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Solved by 1440p HiDPI: MacBook Pro 16“ is hot and noisy with an external monitor

326 points by seam_carver 5y ago

seam_carver 5y ago
If you can't open the link, use incognito mode! Or click the non paywall link: https://axu2.medium.com/solved-by-1440p-hidpi-macbook-pro-16-is-hot-noisy-with-an-external-monitor-f8af19c30f81?sk=29420c4689393089d905cc388248aec1 https://axu2.medium.com/solved-by-1440p-hidpi-macbook-pro-16... This issue has been plaguing me for ages and I only just now figured out the solution!
- stunpix 5y ago
  Since as I'm only occasionally reading the Medium I just disabled cookies for the entire Medium domain and no longer get bothered with either paywall or switching to incognito.
db48x 5y ago
Apple’s lack of QA seems to be getting worse.
- seam_carver 5y ago
  Or they are just doing this intentionally to make M2 look good 0.0
  - arcticbull 5y ago
    Nah. Just an oversight. No excuse though.
    - seam_carver 5y ago
      Yea, was just a joke.
      - db48x 5y ago
        You joke, but it wouldn’t actually be the first time Apple has done something like that: https://www.theverge.com/2020/11/18/21573710/apple-battery-gate-throttle-iphones-settlement-amount https://www.theverge.com/2020/11/18/21573710/apple-battery-g...
        alisonkisk 5y ago
        That's not an accurate description at all.
        arcticbull 5y ago
        I've always taken issue with the positioning of "batterygate" - IMO, they extracted the maximum the battery had to offer along all points of the battery's lifecycle curve. They are consumables after all, and their performance degrades over time. They should be user-serviceable though.
jorgBaller 5y ago
Off topic but why do people still write on medium and share on HN? Its paywalled and most people will not be able to read the post
- gnicholas 5y ago
  The author can choose to have articles in front of the paywall. I believe it defaults to behind the paywall, and if you want the Medium aggregators to be able to share your piece, it has to be behind the paywall. Basically the tradeoff is to have better circulation among subscribers or non-subscribers. I always choose the latter.
- seam_carver 5y ago
  You can just open the link in incognito mode! Also, sorry, I guess I should have posted the friend link instead that doesn't ask to subscribe, but I can't change it after posting! But here's the non paywall link: https://axu2.medium.com/solved-by-1440p-hidpi-macbook-pro-16-is-hot-noisy-with-an-external-monitor-f8af19c30f81?sk=29420c4689393089d905cc388248aec1 https://axu2.medium.com/solved-by-1440p-hidpi-macbook-pro-16...
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
- toast0 5y ago
  It's not good, but it's not bad, it's kind of medium?
  - ddingus 5y ago
    True(ly) funny.
tjpnz 5y ago
What's the solution? I have no intention of giving Medium my details.
- themodelplumber 5y ago
  Switch screen to hidpi mode in Mac settings
- seam_carver 5y ago
  Just open the link in incognito or something. Or click non paywall link https://axu2.medium.com/solved-by-1440p-hidpi-macbook-pro-16-is-hot-noisy-with-an-external-monitor-f8af19c30f81?sk=29420c4689393089d905cc388248aec1 https://axu2.medium.com/solved-by-1440p-hidpi-macbook-pro-16...
treeman79 5y ago
Does this mean a 4K monitor doesn’t have this issue?
- stevep98 5y ago
  I'm running one of the mentioned GPUs on a 4k monitor and never saw this problem.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
- jsjohnst 5y ago
  I run two 5K LG displays (in addition to the laptop screen) on the 16” and don’t have the issue.
- seam_carver 5y ago
  I think it's specific to 1440p
- guofoo 5y ago
  I've used on LG 4K, AOC 4K monitors running at 3840 x 2160 and they all have the similar fan problems. MBP 16 is 5500M
- tomduncalf 5y ago
  Seems like a good excuse to update my monitor lol - any recommendations?
- satysin 5y ago
  I believe this is correct. I have always ran a 4K monitor and never hit this issue. My 15" (2018) and 16" MacBook Pro run silent when connected to the 4K monitor as it uses 2x scaling by default (so 4K "looks like" 1080p). However if I connect a 1440p display after half an hour or so the fans kick in. I don't own a 1440p display anymore to test this solution unfortunately.
userbinator 5y ago
Seeing as how it makes no sense that rendering at 2x resolution cause 1/3 of the power draw My bet is that another scaling step is causing it; and HiDPI mode is "native", so no scaling. You can see this in the comparison of the two screenshots; the first one looks like an antialising filter was applied to all the pixels and halved the resolution (so a 2x2 block of 4 pixels turns into one averaged "huge" pixel), the second one doesn't.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- seam_carver 5y ago
  This might be relevant. I took fullscreen screenshots. The first one was 2560x1440. The second one was 5120x2880.
- crazygringo 5y ago
  > HiDPI mode is "native", so no scaling That's not always the case. It can be, depending on the resolution selected (in this case it's "default for display" so no idea). HiDPI just means 2x rendering. But it still might be scaled to the resolution you've chosen for your display. On my MacBook Pro 13", there are four scale choices from "larger text" to "more space". The first option upscales (slightly blurry), the second option displays the 2x directly ("natively"), and the third and fourth options downscale. They're all still HiDPI though. In contrast, when I plug into my 1080p projector, it goes back to 1x ("LoDPI"?) rendering.
- yarcob 5y ago
  No, it's not. This is a bug. macOS has two rendering modes: Normal (1x) and HiDPI / Retina (2x). For this reason, most apps have two different sets of assets like icons and other images shown in the UI. After rendering the content either at 1x or 2x, the picture is scaled to the "real" resolution of the display. This allows Apple to support a large number of "scaled" resolutions, but the apps only have to support two modes (1x or 2x). You can see that this happens if you have two displays attached to your Mac, one with Retina and one without. When you drag a window from the Non-Retina-Display to the Retina-Display it will be pixelated at first (it was drawin in 1x mode), until it's completely on the new display, then it will redraw in 2x mode and become sharp. Normally 1x mode is faster. Try opening an app that shows a lot of data (eg. a large spreadsheet) and scroll quickly on a 1080p display vs. on a 4K display. You'll should see that the scrolling is much smoother on 1x than on 2x, since the 2x display needs to draw four times as many pixels. So this is clearly a bug, and not because of some additional scaling from 2x->1x. As this blog post shows, it's faster when downscaling from 2x.
tomatotomato37 5y ago
Can the title be edited to remove the exaggerated capitalization? This is an interesting enough article but the title makes it feel like some clickbait video
- seam_carver 5y ago
  I just quoted the 200 page MacRumors article with the same clickbaity title, since I though people might recognize it.
  - moosebear847 5y ago
    Yes, instantly recognized the title as from MacRumors. Although the sad face `:(` is missing
johnklos 5y ago
medium.com sucks. Please put anything that matters anywhere else that isn't trying to sell subscriptions.
- seam_carver 5y ago
  Sorry, I just defaulted to using Medium, didn't realize that people would have trouble reading it! You can still open it using incognito mode to read it. Or use the non paywall link https://axu2.medium.com/solved-by-1440p-hidpi-macbook-pro-16-is-hot-noisy-with-an-external-monitor-f8af19c30f81?sk=29420c4689393089d905cc388248aec1 https://axu2.medium.com/solved-by-1440p-hidpi-macbook-pro-16...
- TacticalCoder 5y ago
  I wish medium links were simply forbidden on HN.
cjbconnor 5y ago
This doesn't fix the issue, many people have had success with similar methods when running with the built-in display off. There's no getting around this with the built-in display active, or with any two non-matching resolution displays.
- seam_carver 5y ago
  My specific issue was it was still hot and noisy even when the built in display was closed. I'm sure other people have 1440p monitors and would love this partial solution.
seam_carver 5y ago
On a related topic, people seem to not like me using Medium. What platforms do you recommend?
- tjpnz 5y ago
  I would recommend self hosting (as in renting a cheap VM somewhere) or leveraging Github pages. You don't need a platform for this kind of content.
