Macbook Pro hitting 128 degrees

[rwood366]

Description of problem
For some reason at random times throughout the day the fan will spin up and the computer will become extremely laggy. Although the indicators say it's hitting 128 the computer doesn't get any warmer. The freezing last anywhere from 10 seconds to 5 minutes. I have attached a screenshot from task manager showing the kernal task hitting 958% which obviously isn't normal any suggestions as to why this might be happening would be greatly appreciated.

Spec
Running macOS High Sierra 10.13.3
MacBook Pro (15-inch, Mid 2012)
Processor: 2.3 GHz Intel Core i7

Cheers
Robert

 

[Mike Boreham]

More than one thing wrong here!

1. Intel processors protect themselves to stop going over about 105 degC.

2. You say the computer doesn't feel any warmer. If the CPU is really 128 degC it would feel very hot.

What software is reporting that? iStat Menus reports several CPU related temps so if one sensor was faulty it would be more apparent.

However even if the actual reported temp is wrong, something is definitely happening to cause the very high CPU and extreme lagginess. Are there any messages in Console when it happens?

Without more info, I can only suggest standard maintenance/repair activities: such as:

Run Disk First AID booted from Recovery
Safe Boot clears caches. This also runs First Aid.
Reset SMC
Reset NVRAM
Run full installer on top of existing install (loses no data apps or settings)
Boot from a bootable installer, erase, reinstall, migrate from backup with Setup Assistant.

 

[jerryk]

Looks the temp sensor or other temp logic failing. 128 being a power of 2 is interesting.

 

[Samuelsan2001]

958% kernel task you have rogue process I’m surprised you can get it to do anything. I would be doing a operating system reinstall at this stage.

 

[leman]

As others have pointed out, 128C is an impossible temperature for your computer assuming its hardware is fine. I also agree with jerryk that there might be a problem with the thermal sensor. Its impossible for us to say why you get such activity spikes, but usual culprits are (in the decreased order of probability):

- a buggy third-party kernel extension
- a hardware problem
- a bug in macOS itself that inly manifests under some borderline conditions that you seem to be hitting