feel the heat sink extremely hot at the point where I almost can't touch it. When it comes to the iStat value, to make sure it wasn't giving me any false info, I downloaded smcFanControl, which lets you control the fans and monitor temps. Although I used it to monitor temps in this case and iStat wasn't lying. Both temps matched fairly close, maybe off my a degree.

Jul 11, 2014 11:06 PM in response to JaiJethani

I mean your i7 isn't near its maximum performance and you have no reason to be concerned.


I do feel the heat sink extremely hot at the point where I almost can't touch it.


The pain threshold is very approximately 140°F and nothing to worry about.


Consider running a stress test. There is a program called Geekbench but I'm not certain if its "stress tests" are included with the free version. There are some Terminal commands you can use but I'm not willing to encourage that sort of thing because doing so can easily cause a Mac to become almost totally unresponsive. You'll find such techniques easily enough if you search for them.

Jul 11, 2014 11:13 PM in response to John Galt

Oh okay, I'm not sure because just web browsing I get about 50C minimum and never really go beneath that which scares me as I'm only web browsing and nothing else. Yes I know I have an i7, but more heat = less lifespan of the MacBook which I don't really want. Which is why I'm so concerned.


And sure, I don't mind going through stress tests, I just want to make sure this is okay and functioning as it should.

Jul 12, 2014 8:44 AM in response to JaiJethani

Cooler is preferable, but I don't know of a single case in which a Mac has been harmed or has failed prematurely simply by using them, even for gaming. Certain model-specific hardware has had problems involving the GPU, but those are well-known, isolated cases that may not have even been related to excessive heat. Yours isn't one of them.


If Macs were commonly known to fail simply by being used, it would be common knowledge and there would be thousands of failures, hundreds of them reported on this site, and there aren't. Macs are designed for maximum performance and to be beaten on all day long. That's how I use mine. Isn't that the reason you bought yours?


Both iStat and smcFanControl probably both use the same or similar algorithms to report temperature. I know of no way to directly query the system to report various temperature sensors in degrees. Since I haven't seen the method by which those programs determine those values, I remain skeptical.

Jul 12, 2014 10:36 AM in response to John Galt

Yes, I'll try to find some sort of cooler for my Mac.


Of course, you're absolutely right saying that I bought mine for maximum performance and best results, which I do seem to be getting. Although, I wasn't planning to run this at maximum performance at all times. If the temperatures are somewhat high just when normal web browsing, that's what concerns me.


Then, the fact that my fans kick in fairly late which I still yet to know if its normal or not is the MAIN issue that concerns me.

Now, if there was another way to find out my temperature without using third party apps, I would. But that isn't the case and i somewhat have to rely on those programs.

When do your fans kick in?

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