  - cdogl 5y ago
    Counterpoint: you don’t need to go through the setup and management hassle of self hosting for this kind of content.
- tverbeure 5y ago
  I simply use <blogname>.github.io with Markdown and some default Jekyll template. It's not fancy, but it works.
- bpodgursky 5y ago
  Don't listen to them. The biggest obstacle to blogging is vacillating endlessly about the perfect place to post it. Post wherever it's easiest. (none of the people who reply to this comment will actually blog regularly; they just like to give advice)
  - adrianN 5y ago
    The biggest obstacle to blogging is not writing content. Compared to the effort of writing a good blogpost, switching hosts is fairly trivial.
  - LegitShady 5y ago
    The hardest part of blogging is having something interesting or valuable to say. I assume everything on Medium is professionally stupid, based on what I've read there so far.
  - 5y ago
varenc 5y ago
You can check your resolution and HiDPI status by running this: system_profiler SPDisplaysDataType | grep -C1 Resolution For example, with my 4k monitor running at 3008x1692 with HiDPI ("retina") enabled, I get this: DELL P2715Q: Resolution: 6016 x 3384 UI Looks like: 3008 x 1692 @ 60 Hz Even with those settings my 16" MBP's idle GPU power usage is only ~8-9W. It makes no sense that enabling HiDPI on a 1440p monitor results in better performance, so this definitely sounds like a bug. I recommend displayplacer [0] for changing and automating macOS display settings. It lets you set all sorts of configs not available in the GUI. Should be easy to have displayplacer enable HiDPI on a 1440p monitor. And it doesn't make persistent system changes or require disabling SIP (i think?) like that script referenced in the article. [0] https://github.com/jakehilborn/displayplacer https://github.com/jakehilborn/displayplacer
- seam_carver 5y ago
  This might be relevant. I took fullscreen screenshots. The first one was 2560x1440. The second one was 5120x2880.
  - varenc 5y ago
    makes sense! Screenshots are in the "real" resolution and not the "Looks Like" resolution. So that helps confirm that doubling the resolution/enabling HiDPI fixed the performance issue. Such a weird bug. Thanks for the write up.
- jakehilborn 5y ago
  Thanks for the shoutout on displayplacer!
  - varenc 5y ago
    I love displayplacer. Thank you for making it! Reading through some of the source code and its use of those undocumented APIs was also really cool. p.s. check out my pull request #62 for a bug fix! Funnily, it's for a scaling/HiDPI related issue. (though only matters when you don't use "mode: <>")
ideamotor 5y ago
Wow. Hilarious. I was one of the original commenters on that thread and stopped following when I returned my - fully loaded - $$$$ - 16” MBP. I think I’ll be glad I returned it because M1 is awesome, but god damn. Why can’t Apple fix this? You figure they would get the idea when I return an ungodly expensive machine and tell them this is the reason. Christ.
- seam_carver 5y ago
  Were you using a 1440p monitor, out of curiosity?
  - ideamotor 5y ago
    Yes I was. And actually, now I’m using a 1600p ultrawide with the M1 and it’s completely silent.
    - seam_carver 5y ago
      Wow, you got wrecked by a 1440p specific bug.
- imwally 5y ago
  This is the reason I swapped my 16” for the M1 Air. The silence is bliss.
- sicromoft 5y ago
  > You figure they would get the idea when I return an ungodly expensive machine and tell them this is the reason. You would hope so, but behemoths like Apple just don't care and don't have to. I'm guessing it would take thousands of returns before it even made a blip on their radar.
  - seam_carver 5y ago
    Probably just very few people have 1440p monitors I guess.
wonnage 5y ago
It's amazing how many thermal/throttling issues have plagued macbooks over the past few years. IIRC there was a bug that would cause throttling if you tried to charge on the left side ports. Not sure if it was fully fixed by a patch. The M1s are a huge improvement but the bar was pretty low.
- p_l 5y ago
  The bug is in hw, so no, it's not fixed. Specifically, it's caused by internal layout - the chips handling power, especially for the cases with beefier wattage and at higher power draw - also can get quite hot. However, apparently the ones on the left side are much closer to CPU/GPU area on the motherboard than the ones on the right side, and thus "contribute" more to temperature observed on CPU/GPU.
smallstepforman 5y ago
MacBookPro’s are dual GPU systens, a low power low performance Intel iris Pro and also a dedicated nVidia/AMD discrete GPU. The nVidia GPU kicks in when you run OpenGL/Metal apps or when you plug in an external monitor. My MBP is well behaved when I dont plug in an external monitor, and noisy/hot when I do. This is with both OSX and Linux. Funny enough, Haiku is silent on the same hardware (no 2nd screen though).
- seam_carver 5y ago
  Well the MacBook is silent even when the dGPU is on if it's rendering at 1440p HiDPI for me. Hot and noisy at normal 1440p.
- AzN1337c0d3r 5y ago
  Intel stopped offering Iris Pro after Skylake. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_Graphics_Technology#Skylake https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_Graphics_Technology#Skyl... The last Macbook Pro with Iris Pro graphics is the Mid-2015 15-inch Macbook Pro. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MacBook_Pro#Technical_specifications_3 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MacBook_Pro#Technical_specific... The Mac in the article in particular is a 2019 16-inch model.
  - wffurr 5y ago
    It still has an Intel GPU: Intel UHD Graphics 630. Too bad it can’t be used with external monitors. It’s probably quite power efficient.
    - alisonkisk 5y ago
      Of course it is. The 13" MBPro and Intel Air work great with external monitor.
    - AzN1337c0d3r 5y ago
      Yes, but it is not correct to claim Macbook Pros are Iris Pros. They are Intel graphics. Intel GPUs (including the UHD Graphics 630) can be used with external monitors. HP, Dell, Lenovo, Acer etc all do it. In fact, in 2013-2015, Macbook Pros were available with ONLY Intel graphics, and supported external monitors. The reason why you cannot do it with dual-GPU Macbook Pros is that Apple has their own display muxing solution that requires the discrete GPU to be powered up to use external monitors (presumably the ports are attached to the discrete GPU).
mdoms 5y ago
There are lots of reasons I absolutely despise my 16" MacBook Pro and the heat while plugged into an external monitor is definitely in the top 30 or so. Really don't understand why people are buying these garbage computers.
- waterlaw 5y ago
  No happy with macOS or macbooks in general. The amount of defects and other miscellaneous issues I've encountered, along with numerous productivity losses moving from Windows and Linux. Makes no sense. My computer needs to function as a productivity machine. I don't have time for it. Next laptop(s) are going to be ThinkPads. Because I can buy two for the price of a macbook. We program for Linux servers anyway.
rcthompson 5y ago
Wow, I thought my 4k 120Hz monitor was to blame for the massive thermal throttling of my MacBook, but maybe it's actually my 1440p secondary monitor.
- merb 5y ago
  without the lid closed, no monitor works. I use 1080p monitors that do not work.
wdr1 5y ago
Is there a way to fix this but still keep the lid open? I open use the smaller screen off to the side for things like my calendar or Spotify.
- carstenhag 5y ago
  And I use my Mac as keyboard/TouchPad, but suffering a lot from this heat crap :(
willtim 5y ago
Hmmm so much for "just works". Macos is becoming as buggy as the average Linux distro. They need to take a pause with adding features and clean it up.
- fit2rule 5y ago
  I recently had to go through the hell of setting up a Java development environment, plus Android emulation, on my new M1 MacBook .. mid-way through, I was cursing myself that I wasn't just using a Linux machine .. but okay, eventually, SDKMAN came to the rescue. For a while there it really felt pretty regressive ..
- t8e56vd4ih 5y ago
  teams works fine on windows and Linux but flickers heavily in my Mac. my Mac is asking me every login for my exchange creds despite having authenticated several times. my Mac is running hot and depleting battery without any discernable reason at random occasions. the esc key on my mbp 2019 itself is a bug in my opinion.
  - 411111111111111 5y ago
