CPU load LOW - Fan speed HIGH - WHY ?

Hi
I'm watching youtube videos on my mac - under Windows XP (bootcamp) - I'm monitoring my CPU usage while watching the videos because my fan is spinning at full speed - yet the CPU is not working hard - about 5 to 10%. Does anyone know why the computer is getting hot and fans spinning faster if CPU load is still very low? Is it possible that I only see one of the cores in the windows monitoring system? I press control alt delete to access the info.
Any suggestions would be helpfull
Thanks

Hi tcdm1972,
A lot of postsfrom fellow users report their fan kicking out loud mostly when watching or using application that related with video or streaming video.
I'm not an apple tech, so I guess that fan also try to cool down the GPU chip sets since it is dinamically adjusted in and out of allocated memory and rendering or streaming video to the screen and become hot as well. (I could be wrong).
And most of the time the fan kicking when macbook plugged with mag safe (processor runs optimal clock speed).
Hope other user have different opinion.
Good Luck.

Similar Messages

Satellite C855 - Average CPU temperature and fan speed

Hello!
I've had this toshiba Satellite C855 since march this year. it's only recently that the CPU temp and Fan speeds have been worrying me.
When I'm not playing games or doing a livestream my CPU temp stays around 35-40% with the fanspeed at steady 50% or not on at all due to it been cool.
When I do play games however the fanspeed is going up to around 66-68% with the CPU been around 55-60%
I was wondering if this is normal? or do I need to clean it out by taking it apart. if it is the second option then I am worried since I do not want to damage anything inside. plus I am not that great with the inner workings of a computer.
Any help or information would be very appreciated thanks.

In my opinion there is no reason for panic. T is logic that under stress CPU activity is higher and CPU produces more heat. Notebook must be cooled down properly so sensors that control cooling fans register growing temperature and cooling fans will run on higher speed.
There is no reason for cleaning. And one day if that must be done please dont do it alone. You are not authorized for doing this.

USB/FireWire usage increases CPU temp and fan speed

Hi,
I'm curious, does the usage of USB and FireWire ports increase CPU temperature and fan speed...?
I have an M-Audio Fast Track USB interface plugged in and whenever I play any songs from iTunes using that interface as an output, my CPU temp increased and fan speed jumped from 2000 to 3300 rpm. And on separate occasion, an 8GB of file transfer from an external FireWire-based HDD had both fans speed up to 4,400 rpm.
Is this normal...? All these were done with an external display plugged onto the MBP with "clamshell" mode.

USB operations involves quite a bit of CPU action, Elphidieus.
Firewire places less demand on the CPU but, in a situation like the one you describe can involve both increases in power usage and in HD temperatures.
The fan speeds on Macs are not simply responsive to CPU usage. Both HD temps and power usage can also play a part in the equation that ultimately produces the fan speed. As HDs have much lower heat tolerance than CPUs you will find that it is quite common to see the fans ramp up when doing a large file transfer over FW (or USB, for that matter) , especially if the internal HD temp gets to over about 50-55º Celsius.
Cheers
Rod

Is there a free app that allows me to show cpu temp and fan speed in menu bar?

i want a free app that monitors cpu temp and fan speed and can display them in the menu bar of my MBA

http://www.apple.com/downloads/dashboard/status/istatpro.html

IPhoto 9.4.3 high fan speeds/ high cpu usage.

For about a month now, my iPhoto has been acting up. My iPhoto CPU usage idles at about 30% and as soon as I start using iPhoto, the CPU usage can go as high as 430%.. This causes the fans to spin at 6000RPM and eventually iPhoto will slow down and I'll have to force quit.
I have tried:
- repairing the iPhoto library
- creating a new library
- re-installing OSX Mountain Lion
- re-installing OSX Mountain Lion and then installing a fresh copy of iPhoto
- rebuilding the iPhoto library with iPhoto Library Manager
Nothing has fixed this issue. I have exhausted all of my options and I would greatly appreciate any help.
Cheers,
Joey
Mac specs:
Early 2011 MBP
Intel Core i7 2.2GHz
8GB 1333MHz RAM
256GB Crucial M4 SSD
750GB Seagate HDD
15 inch Hi-Res AG Display

Did you remember to quit iPhoto before deleting the caches and to log off and on again? WIthout logoff or reboot cleaning the caches may have no effect.
iPhoto is keeping second, hidden cache in $TMPDIR. Try to clear that as well.
You can only open that cache from the Terminal.
Quit iPhoto.
Open a Terminal window and enter
open $TMPDIR
and hit "return".
In the window that opens remove the folder com.apple.iPhoto.
log off and on again, and retry.
Im thinking that this is a software bug.. but I just cant figure out why its happening on a fresh install of OSX / iPhoto. Seems bizzare.
I am using the same iPhoto version on a similar early 2011 MBP Mac without problems. Maybe the file type of your photos and/or videos makes a difference. What media kind are in your iPhoto/Aperture library? Videos? Raw? Jpeg?

