I don't think my Max Studio is loud but it's a fact that it is louder than any MacBook Pro and Mac mini when all are at idle. Whether you hear it or not from your sitting position may vary. Mine does not exhibit the nasty whine that has been written about and audibly captured in this thread. But I cannot say that it is silent from 36" away, line of sight, because I hear the air movement if not the fans themselves. I wound up mounting mine below my desk more than midway towards the rear so now it is indeed silent from my sitting position.
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Mac Studio Max - it's not that quiet
- Thread starter sixers22
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I never heard any of those computers at idle as audible as what I hear with the Mac studios at idle. The difference is you can max out the Mac studio and it’s the same as when idle. I do appreciate this without a doubt. From the high pitched noise i only ever had one Mac known for coil whine. That was the Ti PowerBook G4. I was one of the lucky few whose Ti did not exhibit the coil whine issue. And you might technically be right about Quicksilver if you put it on a desk like one would the Mac Studio. But most put them under desks.
Somewhere amongst all these pages, spectrum analysis has been performed and accurately shows the whining problem at around 2.1 kHz. It’s a confirmed reality for an unknown percentage of Mac Studio owners.
i've done spectral analysis on my own studio with no occurrence of the 2.1 kHz tone. also documented in this thread. An unknown percentage of Mac Studio owners are affected by absence of this whine.
Presumably the vast majority are unaffected, either because the noise isn’t there, or because the user just doesn’t hear it. We will probably never know how many Studios have shipped with the whining sound. Good to hear that yours isn’t a whiny one.
Right. This is getting pretty silly that some people believe they all have whine but some people can't hear it. Not true.
I've posted this before but below is one with whine (captured from a recording sent to me) and then my Ultra without whine. Notice the ~2.2 kHz whine is about 30 dBA above the background noise in the recording but there's no whine tone above the background noise in my Ultra.
And to compare the loudness of the fan at idle with my 2010 Mac Pro at idle, I did this test which shows my Mac Pro is more than 6 dBA louder than my Mac Studio Ultra in a very quiet room (even with a higher percentage of reflected sound coming back to the mic from the Studio) :
2010 Mac Pro and Mac Studio Ultra sitting 8" apart, front of each Mac aligned horizontally. Microphone in middle between Mac Pro and Mac Studio, aligned horizontally with the front of each.
Rear of Mac Studio 2.5" in front of monitor (i.e. some sound reflecting back from monitor toward Mic).
Rear of Mac Pro well behind monitor (i.e. sound from rear of Mac Pro partially blocked by monitor).
Relative SPL
Room with both Macs off - 26.6 dBA
Mac Studio Ultra only at idle - 28.0 dBA
2010 Mac Pro only at idle - 34.1 dBA
No high pitched (2 kHz - 3 kHz) whine detectable with spectrum analysis or by ear an inch from rear of Mac Studio
I think the problem is that the Mac studios s as we never ‘loud’. They are louder than laptops at idle and probably louder than many recent Macs at idle but are, on the whole, quieter under load.
However, the issue for me is the whistling. In my case it’s definitely fan and airflow related as I can make it come and go by changing fan speed or blocking up different sections of the back of the machine. The really irritating part is that it’s not consistent at specific frequencies such that I could just set a slightly different idle speed and be done with it.
I still hope that a firmware update by apple to allow for fans to spin down or lower when under low load might be incoming but I suspect not.
I suspect it’s a manufacturing tolerance issue with the fans and the holes in the back
Or it’s some form of coil whine being amplified by the cooling system as it also appears to be affected by cpu load.
I do remain surprised that anyone would call the studio silent.
However, the issue for me is the whistling. In my case it’s definitely fan and airflow related as I can make it come and go by changing fan speed or blocking up different sections of the back of the machine. The really irritating part is that it’s not consistent at specific frequencies such that I could just set a slightly different idle speed and be done with it.
I still hope that a firmware update by apple to allow for fans to spin down or lower when under low load might be incoming but I suspect not.
I suspect it’s a manufacturing tolerance issue with the fans and the holes in the back
Or it’s some form of coil whine being amplified by the cooling system as it also appears to be affected by cpu load.
I do remain surprised that anyone would call the studio silent.
I have a hard time believing that it's louder than a PowerMac G5.
I have one about 15 feet from me right now though it hasn't been in regular use for many years. What happened is that it's a dust magnet and the fans got progressively louder until it would bug me so much that I'd vacuum it out and then it would be quiet again. That thing was really loud when the fans were on max.
One thing about getting old is that your hearing declines so noise is less of a problem. I have a 2009 iMac 27 in use and I'm typing on a 2010 iMac 27 and the fans can spin up on them but the airflow is in the back so it doesn't sound that bad. My M1 mini has always been silent and I haven't heard of any issues with it.
Whine is one thing (and I’m glad my machine doesn’t exhibit any), but I’m amazed some expected the Mac Studio to be silent.
Considering the thermal corner Apple painted themselves into with the 2013 Mac Pro ”trash can” design, it’s obvious they have left some cooling overhead on all their pro desktop machines, even the studio display.
Having received my Mac Studio this week, it‘s actually much more quiet than I initially expected after seeing Apple’s cutaway illustration showing the additional height over the Mac Mini is due to the fans and cooling system.
