Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
I was told by the Apple store "the first batch of MBA had heating issues"
- Thread starter al82
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
Just out of curiosity, what is the deal with the heatsink? I've heard it described as a piece of sheet metal. Does it make good contact with the chips?
http://www.anandtech.com/mac/showdoc.aspx?i=3217
(See page 3)
----------TOMORROW I AM GETTING ANSWERS---------------
I have an appointment booked at the genius bar and i want answers.
I am going to sit there and demand they call apple and come up with the truth as to why i have been through THREE MBAs.
I noticed something else, if i leave my air on the youtube.com browser for a bit it will overheat. It still does it with the browser closed and a normal avi file playing too.
I have an appointment booked at the genius bar and i want answers.
I am going to sit there and demand they call apple and come up with the truth as to why i have been through THREE MBAs.
I noticed something else, if i leave my air on the youtube.com browser for a bit it will overheat. It still does it with the browser closed and a normal avi file playing too.
I don't have any "before" and "after".. it just seems like the fans to be doing a "better" job of cooling the system.
Its true. The heatsink is just a thin piece of aluminum from what I saw. The heatsink transfers heat from the chips to the "heatsink" then the heatsink directs the heat to the bottom of the casing to be cooled by the fan. I'm tempted to create a thin copper heatsink for this... but I'm scared the conductivity might short out the laptop rather then cooling it.
So I'm on my second Air, have had it just shy of three weeks, and in the last few days it has started overheating during video playback, just like the first one (choppy play, slows everything down, fans shoot up to 6200rpm and seldom come down, etc.), to the point where I find myself having to restart the thing just to get it back to normal. After two hours on the phone with Applecare, trying everything from smc and pram resets to setting up a "test" user account to try watching video on to reseting all my preferences, nothing worked. His last ditch fix, which I'm in the middle of doing now pretty much just to humor him, was to do a Leopard re-install. This, despite the fact that I told him in the beginning that I'd already done this when I first got the machine. Anyway, I have to say that he was really cool about everything but seemed perplexed, if not slightly skeptical, about the whole situation. In the end, after agreeing do do the re-install, I flat-out told him that at this point I'd rather swap the thing for a regular old MacBook like the one I'd passed on to my girlfriend (the one I'm one right now, by the way), and that if need be I'd even take store credit for the balance. He seemed receptive to this, and said that if the re-install didn't change anything (which I'm fairly confident it won't), we could probably work something out with a local Apple store. Truth is, I really wanted this slick little machine to work for me, but until some of these issues are sorted out (be it with firmware/software updates or through recalls), I don't care to spend my time adding thermal paste to an $1800 computer.
Very interesting!
What I really don't understand is, why does it work the first few weeks fine and than they all seem to go downhill? That just seems very weird, and I guess must be as well what the APPLE CARE people are struggling with...
Hmm, very strange indeed!!!
What I really don't understand is, why does it work the first few weeks fine and than they all seem to go downhill? That just seems very weird, and I guess must be as well what the APPLE CARE people are struggling with...
Hmm, very strange indeed!!!
If I had to guess, I'd say the tech folks are documenting all the bad experiences those of us with bum machines are having and passing it along to the developers who will sooner or later presumably come up with a fix. Meantime, they're playing ignorant on the phone and at at the Genius Bars to extract as much useful information as possible out of the disgruntled Air user without letting on that they know as much as they have to, by this point, know about this issue. Personally, I have more important things to do with my computer than be Apple's little field-tester...
maybe this will help???
Apple released another update yesterday, this one being dedicated to MacBook Air owners:
About MacBook Air SMC Update 1.0
The SMC Update fine tunes the speed and operation of the internal fan.
This update is recommended for all MacBook Air systems. The updater application will be installed in the /Applications/Utilities folder. Please follow the instructions in the updater application to complete the process.
