M2 overheating. No solutions so far?

[sunny5]

Even M2 MBP with a fan cant handle M2's heat! Is it a joke or what? Is it a hardware issue or software/firmware issue? Why Apple isn't responding about this issue at all? If you just gonna say Air is just for simple task OR M2 Pro isn't really meant for Pro, then get off. You just wanna protect M2's problem while M1 had no such issues.

 

[Apple_Robert]

Are you having trouble with your 13" MBP M2? As far as I am aware, there is no inherent problem (read: defect) with the M2 MBP.

 

[estabya]

Even M2 MBP with a fan cant handle M2's heat! Is it a joke or what? Is it a hardware issue or software/firmware issue? Why Apple isn't responding about this issue at all?

This is the machine’s normal behavior. There’s nothing for Apple to respond to.

Almost all laptops throttle in much the same way under a sustained load. If you don’t like thermal throttling, don’t ever check your frequencies on an Intel MacBook under load.

 

[NT1440]

Even M2 MBP with a fan cant handle M2's heat! Is it a joke or what? Is it a hardware issue or software/firmware issue? Why Apple isn't responding about this issue at all? If you just gonna say Air is just for simple task OR M2 Pro isn't really meant for Pro, then get off. You just wanna protect M2's problem while M1 had no such issues.

What M2 Pro are you speaking of?

 

[Love-hate 🍏 relationship]

M1 set the bar too high lol

remember intel and amd chips heat up much more than that (but they have fans tho,i hear that )

yes m1 was unbelievably good ,and i thought m2 would be even more efficient ,turns out i was wrong

doesnt make the m2 bad at all,just of less amazing value

 

[BanditoB]

As I watched and read about the testing for throttling of the M2 it still showed the M2 completing tasks slightly faster than the M1, so why worry about it. It's clear that if you have heavy loads of long-running tasks, such as video encoding, that you should go with one of the Pro machines.

Since the M2 is at the same feature size as the M1, 5 nm, there aren't any significant power reductions of the SOC that are possible as they have been with the past A-series chips that regularly underwent feature size shrinkage. Whenever the next shrinkage to 3 nm features occurs, you should see both a performance increase and an overall power consumption decrease, so throttling on that version should be less. However, there will still be sustained loads that are better suited for the Pros than for the Airs.

 

[eicca]

The only real problem is "reviewers" pushing the laptop in ways unrealistic for the actual buyer base. No, the M2 does not overheat under normal use or have any inherent defect.

An M2 that is hot and throttled is still faster than an M1 that is cold and fresh. Get over it. It's fine.

 

[Apple_Robert]

If you want a balanced review of the M2, check out Zollotech. Thank you, Aaron. This video will show you just how much the others posted here have been nothing but a circus act.

 

[sunny5]

Yes, the thermal pad is much larger than M1 MBA but the heat itself still remains inside as it's not connected to the case. Why didnt Apple eliminate the gap between the case and thermal pad for better passive cooling?

 

[thenewperson]

Ooh, another one

 

[JPack]

What’s notable is Apple added thermal insulation (thick black adhesive foil) to the M2 heat spreader. This reduces the amount of heat that will transfer convectively to the notebook bottom cover. It suggests they didn’t want the exterior chassis to get too hot.

 

[James_C]

Yes, the thermal pad is much larger than M1 MBA but the heat itself still remains inside as it's not connected to the case. Why didnt Apple eliminate the gap between the case and thermal pad for better passive cooling?

It is likely to be because they want to protect the battery. It might appear logical to transfer heat to the case, but this is more likely to transfer heat to the battery, which in turn can degrade the life of the battery, if it gets too warm.

So I would not recommend Max Tech’s thermal mod ’Fix’.

 

[doboy]

It is likely to be because they want to protect the battery. It might appear logical to transfer heat to the case, but this is more likely to transfer heat to the battery, which in turn can degrade the life of the battery, if it gets too warm.

So I would not recommend Max Tech’s thermal mod ’Fix’.

Or maybe they didn't want the bottom of the case getting too hot burning people's lap or at least making it very unpleasant.

 

[Pressure]

What’s notable is Apple added thermal insulation (thick black adhesive foil) to the M2 heat spreader. This reduces the amount of heat that will transfer convectively to the notebook bottom cover. It suggests they didn’t want the exterior chassis to get too hot.

There are regulations on how hot the surface on consumer electronics may be to avoid burns.

IEC 60950-1 dictates what is allowed. I believe Linus Tech Tips made a video where they put thermal pads on the heatsink of the M1 MacBook Air so they could use the backplate as a heatsink as well but that resulted in higher than allowed surface temperature but enough thermal headroom to not thermal throttle in most cases.

 

[spiderman0616]

The level of stress this computer is giving to Windows people........I'm loving it.

Do I know OP is a Windows user? No. Do I suspect that a lot of these new posts are made by terrified Windows fans? Yes. Yes I do.

