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Playing WoW On High RPM With SmcFanControl

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Finox831

macrumors member
Original poster
Jul 28, 2010
75
0
I'm on a 13" 2010 MBP and I decided to install SmcFanControl so I can be able to play WoW (overheated my Mac without it). My question is I'm playing WoW around 5 hours a day on a 5900 RPM, could this overtime have any damage affect on my MBP?

-thanks in advance.
 
5900 RPM? sheesh. I dont think you need to to be maxed. Around 1400 - 2000 is fine.

It won't damage your MBP but spinning at max rpm will prolly decrease the fan's lifespan.
 
Have you tried to cap the frame rate? console set max_fps 50

Not sure WoW should be overheating macs tho. Is that normal?
 
frega said:
5900 RPM? sheesh. I dont think you need to to be maxed. Around 1400 - 2000 is fine.

It won't damage your MBP but spinning at max rpm will prolly decrease the fan's lifespan.
Click to expand...

2000 rpm is standard fan speed.

I bump mine to 4000 rpm.

The MBP screen 60hz, so either maxfps 60 or 30. 50 won't be smoother than 30 and will use more GPU power
 
Well I was messing with it, and I read somewhere that the Mac fahrenheit should be around 150~ so only when @ 5900 RPM it will stay around there. Also, my keys would get hot to the point were It would burn my fingers when playing so that's another reason why I'm playing @ 5900 RPM.
 
Collected said:
Have you tried to cap the frame rate? console set max_fps 50

Not sure WoW should be overheating macs tho. Is that normal?
Click to expand...

My 2010 15" gets to around 210F the first minute or so of launching WOW, as the fans are slow to ramp up. I assume that's a Apple preference, a really high temp threshold before speeding up the RPM. Then after a few minutes, it's maxed and temp's usually around 170F. Without knowing what the safe operating temp is for the Intel i7, I'm not terribly comfortable with the CPU hitting 200+F even for that brief minute or two, so lately I've just manually maxed the fan in iStat Menus prior to launching WOW. I'm tempted to not do this though. It's a nuisance, and if Apple programmed the fans to operate this way, surely it should be safe for the system. (I hope.) At least I know that my system isn't an anomaly; other 2010 MBP owners report their fans only ramping up when the CPU is around the 190s F (https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/908210/). In fact, after skimming that thread again just now, maybe I'll just leave the fan alone.

I may decide to cap fps at 60. Do I enter "/console maxfps 60" in the chat window or is there a console window like in FPSes where you normally hit "`" to bring it up?

And should I wish to remove the frame rate cap, why do I type in? Thanks.
 
Finox831 said:
yeah, thing is when mine goes to 80C my keys will start burning my fingers from how hot my MAC is getting, making gaming impossible.
Click to expand...

you have overly sensitive fingers... I have an older Macbook Pro that can hit 95 to 100º C and the keyboard is never hot enough to notice.

My MBP 13" 2010 though maxes out at about 80º C when I'm pushing it really hard, and even then the keys are never hot.
 
Finox831 said:
yeah, thing is when mine goes to 80C my keys will start burning my fingers from how hot my MAC is getting, making gaming impossible.
Click to expand...

Get a stand and an external keyboard.

Keeps your mac cooler and makes it much more comfortable (better viewing angle for your neck too).
 
Collected said:
Have you tried to cap the frame rate? console set max_fps 50

Not sure WoW should be overheating macs tho. Is that normal?
Click to expand...

This is definitely the way to sort this. Cap the frame rate to say 30, 40 or 50 fps and then set the fans to do their own thing.

I played WOW on my macbook pro for months, with the fans blowing at full whack. I kicked myself when I found out about limiting the frame rate and the fans only idled.

The game was more than playable!
 
Justin Lee said:
This is definitely the way to sort this. Cap the frame rate to say 30, 40 or 50 fps and then set the fans to do their own thing.

I played WOW on my macbook pro for months, with the fans blowing at full whack. I kicked myself when I found out about limiting the frame rate and the fans only idled.

The game was more than playable!
Click to expand...

My frame rate has been capped at 30, and the thing is I tried doing this a week ago and what ended up happening was my computer would start to freeze for 30~ sec and unfreeze for 5-10sec then just freeze up again so I had to format the mac and I read about the problem and that's when people were saying my mac was over heating and so to get SmcFanControl, it's been fine ever since I'm just afraid I may be wearing out the fans.

Venkman90 said:
Get a stand and an external keyboard.

Keeps your mac cooler and makes it much more comfortable (better viewing angle for your neck too).
Click to expand...

Can you recommend me a decent stand? would really appreciate it.


Also, do you guys thinking getting a cooling mat will help?

-thanks in advance
 
Can someone post their temps on a 13" with the frame rates capped at 60 and/or 30?
Cheers.
 
Smalss said:
Can someone post their temps on a 13" with the frame rates capped at 60 and/or 30?
Cheers.
Click to expand...

I'm on a 13" MBP with frames capped @ 30, and the fahrenheit stays below 150 but that's also with 5k~ RPM
 
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