Turbo2/PC Alert III/ Adjustable Low Fan Speeds?

Anybody getting low RPM adjustable fans to register in PC Alert III?
I have adjusted the fan speed alerts on CPU and chassis to min, and still can't get proper fan RPM reading. Am guessing fans are about 1/2 speed (given the amount of adjustment I made), or about 1500 RPM. Now getting red 5 digit fan speeds and case temp jumping around.
Am not asking so I can stare at fan speeds, just to see changes in any adjustments I might choose.
Still loving the low dba of my 2 Enermax fans!

Just got a new case and some gadgets...My Thunderbird 1400 now idles at 42 degrees celsius. Overclocked to 1600 it idles at 42-43, under full load @1600 it doesnt go over 43.
In my old case i had 8 case fans, which made a whole lotta noise, so with this one i wanted it quiet. I put four 80mm case fans in (two front, two rear) and a 5 1/4 drive bay temp monitor/fan controller to run them. When its idling, the fans dont run, just the 5000rpm cpu fan, video card fan and thermostatically controlled psu fans. So its almost silent. When its under load, and the temp hits 43 degrees c. the fans kick in until the temp drops back and they switch off.
Gives the best of both worlds really, when im browsing or downloading or doing basically anything that wouldnt put enough load on the cpu that it needs extra cooling its quiet enough to be unnoticable, but when im gaming the fans kick in to keep the system cool. Since i usually either play games with the speakers cranked up (during the day) or use headphones (at night) i rarely even hear the exta fans spinning...
I picked up a motor speed controller kit yesterday, which i havent built yet, but will use that to control a 120mm blowhole and two 80mm side fans, so i can have them running all the time at around 1000rpm (quieter than the psu) to just give a slight breeze through the case, meaning the front and rear fans should only kick in after a lengthy period of gaming or benchmarking.

First Backup on Time Machine - CPU temperature and fan speed

I attached my external WD drive and started Time Machine. Works just fine however I watched the cpu and temp and fan speed as reported by iStat.
During the hour long "first backup" I reached an incredible 160 degrees cpu temp and 6000 rpm fan speed. Cpu was 70 percent or so. When this temp was reached it looked like some limiter took over to reduce cpu consumption and temp. CPU dropped to 30 percent and the temp came down. Fan rpms reduced as temp did.
I don't know if iStat reports the feeds on a MacBook Air properly or not but if so......interesting.

160F is not very high - 160C would be a different matter.
Under sustained 100% load, my Macbook CPU is at about 190F, with the fan at about 6200 rpm, in a room at about 68F.

CPU Temp and Fan Speed

Hi
According to SMC Fan Control and iStat my CPU is running at 74C currently and often 90C under light load with associated fan speed of 6200 rpm. I have checked activity monitor and very little load on CPU jsut safari and Activity Monitor have any significant usage ( 10% ish). Is this a 'normal' CPU temp and if not are there any ways to check cooling or in crease cooling, ultimately to keep the fan low and noise down,battery life up??
many thanks

thanks for the response.
'All processes' is selected - showing 50-70% CPU idle. MacBook has good ventilation, sitting on a hard table. I upgraded the HD a while ago, to a 7200 rpm 320GB unit, would this make a difference?

Thinkpad T430u low fan speed

Hello!
When I am playing on thinkpad t430u CPU/GPU becomes very hot (95-100C), but fan speed is only 3000-3500 RPM. Using "tpfancontrol" I achieved almost 5000 RPM at manual mode and temperatures decreases to 70-75C.
Why fan is so slow at auto mode?
I updated BIOS, but it does not help. Moreover in BIOS there is no fan settings (quiet/performance) as on my old PC.
OS: Windows 8, Nvidia GPU, latest drivers.
Thanks!