Additional information from the following webpage: http://www.apple.com/support/downloads/mac...cupdate10.html)
http://forum.hardmac.com/index.php?showtopic=3498&b=1&st=0&p=&#entry
Apple released another update yesterday, this one being dedicated to MacBook Air owners:
About MacBook Air SMC Update 1.0
The SMC Update fine tunes the speed and operation of the internal fan.
This update is recommended for all MacBook Air systems. The updater application will be installed in the /Applications/Utilities folder. Please follow the instructions in the updater application to complete the process.
Additional information from the following webpage: http://www.apple.com/support/downloads/mac...cupdate10.html)
http://forum.hardmac.com/index.php?showtopic=3498&b=1&st=0&p=&#entry
Perhaps it has for some, but I installed it and nothing changed for me. And I generally question this update given the fact it was not automatic and that I had to be lurking macrumors to even find out about it.
I sort of would like to do this one. Looks really easy and I will get a chance to see visually what's going on with it (if anything)
Just hope I don't slip and FIU
I sort of would like to do this one. Looks really easy and I will get a chance to see visually what's going on with it (if anything)
Just hope I don't slip and FIU
Good luck, buddy. Weird, though. I've never heard of someone feeling the need to do this to a brand new Dell, HP, etc. (Not that I particularly like those brands, mind you, just examples.) Seems to me if Apple neglected to apply the appropriate amount of thermal paste to the Air, and that "the fix" really is as simple as that, they should be the ones responsible for dolloping on some more of it.
^^
rubbing alcohol. Dont use water.
Just like many thngs in life more is not ideal, less is. Apple puts too much thermal paste on their CPUs. This prevents it from working as efficently as it should.
rubbing alcohol. Dont use water.
Just like many thngs in life more is not ideal, less is. Apple puts too much thermal paste on their CPUs. This prevents it from working as efficently as it should.
Conclusion
---------CONCLUSION--------------
Just got back from the Genius Bar at the Apple store------------------------------
They spent an hour with the air, we tried the same thing on the 3 display units they had as the store wasn't busy. They ALL started acting up when watching avi for more than 30 mins or so (some lasted a good 50 mins before they started to stutter.)
The guy even called his manager who called Apple (not sure which department.)
The conclusion was reached that the Air is for "administrative purposes only" and even tasks such as watching avi or divx files or spend much time watching videos on cnn.com or youtube will cause it to slow down because thats not what the machine was built for.
I was offered a refund but decided to pay an extra £70 (student discount) and get the Pro.
I am gutted, i really love the feel and look of the air. When Apple head office said it is not a software or hardware issue and the problems are simply the limitations of the machine i decided i couldn't live with it s my main computer and i can't as a student afford £1200 for a secondary computer.
The air is fantastic as a word, presentation machine but was not designed to play movies. (thats what they said)
---------CONCLUSION--------------
Just got back from the Genius Bar at the Apple store------------------------------
They spent an hour with the air, we tried the same thing on the 3 display units they had as the store wasn't busy. They ALL started acting up when watching avi for more than 30 mins or so (some lasted a good 50 mins before they started to stutter.)
The guy even called his manager who called Apple (not sure which department.)
The conclusion was reached that the Air is for "administrative purposes only" and even tasks such as watching avi or divx files or spend much time watching videos on cnn.com or youtube will cause it to slow down because thats not what the machine was built for.
I was offered a refund but decided to pay an extra £70 (student discount) and get the Pro.
I am gutted, i really love the feel and look of the air. When Apple head office said it is not a software or hardware issue and the problems are simply the limitations of the machine i decided i couldn't live with it s my main computer and i can't as a student afford £1200 for a secondary computer.
The air is fantastic as a word, presentation machine but was not designed to play movies. (thats what they said)
I simply cannot believe this. Of course the Air should be able to play movies, even forever. Even a cellphone can do that. the iPod Touch... everything.
I have a feeling Apple is sitting this one out and won´t take the cost of replacing every single MBA out there.
When I try to flash my Air it says that it already have the latest version. In system profiler the SMC Version is 1.23f9. What does your system profiler say?