The MacBook Air in general is the general purpose Mac most people go for. Now it's way nicer, even faster than M1, and has a new design. And anyone choking on that extra $200 in retail price might still get persuaded to upgrade to the M1 Air if they're still holding out on an Intel machine.

Correlation does not equal causation, I know, but it seems like people always find some weird thing to latch on to in order to try to persuade the world not to buy something. Remember the "hiss" coming from behind the Apple logo on the iPhone 6s? The iPhone 6 Plus that apparently could bend just by someone looking at it? The iPhone X that apparently "didn't work in the cold"? All storms in a teacup on internet forums, started in the name of tribalism.

It's dumb, but it's the nature of tech. People feel personally attached to brands.

 

[1096bimu]

Yes, the thermal pad is much larger than M1 MBA but the heat itself still remains inside as it's not connected to the case. Why didnt Apple eliminate the gap between the case and thermal pad for better passive cooling?

A couple of reasons:
1. Doing this causes the back panel to get very hot, which may be uncomfortable to hold
2. If you put a case on it the benefit is significantly reduced
3. Manually sticking thermal pads on each machine is not exactly the easiest for mass manufacturing
4. There is a layer of black plastic on the inside of the back panel, and there's a black graphite sticker on the metal heat spreader, which in conjunction are designed for some heat transfer via thermal radiation.

 

[throAU]

Even M2 MBP with a fan cant handle M2's heat! Is it a joke or what? Is it a hardware issue or software/firmware issue? Why Apple isn't responding about this issue at all? If you just gonna say Air is just for simple task OR M2 Pro isn't really meant for Pro, then get off. You just wanna protect M2's problem while M1 had no such issues.

Be aware that any modern cpu will boost for short periods whilst thermal headroom is available.


edit:
also, sinking heat into the case means it may end up in your legs. if its raising the case above 45c it may burn your skin.

 

[Toutou]

There is nothing wrong with the machine. Just like the M1 Air, the M2 Air uses a piece of metal as a "thermal sponge" to soak up the heat produced by the bursts of activity and then slowly radiate it away through the case. This gives the user a M2-level performance for 95 % of stuff you do on the machine (literally everything except long-running jobs like compiling huge codebases, exporting many minutes of video or rendering 3D graphics), but in a thin and light body, with no fan to make any noise or get clogged with dust.

If hit with a long-running, taxing job like exporting video, the CPU + GPU slow down to a level where they produce exactly the amount of heat that the machine is able do dissipate. All of this is expected, controlled and designed to work that way. "Thermal throttling" is just a stupid name, it isn't anything destructive, it isn't the last resort before the machine turns into a puddle of aluminium or anything.

Also, the M1 Air works the exact same way, the M1 inside is able to run at full clock speed for a couple of minutes before it slows down to a level that's sustainable. After some tens of minutes the machine reaches thermal equilibrium, the case is hot to the touch (not unbearably hot, but quite hot), the machine is dissipating heat by both radiation and convection and that's exactly what it was designed to do.

Nothing was wrong with the M1 Air design and I don't get why even moderately tech savvy Youtubers seem to think that something is suddenly wrong with the next generation.

 

[throAU]

The alternative to thermal throttling is no boost/reduced maximum clock speed which would mean less responsiveness for spiky workloads.

 

[throAU]

Nothing was wrong with the M1 Air design and I don't get why even moderately tech savvy Youtubers seem to think that something is suddenly wrong with the next generation.

Controversy generates clicks...

 

[Zest28]

The 13” M2 MBP shouldn’t overheat. If it does overheat, you can probably download some software to change the fans settings so that it stays cool.

Only the 13” M2 MBA should overheat, but that is basically what it was designed to do as it is a fanless design. So nothing you can do against that, besides exchanging it for the M2 13” MBP.

 

[throAU]

The 13” M2 MBP shouldn’t overheat. If it does overheat, you can probably download some software to change the fans settings so that it stays cool.

Only the 13” M2 MBA should overheat, but that is basically what it was designed to do as it is a fanless design. So nothing you can do against that, besides exchanging it for the M2 13” MBP.

Reducing clock speed when heat rises is by design. Fans just enable it to run faster for longer. Even with good fans, spiky workloads are the norm so most computers (even desktop i9s) are set up to boost beyond the sustainable clock speed whilst cool enough.

This is not unique to notebooks any more and good luck cooling even a desktop i9-12900k so it maintains max boost speed indefinitely.

 

[Toutou]

Only the 13” M2 MBA should overheat

I wish people stopped using the term "overheat". When a CPU overheats, it shuts down.
If this happens to a machine, that means that the cooling system in that computer is faulty and it should be returned or repaired immediately.
I have never seen this happen to a computer in my whole life. No Apple computer sold in the last ten years does that.

 

[Jackpaultechnab]

I think it's a hardware issue for the overheating!

 

[sunny5]

lol I guess this is how Mac fanboys covering the faulty issue!