13" MBP - vibrates and fan noise
After a month of perfection, my 13" MBP has started to make a quiet low pitched motor vibration noise: kind of as if a CD was in the drive (there isn't). The whole laptop is vibrating which makes it a little awkward to type on.
The pitch changes when the angle of the laptop is changed - at certain angles the noise stops. The noise progressively gets quieter... after about 30 minutes of use it has gone completely.
It's back when the machine is switched off and switched back on again.
Apple support had no solution - they just made me reset a few things.
Was wondering if anyone else had experienced similar?
Very disappointed with Apple on this one - all the support guy could suggest was resetting the SMC/PRAM/whatever ... or take it to the nearest Apple repair shop - 45 min from here.
In the end I removed the bottom cover, popped the fan out and took it apart - applied a tiny amount of grease and reassembled and reinstalled. Awful fan noise completely gone.
** Doing this may affect your warranty - I may or may not have done the above. **
Similar Messages
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My mac mini only shows a steady power light and fan noise when powered up. No video or sound and no commumication with wired keyboard or optical mouse. Tried replacing internal battery and resetting PMU/SMC but nothing seemed to happen. Any suggestions? Many thanks! Richard
You've already done the two things I would have suggested.
If your Mini has an internal battery then I assume it's a G4. That means you've gotten a lot of good years of service from it, and it's old enough that it's certainly not covered by AppleCare anymore, and it's probably not worth spending money trying to repair it.
You should be able to tear it apart using instructions from ifixit.com to get the hard drive out, and then put the hard drive into a nice USB or FireWire enclosure (I like the ones from Other World Computing, macsales.com) so you can transfer your data to a replacement Mac.
I hope someone has another suggestion for you. -
I press the on button and the white light wont turn on, I don´t hear and fan noise, or the beeping sound. This Mac is 1 1/2 months old. Can anyone help.
You are under warranty. You can call Applecare and get advice from the tech rep, or you can bring it to an Apple store or authorized Apple service provider.
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The computer shut down on its own while we were gone and will not start up again. When we press the power button we hear drive and fan noises but no chime and the screen remains black. Any suggestions?
A pretty common thing for computers that have been shipped is a RAM chip becoming dislodged just enough to cause what you are describing. Try re-seating your RAM chips. Basically just pull them out and push them back in. Take a look at this article if you need some direction on this: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1423
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Latest reports on MBP 13' 2011 fan noise?
Hello there,
I'm very close to get a new MBP core i5.
however I've been a little discouraged by the numerous reports of overheating and consequent loud fan noise.
I've developed a sort of a phobia to fan noise with my current Macbook and I'd hate to find myself in similar waters.
I'll be using it with Logic, FW devices, external monitor on day long sessions.
Anyone with similar set up care to share their experience with fan noise on this specific model?
all the bestvalevari wrote:
Hello there,
I'm very close to get a new MBP core i5.
however I've been a little discouraged by the numerous reports of overheating and consequent loud fan noise.
I've developed a sort of a phobia to fan noise with my current Macbook and I'd hate to find myself in similar waters.
I'll be using it with Logic, FW devices, external monitor on day long sessions.
Anyone with similar set up care to share their experience with fan noise on this specific model?
all the best
You should keep in mind that these are technical support forums. Think like this - technical message boards are like hospitals (emergency rooms). Generally, the only people posting here are those with problems. The thousands/millions without problems don't ever come here. -
Just yesterday, my MBP 2008 started making a strange fan noise, very intermittent and random, sounds like the fan is just a tiny bit out of alignment (or, forced out of alignment with small changes to the system's orientation). It's just loud enough to notice in a relatively quiet room, and at a particular pitch that's annoying as all get out.
Not sure if this is one of the noises that's been annoying MBP owners for years now. Doesn't seem like it, but if anyone else can provide an corroboration, that would be great.If there's an Apple Store nearby, make an appointment at the Genius Bar and take it in. The only sound the fans should make is from the air movement/ Having said that, it's pretty difficult to diagnose sounds without actually being able to hear them - thus, get a tech to listen
Hope this helps... -
My MBP temperature and fan speed
Hi,
My problem is that my MBP seems to be getting rather hot (the F panel at the top, and underneath in particular).
I used to notice when I used skype video that the fans spun a little faster and it seemed to keep my MBP at reasonable temperatures. But recently its getting very hot (almost untouchable) and the fans aren't spinning faster to offput the higher temperatures.
I installed smcFanControl2 and it showed my fans running at 1000 rpm while my CPU temperature was about 62 degrees Celsius. I've looked around the forums here and most people seem to be reporting a normal idle speed of about 2000 rpm, so thats the first thing that struck me as odd, as I'm not even using any particularly CPU intensive apps. I used Activity Monitor to check.
