MBP 16 M1 Pro Thermal Issues?

[Ronin22]

Hi

I was wondering if you guys could do a little test for me. Can you please watch the following video and reply if your M1Pro gets noticeably warm underneath.

I have 5 tabs open in safari, watching full screen with the brightness 10 clicks up from the bottom. I also have my mail open- apps are in full screen mode.

The reason I ask is I thought these new units were supposed to have good thermals and yet in the same test with my M1 Air the bottom is still cold to the touch- and it doesn't have fans. Wondering if its a bug or bad unit or just the way it is. Mine is getting almost as warm as an Intelligent processor.



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thanks

 

[Sowelu]

I don't have my M1 Max 16" yet, but I just tried the above with my 14" M1 Max (which is supposed to have less robust cooling/thermals) and the bottom is cool to cold to the touch, and the fans never turned on. I also have Chrome open (8 tabs) as well as Mail, Messages, Notes, Outlook and News.

I also want to add that my initial setup is complete, so there is nothing downloading, syncing, or indexing anymore, so be mindful of that when measuring thermals the first few days of setting up a new Mac.

 

[baummer]

Good thermals ≠ no heat

 

[EnderTW]

I have yet to hear any fans, does it get a little warm? yes.. you can't beat physics, I wonder if Apple tuned these to get warm over fan noise, but it's no where near how my intel 16 inch mbp used to get even with fans audible.

 

[Ronin22]

I don't have my M1 Max 16" yet, but I just tried the above with my 14" M1 Max (which is supposed to have less robust cooling/thermals) and the bottom is cool to cold to the touch, and the fans never turned on. I also have Chrome open (8 tabs) as well as Mail, Messages, Notes, Outlook and News.

I also want to add that my initial setup is complete, so there is nothing downloading, syncing, or indexing anymore, so be mindful of that when measuring thermals the first few days of setting up a new Mac.

Thats interesting thanks. I'm starting to think there might be an issue with mine, even after the video was done I continued to browse and the bottom was getting even a little warmer. Even now I've been on it for maybe 5 minutes while typing this and I can feel the bottom getting warm. A bit of a deal breaker for me- maybe I'll try to get a replacement.

 

[Ronin22]

I have yet to hear any fans, does it get a little warm? yes.. you can't beat physics, I wonder if Apple tuned these to get warm over fan noise, but it's no where near how my intel 16 inch mbp used to get even with fans audible.

Yeah I get it but when you consider the same test with an M1 MacBook Air that was completely cool to the touch I start to wonder.

 

[Sanpete]

What processes are using how much energy in your Activity Monitor?

 

[Ronin22]

What processes are using how much energy in your Activity Monitor?

Not much going on to me but I am far from an expert

 

[CooKieMoNs7eR]

I was watching a 4k video earlier and the laptop got hot af for some reason.

 

[white7561]

I was watching a 4k video earlier and the laptop got hot af for some reason.

Probably YouTube AV1 codec. YouTube started to serve AV1 to some 4K and 8K videos . It should work fine but it's gonna use CPU decoding. Which uses more power and CPU usage which increases heat.

If you're using chrome just use h264-enhanced . And just block AV1. That way every content on YouTube is only vp9 which is hw accelerated.

Av1 hw decoding is only available in a few devices as of now AFAIK. So it is pretty new

 

[Sanpete]

Your energy impact graph shows an oddly large amount of energy use compared to mine, and based on the numbers showing for each app. If it's still warm, try the CPU tab to see if anything is running high in the background.

 

[Ronin22]

Your energy impact graph shows an oddly large amount of energy use compared to mine, and based on the numbers showing for each app. If it's still warm, try the CPU tab to see if anything is running high in the background.

It keeps jumping around of course but here is what I have. I had to shut down since safari locked up on me and thought resetting the controller would help

 

[EnderTW]

Yeah I get it but when you consider the same test with an M1 MacBook Air that was completely cool to the touch I start to wonder.

Yeah nothing will beat the M1 MBA in terms of heat, curious how it runs when doing anything intensive, but with only 4 high performance cores, it might not generate enough heat to be noticeable?

If the M1 MBA is enough for your needs and you prefer zero heat, I don't think you'll find a better computer than that..

 

[Sanpete]

It keeps jumping around of course but here is what I have. I had to shut down since safari locked up on me and thought resetting the controller would help

View attachment 1883535

Was it warmer than your Air usually was when you took the screenshot?

If Safari locked up, it may be that some of your software isn't getting along well. That shouldn't happen.

Anyway, keep an eye on the Activity Monitor tabs to see if anything unusual-seeming pops up while your machine is getting warmer than you think it should.

 

[Ronin22]

Was it warmer than your Air usually was when you took the screenshot?

If Safari locked up, it may be that some of your software isn't getting along well. That shouldn't happen.

Anyway, keep an eye on the Activity Monitor tabs to see if anything unusual-seeming pops up while your machine is getting warmer than you think it should.