    > teams works fine on windows and Linux I have to disagree there. It's so frigging laggy that it feels unusable as a communication tool.
    - 74d-fe6-2c6 5y ago
      I use it only at work. It has many issues. Lagginess isn't one I noticed.
      - eitland 5y ago
        Teams is a case study in subtle and not so subtle bugs and ux issues: Just yesterday we spent time in a team meeting because someones Teams instance was malfunctioning. Sometimes restarting the application completely (be aware it idles in the systray) works, other times restarting the pc or disabling (or enabling) hardware acceleration will work. Other times it helps to move it to the built in monitor it seems. And sometimes, like yesterday, nothing including - all the above, - disabling incoming video - and reinstalling the application works. As for UX issues there's clicking on "join meeting" and continue working for a few minutes until you realize "ah, the first join meeting doesn't join the meeting, only opens the join meeting dialog". Another winner: when you click on the 7 more people icon to see who else are online and it does nothing. Or the fact that joining a started meeting is a multi step process (find calendar, find today, find the meeting click join and join). Yesterday I'm also sure I had an instance of sound getting through before I joined. Still, somethings works flawlessly for me: jumping seamlessly from one device to another during a meeting is fantastic. Sound is OK for me. Background switching is ok etc etc.
tomduncalf 5y ago
Oh wow I’m pretty sure I’ve been debugging this issue all week and was on the verge of reformatting my Mac back to Catalina (as I don’t recall seeing this there). What great timing! I noticed the issue as my laptop feeling laggy overall, but especially that graphics on the laptop screen (eg the minimise animation) ran at like 5fps when my external monitor was connected - they were fine without, and the external monitor was ok. A friend said theirs was fine with the same setup but a 4K monitor so I did wonder if it was something to do with scaling but wasn’t aware you could do anything about it. Will test this out tomorrow! Slightly off topic but related - had a fun day yesterday tracking down the fact that in Big Sur, timers in tasks that are not in the foreground (ie the active window) start firing up to 10 secs late. I thought it must be a symptom of whatever issue was making my computer laggy but it actually seems to be aggressive power saving... so if anyone knows how to opt out of that I’ll be happy, really messes up what I was doing yesterday (basically a program that forwards IPC messages between two programs - they start arriving late after 10 secs or so).
- vaughan 5y ago
  > my laptop feeling laggy overall Run `sudo watch -d -t -n1 thermal levels`. When levels are above 100, your laptop will throttle. Once they return to 100, throttling will cease. There is a back-off algorithm at play too, so its not good enough that your CPU returns to normal temperature, it must stay at normal temperature for a period of time before things stop lagging. Also, disable turbo boost.
  - tomduncalf 5y ago
    Thank you! Will try this out. Shame to have these issues on a £3k laptop but what can ya do lol. Waiting on the M1 Pro then I’ll swap it out!
  - allarm 5y ago
    > Also, disable turbo boost. Is there a way to disable it without installing some 3rd party software?
- tomduncalf 5y ago
BadassFractal 5y ago
Looks like my 5500M GPU draws 10W fewer when I change my external 4K monitor from Scaled (to accommodate for every OS UI element being minuscule) to the display's native resolution. It makes the OS barely usable from a UI standpoint, but the fans are now a lot quieter. I'm on a Dell monitor. Is this by design?
- nicbou 5y ago
  I just tested it on my 2017 rMBP (Radeon 555), and I saw an immediate drop from ~15W to 11W. The total power usage is around 30W, so it's an immediate ~15% drop in power usage.
tandav 5y ago
From the article: "Note, these power draw settings only work if you keep the MacBook lid closed."
- superjan 5y ago
  Yes, why would that be?
  - tandav 5y ago
    My comment was just a clarification. Maybe this is just my experience but me and my coworkers using both external and macbook displays. After reading the title I thought it will fix heating without closing the lid
  - MonaroVXR 5y ago
    Because of heat dissipation. You can't go all out when you are blocking the heat. I am also not sure about the OP's statement. (I am not saying this person is wrong.)
vinay_ys 5y ago
I'm on a late 2019 MacBook Pro with an external monitor that has: B326HK: Resolution: 3840 x 2160 (2160p/4K UHD 1 - Ultra High Definition) UI Looks like: 1920 x 1080 @ 30.00Hz In iStats, Radeon High Side shows 5.6-6W of power usage. But still, my CPU cannot sustain CPU frequency above 2Ghz for more than 5 minutes due to thermal throttling.
- seam_carver 5y ago
  Why only 30 Hz? I hear 60 Hz solves a different class of issues.
  - vinay_ys 5y ago
    My mistake, thanks for pointing that out. I have an old 2013 MBP (on which I'm typing this) which only does 30Hz. On 2019 MBP with DP I am getting 60Hz but the problem remains.
MrRiddle 5y ago
This is not a solution at all. Post says this only works with lid closed, but most MPB16's will achieve reduction from 20W to 8-9W just by closing the lid, with no settings changes needed. That being said, 8-9W with closed lid is still high. Consumption for second monitor when it's idle shouldn't be more than 1W. After seeing the title I got my hopes up, that it will work within 1-2W range for idle regardless of lid being closed. That would be a solution, 8-9W definitely is not.
- dafman 5y ago
  I agree, this doesn't seem like much of a solution. Due to the incredible amount of noise my 2019 16" MBP makes when I have it open and a 4K monitor attached, I have to always use it in clamshell mode, which makes almost no noise at all unless I'm watching a video or doing certain things in VS Code. I too looked at the title and thought someone had finally figured out how to get around having the laptop open and a monitor plugged in with no noise, but it seems like this basically makes no difference at all since it only works when the lid is shut. I've resigned myself to the fact that it'll never be solved, and hope to get this MBP replaced at some point
  - MrRiddle 5y ago
    Pretty much the same with me. I checked that macrumors thread weekly if not daily at one point, but after 100 pages you lose all hope. Will switch to Apple Silicon version of 16 when it comes out, but boy does that leave bad taste in mouth.
    - alisonkisk 5y ago
      > Will switch to Apple Silicon version of 16 when it comes out After buying Mac during a 4 year run of devices with unfixably broken keyboards and GPUs, that will not teach apple to focus on quality or repairability.
- MonaroVXR 5y ago
  >This is not a solution at all. Post says this only works with lid closed, but most MPB16's will achieve reduction from 20W to 8-9W just by closing the lid, with no settings changes needed. Of course, because you can dissipate enough heat with the lid closed. >That being said, 8-9W with closed lid is still high. Consumption for second monitor when it's idle shouldn't be more than 1W. I am not about that, because laptop displays draw more power than 1W most of the time. (I'm aware of those low power displays that Lenovo utilizes.) And there are a couple of factors that I've forgotten.
swyx 5y ago
"You’ve read all your free member-only stories. Become a member to get unlimited access and support the voices you want to hear more from." Can we ban medium posts on HN already? imagine if we login-walled every piece on HN. we should not encourage this behavior and we have the clout to send Medium a message.
- villgax 5y ago
  Opening in private mode should fix it
  - itsdsmurrell 5y ago
    If the fix is so simple (I do this all the time btw), why waste people's time?
    - sichtlinkair 5y ago
      Because there's enough people who don't understand it that it's worth trying?
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- itsdsmurrell 5y ago
  Medium is the worst.
- cactus2093 5y ago
  Why medium specifically? You’d have to ban just about every news and media outlet.
  - swyx 5y ago
    news/media livelihoods depend on that paywall, i'm fine with that. medium literally exists to just put a wall between you and the authors content. nobody's making real money blogging on medium. and HN is an audience of developers, for whom standing up their own blog is trivial. ironically dev.to is shadowbanned on HN (understandable because lots of blogpspam), when medium is the one that gives readers a terrible reading experience.
