gdgt

Ok fellow owners, we know this thing gets HOT, especially on the left side with gaming and heavy web usage. Aside from your standard cooling pads, or stingy power settings, what ideas can we come up with that will help chill this beast?

My ideas:

1. carve fins into the unibody

2. drill a couple of holes somewhere (the side? bottom?) to improve airflow

3. get a heatsink manufacturer to create a USB attachment/hub (stupid 2 USB limit...) that uses heatpipes or something to suck heat directly from the unibody and vents it somewhere else.

4.?????

5. profit!

6. Maybe a permanent iXoft type pad attached to the bottom?

There are several shareware/freeware apps which control the fan parameters for this computer and completely cure the heat problem. Start here: http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/23137

PS: Original post does not describe and photo does not illustrate a unibody MacBook Pro.

if it is a unibody, I have never had a problem with heat. My first gen MBP (2.0 Core Duo), now that gets smoking hot.
If you have a unibody mbp, and are having problems with heat, either you have a problem, or stop using it on your lap/ blanket. Its made to be used on a hard service.

This isn't the unibody MBP, kids.

That's over here:

http://gdgt.com/apple/macbook-pro/15-inch/unibody/

I try to keep the number of applications down, and the number of Firefox windows low. I'm afraid one of my fans might be starting to go, it gets noisier than it used to.

I use a very high tech system that raises the macbook off the table:
http://www.rapidsupplies.com/index.asp?PageAction=VIEWPR
OD&ProdID=8655

For any laptop with modern processors, heat from the device is substantial when the machine is taxed. Essentially what is needed is a heat-sink. A large piece of thermally conductive material that is shaped such that air may flow around it while the laptop sits atop is ideal for this. In fact, the more surface area, and the greater the air-flow, the better. I use a piece of scrap steel that I salvaged from a wheeled cart circa 1950. It is approximately 10 pounds and roughly the dimensions of a large pizza box. The side edges have a wide arc cut away so that air can easily flow beneath. Wood, plastic, and air are poor conductors of heat compared to most metals. If you are uncertain whether a material would make a good heat sink hold it in your hand. If it has been sitting at room temperate, but feels cold in your hand, it is a good choice. It feels cold because it is thermally conductive, and is efficient at pulling the heat away from your hand. The larger this material surface, the more airflow around it, and the larger the temperature difference between the computer and the room, the greater the capacity for pulling heat away from the source.

That said, the extra weight of this solution may make it unattractive to many who enjoy literally using the notebook as a 'laptop' device. For those people I would suggest that just about any barrier between their bodies and the computer will reduce the heat transferred to their legs, and that as long as the temp at the cpu stays below 100 C, they're probably okay from a hardware standpoint. Also a reduction in the mass of the heat-sink can be compensated by an increase in the airflow and also by a reduction of the temperature in the room so the ambitious might find a happy medium by recycling several old cpu heat-sinks and a few fans into a much lighter weight version of my steel 'pizza box'.

Are you guy serious? Drill a hole in a 1500+ MacBook?? It has been engineered to be that hot and to work as temperature permits and to switch off automatically if temperature rises too much. What do you want more?? Use it and that's it, I mean I don't think you feel pain in your hands while typing because of his heat..

I bought a 2 part plastic case when I got the machine. I recently had to send it to Apple for a super drive replacement. I took the case off first. When it came back I turned it on and started using it right away with the case off. It runs much cooler. I'm leaving the case off, scratches be damned. I did also download a free fan control app at MacUpdate and boost the default speeds. At home it sits on a Cooler Master Notepal. I'm not sure where the redline is, but it just makes me nervous if the temp rides up over 160 at the GPU and stays there.

No matter what you do your non-unibody Macbook Pro it will always get hot. It's just what they do, but you can help it at times. Often the fans are inaccurate. For example, spinning fast even though unnecessary or not spinning when necessary. I have found an application called smcFanControl extremely helpful (http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/23049). This free application allows you to control the speed of your two fans. It works great. Also I recommend downloading this widget (http://www.apple.com/downloads/dashboard/status/fans.htm
l), which allows you to see your fans spinning in real time. Hope this helps.

I got a Griffin Elevator stand for mine the other day and now it runs much cooler ...

When playing graphically intensive games on my 2009 unibody MBP (15" and 3.06GHz c2d), the temps hover around 95C. This is even with the fans maxxed out at 6,000 RPM. I know this is not good, especially for prolonged use for hours upon hours. Am I significantly decreasing the lifespan of my notebook? I currently use a Moshi Zefyr cooling pad, which does help by lowering the temp by around 5C, but I'm afraid it's not enough. I use SMCfancontrol when I know the temps will be high, but disable it to let Mac OS X do its job with system monitoring and controlling the fans on its own.

Am I simply doomed to hardware failure due to this constant high temperature?