Hi!
During normal working (word, firefox etc..) temp is around 60-75° with the fan always running at 3800rpm.
While I was doing a map upgrade on my garmin navigation system the notebook crashed many times in a row and I couldn't figure out why.
After some investigation I found out that it was the system overheating protection shutting it down.
I checked this by putting stress on the cpu with prim95 and there the temp goes up as I described in the previous post - just faster than weith the map upgrade. Ambient was 23-24° C.
What just made me wonder is why the hell doesn't the fan speed go up like it once used to do!?
I would expect the fan speed rising at around 75° or so but instead it started at 95° C which way too late!
This is my 3rd Thinkpad and I never experienced this behavior - however I am not sure when it started.

Hot computer... low fan speeds.

I saw a lot of questions here about fans running at full speech and being too loud. I have the opposite issue. I just moved into a new place, and I've had 3-4 freezes due to thermal issues. I have been monitoring the temp, and my processors get too hot. My A processor on my dual 2 gig G5 runs consistently in the 70s C. 76, I think, is the cut off temp.
I installed iStat pro which shows me my fan speeds. No matter how hot my computer gets, they stay at the same speed. The weirdest one is the rear fan which consistently stays at 51 RPM. The others hang out at 300... which isn't even close to max.
I don't think it's an isolated fan issue because it's all the fans and not just one. I don't think it's a sensor issue for the same reason.
Right now, i bought a fan and I have it blowing right into the front of the computer. My processors stay in the low 50s, so I know that if the fans were running properly, my computer would be plenty cool.
Does anyone have any idea why my fans aren't running right? And is there anything I can do to fix this myself?
Thanks,

I have cleaned out the inside... it is pretty much dust free. Would software cause the fans to not run correctly?
I don't have the hardware check disk... I don't think I ever got one. Or it got misplaced. I have the original install disk... but not a hardware check. Ah... it is on the install disk. I just had to read the instructions!
Just for fun, I'll install a fresh OS X on a spare disk to see if that works. It's an interesting idea.
Thanks for the responses... I'm just wondering why this is an isolated thing... a rear exhaust fan running at 51?
I'll also check for another utility, but when I open the side panel, and listen... it's easy to tell that the fans aren't working too hard.

Weired voltage cpu temp and fan speed readings

Built this system last week when i install core center I get no 3.3 v readings. cpu temp plays between 18c to 60c and the fan speed from 800 t0 6000rpm. Check in the bios all voltage readings are fine but cpu temp and fan readins can be way off. Also installed lastest versions of mbm and get the same results. Flashed bios to latest version also. Cool and quiet is not activated. Weired thing everything runs fine. motherboard k8t neo2 cpu amd 64 3500 memory corsair 3200LL 1024 video card BFG 6800gt sound Audigy 2 hard drive WD 120 sata liteon dvd rom and cd-r power supply Antec 480watt neo power Everything is at stock speeds with all latest drivers and xp sp2. Don't know what can be the problem. Please help not the first systeme I have built but first time I encounter this problem. Tried 3 different psu for testing and get the same result.

Well sorry to say I solved the problem for good. Contacted MSI support. Only answer I got was Maybe the board was bad. Got it exchanged from the store and got an Asus av8 deluxe rev.2 instead. Everything runs fine. It was my first MSI board and sad to say it gave me a lot of headaches and configeration problems. The new setup ran great on the first try. Don't think I will buy MSI again in the near future.

K7N2GM-L 6777 BIOS doesnt correctly detect CPU temp and FAN speed

Hello,
I use a K7N2GM-L 6777 mobo with a amd 1800+ and a arctic copper silent 2tc.
the mobo isnt able to detect the right cpu temperature and cpu fan speed in bios.
did anyone experienced that problem??
i already updated to the latest bios V1.6 but no change !!
the cpu temp is shown about 6°C/42°F and the fan speed is 0 rpm !!!
but the system temp is shown correctly (21°C/69°F (when i just started the system))
any idea
greetz,
fba

Hello!
It has been heard of before, yes, but your board is rather new so I don't think it has had an issue yet.
There is normally a sensor on the processor. If it does on your processor I can't say. If there isn't a sensor on the processor, or if it is covered with thermal grease, or otherwise damaged, BIOS and all programs that read BIOS data will be wrong.
Bit off: I'm speculating in that HSF, and I wonder how good and quiet it is. Been recommended by a store nearby.

Hight temperature, low fans speed. A problem_

I have a problem with OS 10.8.3 on macbook pro retina 15.
When temperature increases, above 75°C, I notice no change in fans speed, not increase.
Only with a external program (the smcfan control) is possible to increase speed and decrease the temperature.
Anyone else have this problem?