aashay123 5y ago
I have two 1440p monitors with MBP 16". Using hidpi fixed the high wattage issue when I connect one monitor. But when I connect two 1440p monitors, I still see GPU wattage at around 20W. Any idea what could fix this? Note: Mac lid is closed during all of the testing and usage I am doing.
- MonaroVXR 5y ago
  Difficult to find out and it's difficult to compare an AMD GPU with an Intel or NVIDIA one at this point. Because they do things differently and the laptop that using is doing things differently too. And... about those other laptops, they do things differently too. (ASUS Zephyrus vs a Legion 7 differs a lot.)
xlii 5y ago
I was having exact same problem and done a ton of research on the issue. Ultimately y I decided to buy eGPU which solved my problem. It seems that Radeon is taking a lot of power even on idle screen and with low load. This increases temperature which in turn creates environment where throttling on CPU happens so not only Macbook gets hot but also it’s much slower. After research I found out that I can either work in clamshell mode (and I’d rather grew fond of having MBP + external monitor) or find a way to mitigate it. I decided to opt for eGPU which solved issue immediately. MacOS feel snappier, I don’t remember last time when fans started and it’s cool to touch. Not an exactly cheap solution for a i9 MBP but, eh, you do what you have to do. eGPU brings its own share of problems to MacOS (like ejecting it is not a simple thing - I always have to resort to doing this manually from console) and pulling the cable will kernel panic, but the upside is that I get quite nice connector hub and photo editing software works much nicer. I do think it’s a shame that Apple even designed MBP like that. You buy beefed out MBP (5600M wasn’t even available when I was buying it - and supposedly it fixes this issue) and it can’t handle so complex task as displaying the second monitor without launching the rocket engine.
- fdroidmstrrce 5y ago
  > you do what you have to do. No I don't. Are you an iOS dev?
- ChrisMarshallNY 5y ago
  I have two eGPUs; both of which are collecting dust. One is a BlackMagic eGPU Pro (since discontinued). The main reason that I disconnected them, is that I plan to get an M1X/M2 laptop, once they come out, and I know that the new chips don't work with eGPUs, so I might as well get used to it (Makes for simpler under-desk wiring, too). Also, the eGPUs seemed to introduce random crashes, and I don't like running on discontinued kit.
  - sizzle 5y ago
    I’ll take them off your hands if interested. I need to beef up my i7 Mac mini.
fdroidmstrrce 5y ago
Hmm a few days ago I posted about the overheating issue on m1 that is being talked about on Reddit and a few other websites. I was flagged. HN is carefully curated for our FAANG overlords.
- dang 5y ago
  You've created dozens of accounts, mostly to go on and on about Apple for some reason. It's not surprising that HN users would flag comments that are so predictable and ranty. As for the mods: we don't care about $BigCo or "overlords", but definitely draw the line at single-purpose accounts and serial trolls.
njitbew 5y ago
After upgrading my MacBook Pro 13" (2017) to Big Sur in Dec 2020 I had a similar experience. I use a 4k monitor and everything got super slow, fans started spinning, processes got throttled, and I could barely get any work done. I later did a fresh install of Catalina and everything was fast again. I never did proper benchmarking, but my feeling was that resolution played a role. When using 1080p things were fast, but the resolution is unusable on a 27" 4k display. When using 2160p things were fast, but too small for my eyes. Any resolution in between (this implies things are being scaled?) was sluggish. Note that this is a 13" model, so the problem does not seem to be restricted to the 16" model that the author is talking about.
- tomduncalf 5y ago
  This matches my feeling that it’s a post-Big Sur upgrade issue, which makes me hope it can be fixed. Has anyone spoken to Apple Support regarding this?
  - tomduncalf 5y ago
    See my other update: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27254237 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27254237. I did a clean install of Catalina and same issue persisted so I think I have a hardware fault.
mattgreenrocks 5y ago
2020 16” MBP with 5500M and Big Sur doesn’t have any fan issues in clamshell when using my 1440p display. I don’t use HiDPI, but it is running at 144hz. Another data point. Seems like putting more load on some part of the system prevents this, but it is very strange.
- seam_carver 5y ago
  I'm starting to think it's specific to 1440p60
SigmundA 5y ago
I had the issue when going from driving my two 4k monitors with usb-c directly to going through a thunderbolt 4 hub that then did HDMI out (Caldigit). After some searching it seems HDMI conversion can trigger it. Switched to a TB4 hub that did usb-c to monitors (which uses display port instead, Kensington) and radeon high side idle went back down and fans slowed down. Will be happy to move to Apple Silicon just for the lack of fan noise.
jiofih 5y ago
> this fix only works when the MacBook lid is closed Not really solved then. Everyone I know that has a 16” has the same issue. Since the top of the line model is the one most chosen by professionals, very few will not connect to an external monitor. Apple should be issuing refunds left and right after this fiasco.
- seam_carver 5y ago
  Thank you for your feedback. You aren't the only one who commented something like this, so I added a TLDR at the top of the article.
- SloopJon 5y ago
  I got a 16" MBP last year in order to WFH. I could not get it to work with an old 1920x1200 Dell monitor using DVI adapters. Months later I bought a 1440 monitor that works over HDMI and DisplayPort, but the display is fuzzy. I found some tweaks to improve it, but it's still noticeably worse than a hackintosh running High Sierra. I have felt like the performance isn't great, but I chalked it up to Docker and the Linux VM it uses. However, I also noticed that the computer was warm to the touch with fans running even when I hadn't used it for hours. I've taken to manually forcing it to sleep at the end of the day. I'm excited to try this HiDPI hack, because it may solve the power usage problem and the fuzzy display. It would be a real shame to lose the built-in display if this only works in clamshell mode, but it just might be worth it. Edit: I just realized that I can't use Touch ID in clamshell mode. That makes this a harder call.
  - cyberge99 5y ago
    Make sure you use a good hdmi cable. Upgrading my cable fixed both fuzziness and delayed refresh rate.
  - murermader 5y ago
    If you try it out, I would be interested in knowing if it helped with the fuzzyness. I experienced the same on a 38“ 3840x1600 display, which only looks bad in macOS. I no longer own a macbook so I can‘t do any testing on my own.
STRML 5y ago
If you have two monitors, this doesn't make much difference. I'm at 19W with HiDPI off and 20.2W with it on, with 2x 2560x1440 Dell U2515HXs.
- seam_carver 5y ago
  That's unfortunate, but does 1 monitor/lid closing make a difference?
  - STRML 5y ago
    It does seem to, yes.
deergomoo 5y ago
This was (and is) such a big issue that I sold my 16” MBP and bought an M1 MacBook Air. The monitor issue was particularly egregious because it would cause heat and noise even at idle, but the thing gets perilously hot and loud when put under even the slightest load. I am incredibly surprised that none of the reviews seemed to pick up on it, though I suspect they may have been highly swayed by this being the first MacBook in some years with a usable keyboard. I would not be surprised if we start to see a bunch of them fail en masse in a few years time.
- brokenmachine 5y ago
  >This was (and is) such a big issue that I sold my 16” MBP and bought an M1 MacBook Air. This sentence perfectly encapsulates the Apple mentality. Why would they ever bother fixing it?
AJRF 5y ago
I had this and then got an M1 MBP and it flickers wildly on dark backgrounds when connected via USB-C. I think that's going to be my last Apple laptop.
- smoldesu 5y ago
  Same issue I had on my M1 Macbook Air. Guess I just need to forgo one of my monitors, sigh...
ezconnect 5y ago
Medium hijack the right click when you select a text. What a frustrating user experience.
seam_carver 5y ago