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The PowerMac G5 brand new was not annoying. I also never put them at ear height and were always put on the floor as that was common practice for these. On the floor I never perceived any annoying noise except from the HD drives. Again my post previous I think I discuss mostly the Mac Studio as not being loud but rather annoying, especially 2' in front of you on a desk. My exhaust fan in my bathroom 15' to the left of me as I type is on and "loud" and yet less annoying. I can still hear the high pitch noise even with the bathroom fan on 15' away. I do have mine mounted under my desk and generally have the fans running at 1,100 RPM's and this helps a little. I also put some foam 5' behind which kinda helps. With the 2 different power supplies out there, and one obviously having way more capacitors on the upper left, I actually am thinking maybe the PS with more coverage on the PS board, maybe actually changing there airflow internally just enough to change acoustics exhausting out of the rear. Maybe that why when the one user put tape on the back of his covering id say about 60% he created back pressure and essentially created a similar situation. Ill also admit that my townhouse at the time with any of those computers pre 2006 was defiantly a completely different environment acoustically. It was a 2 story open design and no place for noise to be trapped, echoed or otherwise. So basically a more ideal set up. Just sitting here I still hear the noise, and I still hear the fans, even though under my desk. I would not consider either sound LOUD, but rather annoying.
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I returned my release day base Studio that had the whine. Decided to try again with a new one and it has the same issue. I used the only local Apple store near me, so it could be that their stock is from the same production batch.
There are 2 issues that people are discussing, one is the always on fan that is annoying to some. The other is the high pitched whine that I consider a defect. I've had chargers and even light bulbs that produce a whine and returned all of them. I'm very surprised that Apple would allow this in one of their products.
There are 2 issues that people are discussing, one is the always on fan that is annoying to some. The other is the high pitched whine that I consider a defect. I've had chargers and even light bulbs that produce a whine and returned all of them. I'm very surprised that Apple would allow this in one of their products.
I'm going to a local mall today and will drop by The Apple Store to have a close listen to the Mac Studios there. They had two of them set up the last time I was there and I played around with one but the ambient noise is usually high and I didn't look at the Studio; I just played around with it on the KVM and the Studio was behind the monitor. I do not plan to get a Studio as I don't need one though it would simplify my home desktop setup.
You must have high imagination. The forum is to share experience and have discussion if certain “issue” is normal or not. Fan noise was never a key issue, at least for most of the folks that reported the high pitch whine. Some folks shared the same experience, others reported silent, including you, and that’s good for you. But it doesn’t mean what others experienced are “disinformation campaign”. Some even have recording of the high pitch, analysis, etc.
So is your Mac Studio too windy, or are you a mechanical watch fan?
You know what's not imagination? Reading posters who claimed that Apple gave reviewers special quiet computers and that the truth would come out when ordinary people received theirs. Meanwhile, the "truth" that's come out is the widespread view that these computers are extremely quiet. This whole "scandal" is being driven by a tiny group of people.
It doesn't change the fact that apparently some units are noisy. Like mine. Even ArtIsRight says you can definitely hear it pushing air and is louder than his 2019 Mac Pro.
It's weird since you can get the same performance with the 14" and 16" MacBook Pro but with less noise.
It must be the 370 Watt PSU that needs constant air circulation, otherwise the default fan RPM wouldn't be 1300.
Never read about that kind of claim. What you are doing is trying to shut people from sharing their experience and come with conspiracy just because you have different experience.
The high pitch noise is there, some people shared the same issue. No one is claiming that it is common or it is a “scandal”. You are just telling nonsense. Again, it’s good to read many said theirs are silent. But some has the issue and that is the fact.
Absurd posts like yours and Moonlight are not helping the discussion on the issue. You guys are the one came with these conspiracy that somehow people that reported the high pitch are part of “espionage campaign” and it is somehow widespread ??
I have returned the Mac Studio long time back, but am still hoping to get some updates on this thread that perhaps the issue has been addressed, since Mac Studio is the ideal machine (except the high pitch that I couldn’t stand).
I returned my a second Studio, high pitched whine noise, online. I found it interesting that Apple didn't ask why I was returning the computer. I guess it's good to have a "no questions asked" return policy, but at least let people enter the reason if they want.
Mine M1 Ultra is noticebly audible at default ~1330 rpm (without high pitched whine though) but pretty much silent at 1100 rpm.
That's a surprisingly low speed to be audible. The fans on my desktops are silent at those speeds. I suspect their fan design pushes a lot of air at that speed.
It’s true though that it is audible at that RPM. Not loud but audible
I've been tempted to order some in-stock custom configs from B&H, but they won't accept returns for open boxes and I'm afraid of getting a Studio that has the high pitched whine fan noise. I don't mind fan noise, but this sounds like it's a bad batch of fans.
At some point, there will be ample availability on terms that are decent. Right now I can get the Intel iMacs from Costco if I want at several hundred off MSRP. The M1s will get discounted when the M2s come out and this includes the used and refurbished market. I see used M1 minis in the $400 - $500 range in my local Craigslist where they were stuck at $500 - $600 for a long time. If you need one right now, then you buy one. If you can wait, then you wait.
I suspect that this sound would annoy me quite a bit and I'd try to put it someplace where the effect is reduced. My last PC build has a huge case, lots of airflow, five case fans and I used low-power parts. The design goals were that it runs quiet and cool and that was achieved. I've had very noisy computers in the past and really wanted something quiet. Apple Silicon certainly can run cool and quiet - but there is some issue with these Studios and I hope that they can get them straightened out.