The first thing you should do is to reset the SMC > http://support.apple.com/kb/HT3964
If it doesn't work, you may have a hardware problem, so connect your computer to a power source and run Apple Hardware Test > http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1509 To start in Apple Hardware Test, hold Option (Alt) and D keys while the Mac is starting.
Then, select your language, mark the option for extended mode and start the test. If you see an error at the end of that test, copy it here. Make a backup of your computer and take the MacBook Pro to an Apple Store or reseller to get it replaced or repaired

Kernel_task cpu usage and fans on high (slow system)

Ok so I have a fairly new MacBook Pro that is acting up. It is probably 2 months old and I noticed the kernel_task has spiked using majority of cpu (system% is in the 90's). So I went through cleaning out cache, temp files, trash, etc... then removed newly installed apps. When I go into Safe Mode my system runs fine but the fans still sound like they are on high. So I thought maybe there was a software problem.... I erased the OS and reinstalled it and it is doing the same thing w/ a new OS install. Safe Mode works fine but kernal_task still eating cpu in normal mode.
What else is there to do? I read some people having issues w/ MacBook Air with a hardware issue causing this same issue, but wouldn't it seem software related if Safe Mode works fine?

emperpavel wrote:
Ok so I have a fairly new MacBook Pro that is acting up. It is probably 2 months old and I noticed the kernel_task has spiked using majority of cpu (system% is in the 90's). So I went through cleaning out cache, temp files, trash, etc... then removed newly installed apps. When I go into Safe Mode my system runs fine but the fans still sound like they are on high. So I thought maybe there was a software problem.... I erased the OS and reinstalled it and it is doing the same thing w/ a new OS install. Safe Mode works fine but kernal_task still eating cpu in normal mode.
What else is there to do? I read some people having issues w/ MacBook Air with a hardware issue causing this same issue, but wouldn't it seem software related if Safe Mode works fine?
Why does everyone reinstall their OSX? It rarely fixes issues, and you really wasted some time in doing so.
The kernel task issue is something you need to diagnose one step at a time. I had the same thing, found out it was one program that was causing it. I contacted the developer, they saw the same thing on i7 MBP's, and they put out an update a few weeks later.
But if you're saying that you have a kernel task that is taking up your system resources without any programs running, including background tasks, then you might have a hardware issue. Take it back to Apple if you can't find a program that's causing it.

Huge CPU temperature, low fan rpm, is it normal?

Hello!
I'm a new mac user, I have a new macbook 2.0Ghz, 4GB Ram and a hdd 160Gb.
I compared the temperatures of my mac with other macs and my values are huge.
In normal CPU usage I get 60ºC, but when I turn on my virtual machine the CPU temp can go to 84ºC and the fan is only at 3265rpm!
For example, now I got CPU usage of 70% and it's at 80ºC and the fan is at 2456rpm, is it normal?
Above there is a list of CPU temp and respectively fan rpm
84ºC - 3265rpm
80ºC - 2427rpm
78ºC - 2004rpm
60ºC - 2000rpm
45ºC - 1998rpm
40ºC - 2001rpm

Hello All, I have a early 2008 Macbook 4.1, with a 2.1 Ghz, 4G ram, and a 7200 RPM HD, and I am also frequently between 60-85 deg C. (140 - 185 deg F.)
My fans runs between 1800 rpm up to 6200 at higher CPU temps.
Sometimes I wonder if running the Macbooks wifi, bluetooth, and an external 24" monitor, increases the interior temp?
I have had on occasion, doing some encoding with a slew of programs running, had the temp up to 96 deg C (205 deg F), and it still was running fine, mind you I was freaking out.
But when I checked on the Intel site for max CPU temp for my model processor T8300, it said that it was 105 deg C as the maximum. 105 deg C converts to which is 221 deg F.
I figure that they must have some kind of CPU shutdown/slowdown mechanism so if it gets too hot.
And if it doesn't, my 3 year AppleCare will have to deal with it.
I am more interested in the Hard Drive temp, since if that cooks, there goes my "restore plan" into action. But it generally stays around 90 - 100 deg F.
My buddy has an iMac, and it runs between 70-100 deg F. Go figure, it's cold as ice
Just thought I would share my 2 cents worth, IAN...

CPU load LOW - Fan speed HIGH - WHY ?

Similar Messages

Maybe you are looking for