I then used smcFanControl2 to up my fan speed to 4000, and it ducked underneath 50 degrees celsius, so I reduced the fan speed back to 2060 (couldn't select exactly 2000) and now its running at about 53 degrees (I'm running system profiler, console, skim, textedit, itunes, mail, and finder right now). This seems to be a much more normal temperature, and I can barely even hear the fans.
*Now my question:*(thanks for sticking with me so far): Shouldn't my MBP automatically have upped the fan speeds to keep my CPU temperature at a reasonable 50 degrees or so? Or is the cutoff point higher and I've just never noticed before? Also, is there a program (like smcFanControl2) perhaps that I can use to set a particular temperature I want to keep my MBP at and it will automatically set the fan speed to keep it at that temp?
NB, I recently swapped my 1 GB of Apple memory for 2 GB of Crucial memory. I'm assuming this might have bumped the temperatures up a little bit but I definitely found my MBP was warmer than usual even before the upgrade.
Thanks for any replies!sternkanz,
In general, the upper operating limit for all Macbook Pros is in the 80-90 C range. In other words, the cut-off point is higher than you think, and you just haven't noticed it. The EFI firmware and PMU is designed to managed the fans such that 80-85 C is about as hot as the CPU gets, but of course, they (the fans) ramp up a bit earlier and slightly higher temps are not just possible, but common.
Adding the additional memory may be a contributing factor, but not by much. Certainly, having a second DIMM in place moves the heat being produced by the RAM (considerable, BTW) closer to the bottom of the Macbook Pro's case, and therefore adds to the heat you'll feel underneath. And, just having more RAM will marginally increase the amount of power your Macbook Pro uses; more power equals more heat.
In the end, this is all normal, and I don't see that you have anything to worry about.
Scott -
Hard Drive upgrade? and fan noise.
I have a 2008 MacBook 4,1 (Early 2008) MB404LL/A. Im thinking about switching out the hard drive for a bigger one. Would the 2.5" HGST 5400RPM 7mm HD be compatible? Or would you guys recommond a different one? Also, every now and then, my fan will blow pretty loud. Any ideas on how to fix that? Any tips would be appreciated.
Most 2.5" SATA drives should work with the machine; the drive that originally shipped with the machine was a 9.5mm so 7mm will fit.
Regarding the fan noise - your machine being 5 years old, there's probably lots of dust clogging the fins of the heatsink along with dried up, degraded thermal paste impeding thermal transfer, hence leading to high system temperatures and the fan working harder to dissipate heat.
Since you'll have the machine apart while replacing the drive, take the opportunity to remove the fans and blow out the heatsink fins with a can of compressed air.
If you're feeling up to it, you can remove the motherboard along with the heatsink assembly and replace the ancient factory paste with a fresh new coat - I suggest Arctic Silver 5 thermal paste. -
Hi , i have late 2011 model of 13 inch macbook pro. Installled mountain lion . Around 200 gb of free space. Now when i start my mac os the icons lag and it takes time to open up even scrolling the mouse you can see it drag and also the fan runs at high rpm .The cpu processesor runs at peak. When i switch on the windows the fan noise still there but the performance is good.Please advice me what might be the problem and what shall i do to solve it.
Please read this whole message before doing anything.
This procedure is a diagnostic test. It won’t solve your problem. Don’t be disappointed when you find that nothing has changed after you complete it.
Third-party system modifications are a common cause of usability problems. By a “system modification,” I mean software that affects the operation of other software — potentially for the worse. The following procedure will help identify which such modifications you've installed. Don’t be alarmed by the complexity of these instructions — they’re easy to carry out and won’t change anything on your Mac.
These steps are to be taken while booted in “normal” mode, not in safe mode. If you’re now running in safe mode, reboot as usual before continuing.
Below are instructions to enter some UNIX shell commands. The commands are harmless, but they must be entered exactly as given in order to work. If you have doubts about the safety of the procedure suggested here, search this site for other discussions in which it’s been followed without any report of ill effects.
Some of the commands will line-wrap or scroll in your browser, but each one is really just a single line, all of which must be selected. You can accomplish this easily by triple-clicking anywhere in the line. The whole line will highlight, and you can then copy it. The headings “Step 1” and so on are not part of the commands.
Note: If you have more than one user account, Step 2 must be taken as an administrator. Ordinarily that would be the user created automatically when you booted the system for the first time. The other steps should be taken as the user who has the problem, if different. Most personal Macs have only one user, and in that case this paragraph doesn’t apply.
Launch the Terminal application in any of the following ways:
☞ Enter the first few letters of its name into a Spotlight search. Select it in the results (it should be at the top.)