No my Air is always cool- Going back to my original example of playing that 4k clip.

 

[Ronin22]

Yeah nothing will beat the M1 MBA in terms of heat, curious how it runs when doing anything intensive, but with only 4 high performance cores, it might not generate enough heat to be noticeable?

If the M1 MBA is enough for your needs and you prefer zero heat, I don't think you'll find a better computer than that..

Could be but I would think with M1Pro they would optimize the heat disapation - which is what I understood from what I heard. Also, it seems not many others are mentioning heat with light use, same teat was done by others here and theirs was cool.

Yeah MBA M1 is a great rig but this screen is hard to give up....hahaha.

maybe I will try to reinstall the OS

 

[Ronin22]

So I tried that video again and had the activity monitor up. When I started watching the energy graph was like this

Then while watching went to this

then finally to this

It didn't seem to get as warm this time around and I played it a couple times, so not sure what's going on or why my spotlight was using so much energy as it shouldn't be indexing days after I set this up.

 

[nbjustforfun]

Hi

I was wondering if you guys could do a little test for me. Can you please watch the following video and reply if your M1Pro gets noticeably warm underneath.

I have 5 tabs open in safari, watching full screen with the brightness 10 clicks up from the bottom. I also have my mail open- apps are in full screen mode.

The reason I ask is I thought these new units were supposed to have good thermals and yet in the same test with my M1 Air the bottom is still cold to the touch- and it doesn't have fans. Wondering if its a bug or bad unit or just the way it is. Mine is getting almost as warm as an Intelligent processor.



MacRumors Video Pixel Vs iPhone


thanks

 

[Ronin22]

Well if anyone one is curious I did more testing and it looks like the culprit is how Safari handles embedded videos and the "Windowserver" process in activity monitor. I play a certain embedded video in safari and the window server process kicks up to 150 - 200 CPU percent and the cpu temp goes up around 40 to 50 degrees. I then close out of Safari and the window server process stays at just over 100 percent on the CPU and never come down to normal even though all apps are now closed- so this keeps the CPU temp up.

When I run the same test video in Firefox the windoserver process never goes above 100 percent for the CPU and the temp on the CPU never moves more than 5 degrees, and once I stop the video the process goes back to a normal level.

its just odd that my MBA M1 doesn't exhibit the same behavior while using safari and they are both running the same version.

 

[Alfred.Woodden]

Did you ever find out the issue? My brand new MacBook Pro 14 base model gets luke warm with just light browsing, compared to my previous 13 M1, which was always cold to the touch no matter how many Safari windows and tabs. I'm really bummed out... I thought the m1 pro with its bigger chassis was gonna be just as cold as the 13 m1.

 

[Sanpete]

Did you ever find out the issue? My brand new MacBook Pro 14 base model gets luke warm with just light browsing, compared to my previous 13 M1, which was always cold to the touch no matter how many Safari windows and tabs. I'm really bummed out... I thought the m1 pro with its bigger chassis was gonna be just as cold as the 13 m1.

Read the post above yours for the OP's resolution. Your machine may continue to run warmer than your Air. Other have said the same.

I prefer lukewarm myself. My 16" is often too cold for comfort.

 

[flapflapflap]

Did you ever find out the issue? My brand new MacBook Pro 14 base model gets luke warm with just light browsing, compared to my previous 13 M1, which was always cold to the touch no matter how many Safari windows and tabs. I'm really bummed out... I thought the m1 pro with its bigger chassis was gonna be just as cold as the 13 m1.

Get the new 16 inch or stick with the M1 13. I have both. I tried the MBP 14 and found the battery life and thermals insufficient for me. I had thought about selling my M1 13 but decided to keep it because it's such a capable laptop that is light and has insane battery life.

 

[Alfred.Woodden]

Read the post above yours for the OP's resolution. Your machine may continue to run warmer than your Air. Other have said the same.

I prefer lukewarm myself. My 16" is often too cold for comfort.

Ah, so the M1 16" is colder than the M1 14", despite having more CPU and GPU cores on the base model than the 14 base model? Is it as cold as the M1 13 and M1 Air? Do you happen to have iStat menu or Stats (free) installed and know the temperature of it doing light tasks?

 

[Alfred.Woodden]

Get the new 16 inch or stick with the M1 13. I have both. I tried the MBP 14 and found the battery life and thermals insufficient for me. I had thought about selling my M1 13 but decided to keep it because it's such a capable laptop that is light and has insane battery life.

Agreed, sadly I sold the 13". I figured it was a good decision since they're redesinging it from its old and tired design, and figured I'd get more for it now than when the M2-macs arrive.

I agree, while I do feel like a little spoiled kid, the battery life and thermal of the 14 is quite the downgrade compared to the M1 13.

 

[pshufd]

Cold to the touch (all around). Fans are not spinning. SOC temps around 42 degrees. MacBook Pro 16, M1 Pro.