I was kind of hoping people would be commenting "Wow this fixed my issue" but I guess very few people have 2560x1440p60 monitors...
seam_carver 5y ago
TLDR: My Macbook Pro is hot and noisy when connected to a 2560x1440p60 monitor, even when the lid is closed at idle. This article outlines a partial solution that enables silent operation at idle when the lid is closed. Sorry, didn't realize paywall was default option: https://axu2.medium.com/solved-by-1440p-hidpi-macbook-pro-16-is-hot-noisy-with-an-external-monitor-f8af19c30f81?sk=29420c4689393089d905cc388248aec1 https://axu2.medium.com/solved-by-1440p-hidpi-macbook-pro-16...
wombat-man 5y ago
I have this problem. Had no problem working with the laptop open and 2 monitors for a year or so. Upgraded to big sur and now it’s an issue. I think i can manage but i hear those fans struggling.
orangegreen 5y ago
Had the same issue on my 16" before I spilled coffee all over it and broke it. A lot of the time kernal_task would take up like 400% CPU, which was because plugging the power cable into certain thunderbolt ports (on the left side) would overheat the computer. Even then I was consistently getting low performance, my fans were on all the time, and my computer was burning hot trying to power a 4k monitor and a 1080p monitor. After my 16" broke I got an M1 Mac Mini and obviously have not been having the same issues. Now my computer feels fast again. My old set up felt like I was using a Macbook Air or something.
neonate 5y ago
https://archive.md/wWsjs https://archive.md/wWsjs
rayiner 5y ago
The MBP 16” is a buggy garbage machine. It also routinely kernel panics when disconnecting thunderbolt devices. For the first month it also regularly kernel panicked waking up from sleep like some piece of shit Windows laptop, but that seems to have gotten fixed in Catalina.
hesdeadjim 5y ago
These machines are a complete joke for anyone doing “Pro” work. Endless thermal throttling driving CPU frequencies down to 2.4Ghz, low GPU performance, it’s utter bullshit. I’ve spent $5k on maxed out machines for my engineers, and it’s been a complete mess. Half of them have had to switch to a Windows machine as their primary so they can work without staring at a compiler spinning its wheels. Maybe an Mx Pro will live up to the legacy of the 2012 era, but Apple’s obsession with thinness and mediocre cooling doesn’t give me much hope for pro users.
- Koshkin 5y ago
  > switch to a Windows Why not Linux?
  - foepys 5y ago
    WSL2 is nearly Linux. File IO is a bit slow compared to native Linux and if you want to call a Windows application running on localhost from within WSL2 it's a bit tricky but otherwise it works very well.
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
    - yepthatsreality 5y ago
      I spent years developing in WSL and while it’s decent, it’s still not fool proof. Recently I’ve made the switch to pure Linux work stations and I have the opposite to offer: I’d rather config WINE to run a Windows app then configure and play with WSL. It’s a great tactic but Linux DE’s are so polished these days I think WSL is a poor choice.
      - foepys 5y ago
        As soon as Visual Studio can run on Linux I will gladly switch but currently my backend tooling is Windows only and WSL2 is godsent to connect .NET with cloud tooling. WSL1 was not well designed. If you only worked with WSL1, you would be surprised how well WSL matured.
dawnerd 5y ago
Apple is just awful with external displays in general. I’ve yet to find a monitor/Mac combo that doesn’t have issues. They really need to put some focus into it because Windows really makes macOS look bad in this regard.
- nvr219 5y ago
  Seriously. Even with one external monitor I get things like windows "disappearing" into some in-between land, wallpaper getting messed up... It's shocking.
- spacedcowboy 5y ago
  Like what ? For the past year I've been WFH with the MBP (which has a 5500M gpu) driving its own panel (3072x1920), an external "wide" ~4K~ "Big-ass" (3440 x 1440) and an external "4:3" 4k (3840x2160) No problems here. [edit: display info] tanelorn ~ % system_profiler SPDisplaysDataType | grep -C1 Resolution Display Type: Built-In Retina LCD Resolution: 3072 x 1920 Retina Framebuffer Depth: 24-Bit Color (ARGB8888) -- -- V3L6W: Resolution: 3440 x 1440 (UWQHD - Ultra-Wide Quad HD) UI Looks like: 3440 x 1440 @ 60 Hz -- -- PN-K321: Resolution: 3840 x 2160 (2160p/4K UHD 1 - Ultra High Definition) UI Looks like: 3840 x 2160 @ 30 Hz
  - clappski 5y ago
    3440 x 1440 isn't 4k, it's an ultrawide 1440p monitor
    - spacedcowboy 5y ago
      Fairy nuff. Substitute "Big-ass" for "4k".
    - Marsymars 5y ago
      I’ve also seen them called “ultrawide 2k”, which makes it very clear that it isn’t 4k.
  - 5y ago
dontblink 5y ago
What was used to monitor the power consumption?
- SloopJon 5y ago
  iStat Menus: > You can tell, since the screenshot of the power draw monitoring utility (iStat Menus) is twice as sharp in the second example.
mstg 5y ago
I've had thermal throttling issues with my 16" since I've gotten it, and it's only gotten worse. I had to do a downgrade to Catalina to even be able to use it. It's so funny that a $4.3k machine can't even run Zoom or Meet properly. I also had to do a SwitchResX trick + clamshell mode to even be able to dock for a few hours (and it'll overheat again). I play an occasional Dota 2 match, that my 2014 13" handled without any issues, while my 16" just shuts itself down because of overheating (even while not docked, because of dGPU usage). I don't care if it's an AMD issue, then the GPUs shouldn't be in their machine. MacBooks used to be so good, and just work. Now not so much. I'll think twice before buying anything Apple (computer-wise) ever again. Specs: 2,3Ghz 8-core i9, 64GB RAM, AMD Radeon Pro 5500M 8GB
- tqkxzugoaupvwqr 5y ago
  I have a MacBook Pro with the same specs. $4000 machine that runs hot with loud fans when I connect an external 4K monitor. It’s annoying af.
vaughan 5y ago
Some tips on throttling problems: First, disable turbo boost. Second, point a desk fan at your MacBook. Third, eliminate processes that peg the CPU. --- How to know when it is throttling: Download Intel Power Gadget and watch the Frequency graph. If blue line doesn't match the red line then you are throttling. Run `sudo watch -d -t -n1 thermal levels`. When any reading goes over 100, it is in throttling mode. Once it trips over 100 you start throttling. Throttling doesn't end though until this value returns below 100. This number is not directly linked to temperature either. Even though your CPU may be at a safe temperature like 80 degrees which normally shouldn't throttle, your `thermal levels` will not decrease immediately. The best way to get them to decrease is by sleeping your MacBook. Maybe there is a hard-coded delayed back-off algorithm that is a function of the time the CPU spends above a certain temperature threshold - I'm not sure. I have also read that its potentially the voltage-regulator module that doesn't have a temp sensor that this may be linked to. --- You can also do a [cooling mod][1] if you really want to but its probably going to void and warranty and its risky. [1]: https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/2018-macbook-pro-cooling-mod.2147106/ https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/2018-macbook-pro-coolin...
- sneak 5y ago
  The article identifies this as a GPU driver bug, not an issue with CPU or CPU throttling.
  - vaughan 5y ago
    The voltage regulator module serves both CPU and GPU so the thermal issues are related.
Filligree 5y ago
One comment here is that the M1 does better. No doubt that's true; I haven't observed this particular problem. However, OSX' logic for external monitors doesn't work a whole lot better than for older laptops -- in particular, if I connect it to a monitor that's connected through a Startech KVM it remains stuck at XGA (1024x768) resolution, which reflects the EDID the KVM provides to inactive computers. It doesn't update when the laptop is selected, and there seems to be no way to reset it. Nothing else does that. IMO, it's all indicative of a prototype-level implementation.
d_runs_far 5y ago
I did a pram reset and have had zero issues. First day with the machine with a 27” 4K monitor and temps were soaring, fans going crazy with just chrome, sublime and vagrant running. PRAM reset and fans only turn on when something actually intense is happening. Latest big sur, and pretty much a maxed out machine - 64gb/1TB/ and I think the same graphics as mentioned in the article.