☞ In the Finder, select Go ▹ Utilities from the menu bar, or press the key combination shift-command-U. The application is in the folder that opens.
☞ Open LaunchPad. Click Utilities, then Terminal in the icon grid.
When you launch Terminal, a text window will open with a line already in it, ending either in a dollar sign (“$”) or a percent sign (“%”). If you get the percent sign, enter “sh” and press return. You should then get a new line ending in a dollar sign.
Step 1
Triple-click the line of text below on this page to select it:
kextstat -kl | awk '!/com\.apple/{printf "%s %s\n", $6, $7}' | open -f -a TextEdit
Copy the selected text to the Clipboard by pressing the key combination command-C. Then click anywhere in the Terminal window and paste (command-V). A TextEdit window will open with the output of the command. If the command produced no output, the window will be empty. Post the contents of the TextEdit window (not the Terminal window), if any — the text, please, not a screenshot. You can then close the TextEdit window. The title of the window doesn't matter, and you don't need to post that. No typing is involved in this step.
Step 2
Repeat with this line:
{ sudo launchctl list | sed 1d | awk '!/0x|com\.(apple|openssh|vix)|org\.(amav|apac|cups|isc|ntp|postf|x)/{print $3}'; sudo defaults read com.apple.loginwindow LoginHook; sudo crontab -l; } 2> /dev/null | open -f -a TextEdit
This time you'll be prompted for your login password, which you do have to type. Nothing will be displayed when you type it. Type it carefully and then press return. You may get a one-time warning to be careful. Heed that warning, but don't post it. If you see a message that your username "is not in the sudoers file," then you're not logged in as an administrator.
Note: If you don’t have a login password, you’ll need to set one before taking this step. If that’s not possible, skip to the next step.
Step 3
{ launchctl list | sed 1d | awk '!/0x|com\.apple|org\.(x|openbsd)/{print $3}'; crontab -l 2> /dev/null; } | open -f -a TextEdit
Step 4
ls -1A /e*/{la,mach}* {,/}L*/{Ad,Compon,Ex,Fram,In,Keyb,La,Mail/Bu,P*P,Priv,Qu,Scripti,Servi,Spo,Sta}* L*/Fonts .la* 2> /dev/null | open -f -a TextEdit
Important: If you formerly synchronized with a MobileMe account, your me.com email address may appear in the output of the above command. If so, anonymize it before posting.
Step 5
osascript -e 'tell application "System Events" to get name of every login item' | open -f -a TextEdit
Remember, steps 1-5 are all copy-and-paste — no typing, except your password. Also remember to post the output.
You can then quit Terminal. -
10.4.9 and hot macbook pro battery and fan noise
Since upgrading -- the bottom of the macbook pro 15 is suddenly really hot...I mean, really hot...and the fan keeps coming on -- which NEVER came one with the previous version of 10.4....
Any ideas??Since upgrading -- the bottom of the macbook pro 15
is suddenly really hot...I mean, really hot...and the
fan keeps coming on -- which NEVER came one with the
previous version of 10.4....
Same problem here, but replying the combo installer didn't do the trick -- before the 10.4.9 update the computer ran nice and cool, and fans only came on under heavy heavy processor load (with 'Fan Control' 1.1 at a medium setting). After the update, even with 'Fan Control' at maximum, the fans were suddenly going most of the time and computer was hot hot hot.
I reapplied the update from the Combo installer, and reinstalled 'Fan Control' just to be sure, but I'm noticing the same problem still -- running almost no processor load and the computer is hot and the fans are whirring.
Anyone have any other ideas? Cheers.
Macbook Pro Mac OS X (10.4.9) 2.16 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo 3GB RAM -
Vibrating and whirling noise whenever I load a new song?
I just bought a new 30GB video ipod from Costco and I've noticed that whenever I choose a new song, I can feel my iPod vibrating in my hands and I can hear whirling and clicking sounds inside of it. Basically I can distinctly hear my iPod loading the new song. I used to use my friend's iPod all the time, and I don't remember ever noticing this with hers.
So I'm just curious as to whether this is normal or not. If it is, I can deal. If it isn't, I'd like to exchange this for a new iPod at Costco. Thanks in advance for your help!Ok i had one of the early ipods and i knoticed this noise and knew what it is. Recently i lost mine and bought a new 30gb and its different. (Its the new ones w/ search) When its loading songs on there or a movie is playing and i turn it any way (up, down side or anything) it will stop the hard drive and make a sound like the disc in the hard drive is lose. It stops all progress and take like 5 seconds to start back up doing it until you bump it again. I took it back and got the new one and it does the same thing. My old one didnt and neither does my firends new ipod that has the search option on it also...
