MacBook Air heats up like a grill

Question

MacBook Air heats up like a grill

Hello,

I installed Stardew Valley on my MacBook Air, which is a small farming game, pretty basic, pixelated graphics, nothing fancy. Game works like a charm, no frame rate issues whatsoever.

The problem is that my MacBook overheats like crazy. Ten minutes in the game and I can feel my fingers burning when I touch the top left part of the keyboard.

Is it normal? I ran a diagnostic test, and everything seems to be fine.

I know that this is not a gaming computer, but the game is really basic, and it works fine, aside from the overheating, so I recon the unit has the necessary specs to run it.

Is there anything I can do?

Is it dangerous for the MacBook to overheat? I don't want to damage it.

Thank you,

Andrew

MacBook Air, macOS Sierra (10.12.3)

Posted on May 20, 2017 6:09 AM

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Answer 1

Jan 1, 2018 8:38 PM in response to Andrei Mihnea

I have a cloth ice pack (no condensation) I just put the laptop on top of it to help with the cooling down process.

That or I put my laptop in the refrigerator for a good 5 min.

It's a great cheap option.

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Answer 2

tjk

Level 9

51,192 points

May 20, 2017 12:04 PM in response to Andrei Mihnea

Hi,

First, make sure the Mac is on a flat, hard surface to help air circulate around/under it (not your lap or a pillow or bed, etc.).

It's normal for a Mac to heat up significantly while using games. Your question is, is it dangerous. Probably not. If the Mac heats up too much, it will go into thermal shutdown to protect itself.

Far before that though, the fans should ramp up to full speed, around 6000RPMs, which should be quite audible to you. If it's not, there is an issue. Try resetting the SMC: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201295.

If that doesn't help the fans ramp up to cool the Mac, install a temperature and fan monitoring application to keep track of the temp and fan speeds.

Temperature monitoring apps:

http://www.bresink.com/osx/HardwareMonitor.html ($9.50)

or google for more

check a whole list of them: http://www.tomsguide.com/forum/all.html?refine=temperature+monitoring+free+app

or google for more

Fan monitoring app:

smcFanControl (only if you can control the urge to control the fan speed; Mac OS X/macOS is designed to do this properly without outside interference):

https://www.eidac.de/?cat=40

or google for more

Fan and Temperature monitoring apps:

http://osxdaily.com/2016/03/13/monitor-system-stats-cpu-temp-fan-speed-in-mac-no tification-center/

http://fannywidget.com

or google for more

Also, run Apple Hardware Diagnostics and see if it catches anything: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT202731

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