326 points by seam_carver 5y ago

If you can't open the link, use incognito mode! Or click the non paywall link: https://axu2.medium.com/solved-by-1440p-hidpi-macbook-pro-16-is-hot-noisy-with-an-external-monitor-f8af19c30f81?sk=29420c4689393089d905cc388248aec1 https://axu2.medium.com/solved-by-1440p-hidpi-macbook-pro-16... This issue has been plaguing me for ages and I only just now figured out the solution!

stunpix 5y ago
Since as I'm only occasionally reading the Medium I just disabled cookies for the entire Medium domain and no longer get bothered with either paywall or switching to incognito.

db48x 5y ago

Apple’s lack of QA seems to be getting worse.

seam_carver 5y ago
Or they are just doing this intentionally to make M2 look good 0.0
- arcticbull 5y ago
  Nah. Just an oversight. No excuse though.
  - seam_carver 5y ago
    Yea, was just a joke.
    - db48x 5y ago
      You joke, but it wouldn’t actually be the first time Apple has done something like that: https://www.theverge.com/2020/11/18/21573710/apple-battery-gate-throttle-iphones-settlement-amount https://www.theverge.com/2020/11/18/21573710/apple-battery-g...
      - alisonkisk 5y ago
        That's not an accurate description at all.
      - arcticbull 5y ago
        I've always taken issue with the positioning of "batterygate" - IMO, they extracted the maximum the battery had to offer along all points of the battery's lifecycle curve. They are consumables after all, and their performance degrades over time. They should be user-serviceable though.

jorgBaller 5y ago

Off topic but why do people still write on medium and share on HN? Its paywalled and most people will not be able to read the post

gnicholas 5y ago
The author can choose to have articles in front of the paywall. I believe it defaults to behind the paywall, and if you want the Medium aggregators to be able to share your piece, it has to be behind the paywall. Basically the tradeoff is to have better circulation among subscribers or non-subscribers. I always choose the latter.
seam_carver 5y ago
You can just open the link in incognito mode! Also, sorry, I guess I should have posted the friend link instead that doesn't ask to subscribe, but I can't change it after posting! But here's the non paywall link: https://axu2.medium.com/solved-by-1440p-hidpi-macbook-pro-16-is-hot-noisy-with-an-external-monitor-f8af19c30f81?sk=29420c4689393089d905cc388248aec1 https://axu2.medium.com/solved-by-1440p-hidpi-macbook-pro-16...
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
toast0 5y ago
It's not good, but it's not bad, it's kind of medium?
- ddingus 5y ago
  True(ly) funny.

tjpnz 5y ago

What's the solution? I have no intention of giving Medium my details.

themodelplumber 5y ago
Switch screen to hidpi mode in Mac settings
seam_carver 5y ago
Just open the link in incognito or something. Or click non paywall link https://axu2.medium.com/solved-by-1440p-hidpi-macbook-pro-16-is-hot-noisy-with-an-external-monitor-f8af19c30f81?sk=29420c4689393089d905cc388248aec1 https://axu2.medium.com/solved-by-1440p-hidpi-macbook-pro-16...

treeman79 5y ago

Does this mean a 4K monitor doesn’t have this issue?

stevep98 5y ago
I'm running one of the mentioned GPUs on a 4k monitor and never saw this problem.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
jsjohnst 5y ago
I run two 5K LG displays (in addition to the laptop screen) on the 16” and don’t have the issue.
seam_carver 5y ago
I think it's specific to 1440p
guofoo 5y ago
I've used on LG 4K, AOC 4K monitors running at 3840 x 2160 and they all have the similar fan problems. MBP 16 is 5500M
tomduncalf 5y ago
Seems like a good excuse to update my monitor lol - any recommendations?
satysin 5y ago
I believe this is correct. I have always ran a 4K monitor and never hit this issue. My 15" (2018) and 16" MacBook Pro run silent when connected to the 4K monitor as it uses 2x scaling by default (so 4K "looks like" 1080p). However if I connect a 1440p display after half an hour or so the fans kick in. I don't own a 1440p display anymore to test this solution unfortunately.

userbinator 5y ago

Seeing as how it makes no sense that rendering at 2x resolution cause 1/3 of the power draw My bet is that another scaling step is causing it; and HiDPI mode is "native", so no scaling. You can see this in the comparison of the two screenshots; the first one looks like an antialising filter was applied to all the pixels and halved the resolution (so a 2x2 block of 4 pixels turns into one averaged "huge" pixel), the second one doesn't.

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
seam_carver 5y ago
This might be relevant. I took fullscreen screenshots. The first one was 2560x1440. The second one was 5120x2880.
crazygringo 5y ago
> HiDPI mode is "native", so no scaling That's not always the case. It can be, depending on the resolution selected (in this case it's "default for display" so no idea). HiDPI just means 2x rendering. But it still might be scaled to the resolution you've chosen for your display. On my MacBook Pro 13", there are four scale choices from "larger text" to "more space". The first option upscales (slightly blurry), the second option displays the 2x directly ("natively"), and the third and fourth options downscale. They're all still HiDPI though. In contrast, when I plug into my 1080p projector, it goes back to 1x ("LoDPI"?) rendering.
yarcob 5y ago
No, it's not. This is a bug. macOS has two rendering modes: Normal (1x) and HiDPI / Retina (2x). For this reason, most apps have two different sets of assets like icons and other images shown in the UI. After rendering the content either at 1x or 2x, the picture is scaled to the "real" resolution of the display. This allows Apple to support a large number of "scaled" resolutions, but the apps only have to support two modes (1x or 2x). You can see that this happens if you have two displays attached to your Mac, one with Retina and one without. When you drag a window from the Non-Retina-Display to the Retina-Display it will be pixelated at first (it was drawin in 1x mode), until it's completely on the new display, then it will redraw in 2x mode and become sharp. Normally 1x mode is faster. Try opening an app that shows a lot of data (eg. a large spreadsheet) and scroll quickly on a 1080p display vs. on a 4K display. You'll should see that the scrolling is much smoother on 1x than on 2x, since the 2x display needs to draw four times as many pixels. So this is clearly a bug, and not because of some additional scaling from 2x->1x. As this blog post shows, it's faster when downscaling from 2x.

tomatotomato37 5y ago

Can the title be edited to remove the exaggerated capitalization? This is an interesting enough article but the title makes it feel like some clickbait video

seam_carver 5y ago
I just quoted the 200 page MacRumors article with the same clickbaity title, since I though people might recognize it.
- moosebear847 5y ago
  Yes, instantly recognized the title as from MacRumors. Although the sad face `:(` is missing

johnklos 5y ago

medium.com sucks. Please put anything that matters anywhere else that isn't trying to sell subscriptions.

seam_carver 5y ago
Sorry, I just defaulted to using Medium, didn't realize that people would have trouble reading it! You can still open it using incognito mode to read it. Or use the non paywall link https://axu2.medium.com/solved-by-1440p-hidpi-macbook-pro-16-is-hot-noisy-with-an-external-monitor-f8af19c30f81?sk=29420c4689393089d905cc388248aec1 https://axu2.medium.com/solved-by-1440p-hidpi-macbook-pro-16...
TacticalCoder 5y ago
I wish medium links were simply forbidden on HN.