Is this a hardware error w/ the new ones because it ***** when your watching a movie... stopping all the time... anyone know what to do or if this is normal which doesnt seem to be the case to me but w/e.... -
Guys,
I bought the Satellite R20 tablet pc intending to take it to my classes. There is a serious problem, though - the fan on it is REALLY loud, it goes like a turbine sometimes - and bothers the entire class.
Is there anyway to fix this and make the laptop run silently ?
Also, I'm having issues with the battery .... it will only hold 1h30 minutes MAXIMUM.
I'm overall very disappointed with the purchase, the device is SOOOO bulky! :(
Thanks very much for the help ,Hi there wladston ,
Having that kind of noise is really not normal, There's a possibility that the fan might had accumulated alot of dirt on it due to daily use and simply by cleaning it resolves the issue..
For the battery you said that the battery last for 1h30minutes only. Battery life depends on the activity on the laptop. If you are using a 6 cell battery then that is almost close to the normal performance of it. Configure your system to use minimal power only if possible if you want to use it in longer hours.
Toshiba has 1 year warranty for the battery. If you you are still under warranty then you can simply have it replaced. But if not. Just buy a 9 cell battery pack
Cheers !. -
My macbook pro has started to make a funny noise, at first I thought it was the fan, but it's on the left hand side of the trackpad so I am assuming it's the hard drive?
It sounds like a fan / slight grinding noise it's not too loud but it's noticeable and irritating.
Anyone had this issue before or have any suggestions on how to fix?
I've not long had my machine back from a previous repair and I can't afford to loose it for another month, I'm a freelance designer, last time I took it to my apple reseller store (Bristol) and was told it would be fixed in a week, it ended up being a month, and that resulted in my loosing a month wages. What are my options?Also, get a firewire external hard drive and baak up all your data and keep it backed up, just in case. In the meantime, you could use the Disk Utility on your install disc #1 to verify and repair if necessary both permissions and the start up disk.
There is also a little utility called "SMART Reporter" that you might like:
http://homepage.mac.com/julianmayer/smartreporter/index.html
This will allow you to install a hard drive icon in your menu bar that will let you monitor the SMART status of your hard drive. SMART status doesn't guarantee your hard drive has no problems, but if the icon turns from green to red you know you have to worry.
Good luck! -
Any problems with heat and fan noise on Guild Wars 2 Macbook Pro retina?
I am thinking to start Guild Wars 2 Mac beta on my Macbook pro retina, but i have been reading in different forums that it heats up the system and that the fan kicks off really loud when playing the game. Anyone has any experience on this? Any guild wars 2 gamers please give me some feedback.
I have been playing GW2 for a while now on Beta. The game runs choppier than windows but I think that's because it's a Beta version. I bet after they finish optimizing it things should change, even heat.
As for the heat, it gets super hot. So hot the keyboard gets hot, and when I push in the keys, I feel heat. It's warm enough to cause concern. I don't know if it's bad or not, but the dude at the Apple Genius/Store said, the MBPR knows when it gets too hot and it'll let you know. He said if it plays and nothing is warning me then it's fine. The MBPR won't allow itself to go to catastrophic failure due to heat.
So I took his advice and have played. Just Monday (October 1st 2012) I played for a good 5 hours non-stop and nothing came up so if the Apple Genius guy is correct then I wouldn't worry about it. I do have AppleCare so if something does fail then I will blame the apple genius guy.
It's a fun game, my first MMO, but it's too hard for me sometimes. I don't like that -
After using software update to install 10.4.9 I'm having a problem with the fan running noisily and constantly. Mdimport appears to be the problem. It runs most of the time and consumes between 55 and 60% of cpu. I initially assumed that the install prompted spotlight to re-index the hard drives (the mac's and an external drive). It's been doing it for 3 days now. Is there any way to stop mdimport - or apply another cure?
iMac G5 2 GHz Mac OS X (10.4.9)I too have upgraded with all relevant updates to 10.4.9 with the result that the fans come up to full speed (although not constantly). Using Activity Monitor utility I also find that mdimport (whatever that is) is using between 22% and 60% of the CPU, SystemUIServer 2-4% and Activity Monitor itself uses 2-4%.
The only application running is Safari, but it's the same with just Mail or even just moving files around within finder!
What concerns me is what will happen when I start to use more hungry apps like Final Cut Express HD or Photoshop.
Anyone know why? Is Tiger doing something else that makes the CPU hotter than with Panther? What is mdimport and can it be switched off?
Reading through other threads it seems many people are having this problem, I have always done system maintenance regularly, and all hardware is fine, or at least it was this morning when it was running Panther. I don't think we could all be unlucky enough to have hardware go down just as we upgraded to Tiger. So it must be system/software related.
Actually while I am writing this I can here hard drive activity... something is writing something somewhere.
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