Also I have found that watching videos in OSX exhibits the slowdown behavior. I'm not really sure about XP, but I think its better there, and although I have experienced some slowdowns I only have to minimize and maximize the video application to get up to full speed again. I don't know if this is a power saving feature kicking in, or if it has the same cause as the OSX slowdowns.
Also I have found that watching videos in OSX exhibits the slowdown behavior. I'm not really sure about XP, but I think its better there, and although I have experienced some slowdowns I only have to minimize and maximize the video application to get up to full speed again. I don't know if this is a power saving feature kicking in, or if it has the same cause as the OSX slowdowns.
I have had a macbook air about 3 weeks, date code in the serial number is 7th week of 2008. It's the 1.6Ghz C2D with the 80GB HD.
While the area under the escape key does tend to get warm while decoding video, I was able to watch an hour of DivX video(using VLC) with the laptop plugged in without a stutter. I don't have a hardware monitor to check temps or fan speeds, but the fan only rarely comes on. I've done the same while on battery. The video was coming off a usb-attached external HD. I'll do it again with a file on the internal disk, maybe install that hardware monitor someone linked above.
Environment-wise, it was sitting on my desk at work, it's prolly ~70-75 degrees in here. I've used it to watch YouTube videos before, with no noticable issues.
While the area under the escape key does tend to get warm while decoding video, I was able to watch an hour of DivX video(using VLC) with the laptop plugged in without a stutter. I don't have a hardware monitor to check temps or fan speeds, but the fan only rarely comes on. I've done the same while on battery. The video was coming off a usb-attached external HD. I'll do it again with a file on the internal disk, maybe install that hardware monitor someone linked above.
Environment-wise, it was sitting on my desk at work, it's prolly ~70-75 degrees in here. I've used it to watch YouTube videos before, with no noticable issues.
Unbelievable!
It is not al82's experiences that disturb me so much as the store's response. If true, this is outrageous--and should be reported to the media. I love Apple and buy tons of their equipment, but if the current build of the Air can't play video, there should be a recall. Period.
Thank you, al82, for your faithful reportage.
It is not al82's experiences that disturb me so much as the store's response. If true, this is outrageous--and should be reported to the media. I love Apple and buy tons of their equipment, but if the current build of the Air can't play video, there should be a recall. Period.
Thank you, al82, for your faithful reportage.
Yes thank you al82!
***************************
At the same time it seems its not simply a problem with videos, but specifically with flash videos, on safari! I think that is an important difference!
If someone could test you tube videos under bootcamp/xp it would be interesting to see if the problems dissappear.
If that is the case, maybe an OS X update could improve things?
m
Or Adobe could rewrite Flash for OS X to not suck as much (CPU power as it currently does).
Same here. As I posted in another thread I messed up my foot and have been layed up on the couch for a few days. I watched a Divx of the Superbowl a few times, Air on my lap with no problems. Watching youtube vids, my temp is at around 30 degrees celsius. Fans around 2500. This is on the 1.6 80HD.
OK, 2 things:
First, someone on this forum posted results of just that--running flash in bootcamp--recently, and I recall it was fine.
Second, Cnet's Buzz Out Loud recently covered this Apple Flash issue. Apple is favoring the H.264 codec, which I believe is open source. Apple recently removed all Flash content from their website. So where this is heading, I think, is that Apple is out to compete with Macromedia and Flash by having their own codec. No wonder the Air is choking on Flash--it's sucking up its oxygen!
First, someone on this forum posted results of just that--running flash in bootcamp--recently, and I recall it was fine.
Second, Cnet's Buzz Out Loud recently covered this Apple Flash issue. Apple is favoring the H.264 codec, which I believe is open source. Apple recently removed all Flash content from their website. So where this is heading, I think, is that Apple is out to compete with Macromedia and Flash by having their own codec. No wonder the Air is choking on Flash--it's sucking up its oxygen!