cjbconnor 5y ago

This doesn't fix the issue, many people have had success with similar methods when running with the built-in display off. There's no getting around this with the built-in display active, or with any two non-matching resolution displays.

seam_carver 5y ago
My specific issue was it was still hot and noisy even when the built in display was closed. I'm sure other people have 1440p monitors and would love this partial solution.

seam_carver 5y ago

On a related topic, people seem to not like me using Medium. What platforms do you recommend?

tjpnz 5y ago
I would recommend self hosting (as in renting a cheap VM somewhere) or leveraging Github pages. You don't need a platform for this kind of content.
- cdogl 5y ago
  Counterpoint: you don’t need to go through the setup and management hassle of self hosting for this kind of content.
tverbeure 5y ago
I simply use <blogname>.github.io with Markdown and some default Jekyll template. It's not fancy, but it works.
bpodgursky 5y ago
Don't listen to them. The biggest obstacle to blogging is vacillating endlessly about the perfect place to post it. Post wherever it's easiest. (none of the people who reply to this comment will actually blog regularly; they just like to give advice)
- adrianN 5y ago
  The biggest obstacle to blogging is not writing content. Compared to the effort of writing a good blogpost, switching hosts is fairly trivial.
- LegitShady 5y ago
  The hardest part of blogging is having something interesting or valuable to say. I assume everything on Medium is professionally stupid, based on what I've read there so far.
- 5y ago

varenc 5y ago

You can check your resolution and HiDPI status by running this: system_profiler SPDisplaysDataType | grep -C1 Resolution For example, with my 4k monitor running at 3008x1692 with HiDPI ("retina") enabled, I get this: DELL P2715Q: Resolution: 6016 x 3384 UI Looks like: 3008 x 1692 @ 60 Hz Even with those settings my 16" MBP's idle GPU power usage is only ~8-9W. It makes no sense that enabling HiDPI on a 1440p monitor results in better performance, so this definitely sounds like a bug. I recommend displayplacer [0] for changing and automating macOS display settings. It lets you set all sorts of configs not available in the GUI. Should be easy to have displayplacer enable HiDPI on a 1440p monitor. And it doesn't make persistent system changes or require disabling SIP (i think?) like that script referenced in the article. [0] https://github.com/jakehilborn/displayplacer https://github.com/jakehilborn/displayplacer

seam_carver 5y ago
This might be relevant. I took fullscreen screenshots. The first one was 2560x1440. The second one was 5120x2880.
- varenc 5y ago
  makes sense! Screenshots are in the "real" resolution and not the "Looks Like" resolution. So that helps confirm that doubling the resolution/enabling HiDPI fixed the performance issue. Such a weird bug. Thanks for the write up.
jakehilborn 5y ago
Thanks for the shoutout on displayplacer!
- varenc 5y ago
  I love displayplacer. Thank you for making it! Reading through some of the source code and its use of those undocumented APIs was also really cool. p.s. check out my pull request #62 for a bug fix! Funnily, it's for a scaling/HiDPI related issue. (though only matters when you don't use "mode: <>")

ideamotor 5y ago

Wow. Hilarious. I was one of the original commenters on that thread and stopped following when I returned my - fully loaded - $$$$ - 16” MBP. I think I’ll be glad I returned it because M1 is awesome, but god damn. Why can’t Apple fix this? You figure they would get the idea when I return an ungodly expensive machine and tell them this is the reason. Christ.

seam_carver 5y ago
Were you using a 1440p monitor, out of curiosity?
- ideamotor 5y ago
  Yes I was. And actually, now I’m using a 1600p ultrawide with the M1 and it’s completely silent.
  - seam_carver 5y ago
    Wow, you got wrecked by a 1440p specific bug.
imwally 5y ago
This is the reason I swapped my 16” for the M1 Air. The silence is bliss.
sicromoft 5y ago
> You figure they would get the idea when I return an ungodly expensive machine and tell them this is the reason. You would hope so, but behemoths like Apple just don't care and don't have to. I'm guessing it would take thousands of returns before it even made a blip on their radar.
- seam_carver 5y ago
  Probably just very few people have 1440p monitors I guess.

wonnage 5y ago

It's amazing how many thermal/throttling issues have plagued macbooks over the past few years. IIRC there was a bug that would cause throttling if you tried to charge on the left side ports. Not sure if it was fully fixed by a patch. The M1s are a huge improvement but the bar was pretty low.

p_l 5y ago
The bug is in hw, so no, it's not fixed. Specifically, it's caused by internal layout - the chips handling power, especially for the cases with beefier wattage and at higher power draw - also can get quite hot. However, apparently the ones on the left side are much closer to CPU/GPU area on the motherboard than the ones on the right side, and thus "contribute" more to temperature observed on CPU/GPU.

smallstepforman 5y ago

MacBookPro’s are dual GPU systens, a low power low performance Intel iris Pro and also a dedicated nVidia/AMD discrete GPU. The nVidia GPU kicks in when you run OpenGL/Metal apps or when you plug in an external monitor. My MBP is well behaved when I dont plug in an external monitor, and noisy/hot when I do. This is with both OSX and Linux. Funny enough, Haiku is silent on the same hardware (no 2nd screen though).

seam_carver 5y ago
Well the MacBook is silent even when the dGPU is on if it's rendering at 1440p HiDPI for me. Hot and noisy at normal 1440p.
AzN1337c0d3r 5y ago
Intel stopped offering Iris Pro after Skylake. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_Graphics_Technology#Skylake https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_Graphics_Technology#Skyl... The last Macbook Pro with Iris Pro graphics is the Mid-2015 15-inch Macbook Pro. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MacBook_Pro#Technical_specifications_3 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MacBook_Pro#Technical_specific... The Mac in the article in particular is a 2019 16-inch model.
- wffurr 5y ago
  It still has an Intel GPU: Intel UHD Graphics 630. Too bad it can’t be used with external monitors. It’s probably quite power efficient.
  - alisonkisk 5y ago
    Of course it is. The 13" MBPro and Intel Air work great with external monitor.
  - AzN1337c0d3r 5y ago
    Yes, but it is not correct to claim Macbook Pros are Iris Pros. They are Intel graphics. Intel GPUs (including the UHD Graphics 630) can be used with external monitors. HP, Dell, Lenovo, Acer etc all do it. In fact, in 2013-2015, Macbook Pros were available with ONLY Intel graphics, and supported external monitors. The reason why you cannot do it with dual-GPU Macbook Pros is that Apple has their own display muxing solution that requires the discrete GPU to be powered up to use external monitors (presumably the ports are attached to the discrete GPU).

mdoms 5y ago

There are lots of reasons I absolutely despise my 16" MacBook Pro and the heat while plugged into an external monitor is definitely in the top 30 or so. Really don't understand why people are buying these garbage computers.

waterlaw 5y ago
No happy with macOS or macbooks in general. The amount of defects and other miscellaneous issues I've encountered, along with numerous productivity losses moving from Windows and Linux. Makes no sense. My computer needs to function as a productivity machine. I don't have time for it. Next laptop(s) are going to be ThinkPads. Because I can buy two for the price of a macbook. We program for Linux servers anyway.

rcthompson 5y ago

Wow, I thought my 4k 120Hz monitor was to blame for the massive thermal throttling of my MacBook, but maybe it's actually my 1440p secondary monitor.

merb 5y ago
without the lid closed, no monitor works. I use 1080p monitors that do not work.

wdr1 5y ago

Is there a way to fix this but still keep the lid open? I open use the smaller screen off to the side for things like my calendar or Spotify.

