2013 MBP Crashing

[sb in ak]

My 15" 2013 MBP (discrete Nvidia graphics) has been routinely crashing the last few years. It will lock up, the fans spin up, and then the whole thing turns off. I recently upgraded to a new 16" M1 but am hoping I can squeeze a few more years of use out of my old machine as a backup/Spotify player etc.

My suspicion has been that the machine is overheating or that something is up with the GPU. I've tried to look in the logs but can't find anything. I had the battery replaced a few years back and that didn't solve the problem. It tends to crash when being pushed (happens more often editing photos in LR or watching Youtube videos). It crashes much left often when plugged in, though it still does obsessionally. I installed some software to force the fans to run at a higher rate, which also does seem to help a bit. I have it set to not graphics switch and use the DGPU all the time.

Thoughts? I am thinking of experimenting and applying some new thermal paste to the CPU and GPU to see if that does anything. Thanks!

 

[m..]

I have the same problem with my 2011 MBP and came to the same conclusion that it was probably heat related. Although I don't really have any evidence other than it might happen less often after removing fluff from the fan and heat sink.
My other thought was it was trying to use more power than the psu and ancient battery can supply. Or it was something to do with Mac OS Catalina on a computer which dose not support it. But I think those are less likely.

I have thought about replacing the thermal paste but as I am replacing it soon it seems like a lot of work for something which might not fix the crashes.
If you do change the paste, I'd be interested to hear how you get on and if it solves the problem.

 

[sb in ak]

I have the same problem with my 2011 MBP and came to the same conclusion that it was probably heat related. Although I don't really have any evidence other than it might happen less often after removing fluff from the fan and heat sink.
My other thought was it was trying to use more power than the psu and ancient battery can supply. Or it was something to do with Mac OS Catalina on a computer which dose not support it. But I think those are less likely.

I have thought about replacing the thermal paste but as I am replacing it soon it seems like a lot of work for something which might not fix the crashes.
If you do change the paste, I'd be interested to hear how you get on and if it solves the problem.

Thanks for your thoughts. I'll probably give this a shot in the next few weeks and will let you know how it goes. Changing out the thermal paste looks like a bit of a pain but not too bad. My 2013 is still a great machine minus this issue so I think it's worth throwing a little time at.