carstenhag 5y ago
And I use my Mac as keyboard/TouchPad, but suffering a lot from this heat crap :(

willtim 5y ago

Hmmm so much for "just works". Macos is becoming as buggy as the average Linux distro. They need to take a pause with adding features and clean it up.

fit2rule 5y ago
I recently had to go through the hell of setting up a Java development environment, plus Android emulation, on my new M1 MacBook .. mid-way through, I was cursing myself that I wasn't just using a Linux machine .. but okay, eventually, SDKMAN came to the rescue. For a while there it really felt pretty regressive ..
t8e56vd4ih 5y ago
teams works fine on windows and Linux but flickers heavily in my Mac. my Mac is asking me every login for my exchange creds despite having authenticated several times. my Mac is running hot and depleting battery without any discernable reason at random occasions. the esc key on my mbp 2019 itself is a bug in my opinion.
- 411111111111111 5y ago
  > teams works fine on windows and Linux I have to disagree there. It's so frigging laggy that it feels unusable as a communication tool.
  - 74d-fe6-2c6 5y ago
    I use it only at work. It has many issues. Lagginess isn't one I noticed.
    - eitland 5y ago
      Teams is a case study in subtle and not so subtle bugs and ux issues: Just yesterday we spent time in a team meeting because someones Teams instance was malfunctioning. Sometimes restarting the application completely (be aware it idles in the systray) works, other times restarting the pc or disabling (or enabling) hardware acceleration will work. Other times it helps to move it to the built in monitor it seems. And sometimes, like yesterday, nothing including - all the above, - disabling incoming video - and reinstalling the application works. As for UX issues there's clicking on "join meeting" and continue working for a few minutes until you realize "ah, the first join meeting doesn't join the meeting, only opens the join meeting dialog". Another winner: when you click on the 7 more people icon to see who else are online and it does nothing. Or the fact that joining a started meeting is a multi step process (find calendar, find today, find the meeting click join and join). Yesterday I'm also sure I had an instance of sound getting through before I joined. Still, somethings works flawlessly for me: jumping seamlessly from one device to another during a meeting is fantastic. Sound is OK for me. Background switching is ok etc etc.

tomduncalf 5y ago

Oh wow I’m pretty sure I’ve been debugging this issue all week and was on the verge of reformatting my Mac back to Catalina (as I don’t recall seeing this there). What great timing! I noticed the issue as my laptop feeling laggy overall, but especially that graphics on the laptop screen (eg the minimise animation) ran at like 5fps when my external monitor was connected - they were fine without, and the external monitor was ok. A friend said theirs was fine with the same setup but a 4K monitor so I did wonder if it was something to do with scaling but wasn’t aware you could do anything about it. Will test this out tomorrow! Slightly off topic but related - had a fun day yesterday tracking down the fact that in Big Sur, timers in tasks that are not in the foreground (ie the active window) start firing up to 10 secs late. I thought it must be a symptom of whatever issue was making my computer laggy but it actually seems to be aggressive power saving... so if anyone knows how to opt out of that I’ll be happy, really messes up what I was doing yesterday (basically a program that forwards IPC messages between two programs - they start arriving late after 10 secs or so).

vaughan 5y ago
> my laptop feeling laggy overall Run `sudo watch -d -t -n1 thermal levels`. When levels are above 100, your laptop will throttle. Once they return to 100, throttling will cease. There is a back-off algorithm at play too, so its not good enough that your CPU returns to normal temperature, it must stay at normal temperature for a period of time before things stop lagging. Also, disable turbo boost.
- tomduncalf 5y ago
  Thank you! Will try this out. Shame to have these issues on a £3k laptop but what can ya do lol. Waiting on the M1 Pro then I’ll swap it out!
- allarm 5y ago
  > Also, disable turbo boost. Is there a way to disable it without installing some 3rd party software?
tomduncalf 5y ago

BadassFractal 5y ago

Looks like my 5500M GPU draws 10W fewer when I change my external 4K monitor from Scaled (to accommodate for every OS UI element being minuscule) to the display's native resolution. It makes the OS barely usable from a UI standpoint, but the fans are now a lot quieter. I'm on a Dell monitor. Is this by design?

nicbou 5y ago
I just tested it on my 2017 rMBP (Radeon 555), and I saw an immediate drop from ~15W to 11W. The total power usage is around 30W, so it's an immediate ~15% drop in power usage.

tandav 5y ago

From the article: "Note, these power draw settings only work if you keep the MacBook lid closed."

superjan 5y ago
Yes, why would that be?
- tandav 5y ago
  My comment was just a clarification. Maybe this is just my experience but me and my coworkers using both external and macbook displays. After reading the title I thought it will fix heating without closing the lid
- MonaroVXR 5y ago
  Because of heat dissipation. You can't go all out when you are blocking the heat. I am also not sure about the OP's statement. (I am not saying this person is wrong.)

vinay_ys 5y ago

I'm on a late 2019 MacBook Pro with an external monitor that has: B326HK: Resolution: 3840 x 2160 (2160p/4K UHD 1 - Ultra High Definition) UI Looks like: 1920 x 1080 @ 30.00Hz In iStats, Radeon High Side shows 5.6-6W of power usage. But still, my CPU cannot sustain CPU frequency above 2Ghz for more than 5 minutes due to thermal throttling.

seam_carver 5y ago
Why only 30 Hz? I hear 60 Hz solves a different class of issues.
- vinay_ys 5y ago
  My mistake, thanks for pointing that out. I have an old 2013 MBP (on which I'm typing this) which only does 30Hz. On 2019 MBP with DP I am getting 60Hz but the problem remains.

MrRiddle 5y ago

This is not a solution at all. Post says this only works with lid closed, but most MPB16's will achieve reduction from 20W to 8-9W just by closing the lid, with no settings changes needed. That being said, 8-9W with closed lid is still high. Consumption for second monitor when it's idle shouldn't be more than 1W. After seeing the title I got my hopes up, that it will work within 1-2W range for idle regardless of lid being closed. That would be a solution, 8-9W definitely is not.

dafman 5y ago
I agree, this doesn't seem like much of a solution. Due to the incredible amount of noise my 2019 16" MBP makes when I have it open and a 4K monitor attached, I have to always use it in clamshell mode, which makes almost no noise at all unless I'm watching a video or doing certain things in VS Code. I too looked at the title and thought someone had finally figured out how to get around having the laptop open and a monitor plugged in with no noise, but it seems like this basically makes no difference at all since it only works when the lid is shut. I've resigned myself to the fact that it'll never be solved, and hope to get this MBP replaced at some point
- MrRiddle 5y ago
  Pretty much the same with me. I checked that macrumors thread weekly if not daily at one point, but after 100 pages you lose all hope. Will switch to Apple Silicon version of 16 when it comes out, but boy does that leave bad taste in mouth.
  - alisonkisk 5y ago
    > Will switch to Apple Silicon version of 16 when it comes out After buying Mac during a 4 year run of devices with unfixably broken keyboards and GPUs, that will not teach apple to focus on quality or repairability.
MonaroVXR 5y ago
>This is not a solution at all. Post says this only works with lid closed, but most MPB16's will achieve reduction from 20W to 8-9W just by closing the lid, with no settings changes needed. Of course, because you can dissipate enough heat with the lid closed. >That being said, 8-9W with closed lid is still high. Consumption for second monitor when it's idle shouldn't be more than 1W. I am not about that, because laptop displays draw more power than 1W most of the time. (I'm aware of those low power displays that Lenovo utilizes.) And there are a couple of factors that I've forgotten.

swyx 5y ago

"You’ve read all your free member-only stories. Become a member to get unlimited access and support the voices you want to hear more from." Can we ban medium posts on HN already? imagine if we login-walled every piece on HN. we should not encourage this behavior and we have the clout to send Medium a message.

villgax 5y ago
Opening in private mode should fix it
- itsdsmurrell 5y ago
  If the fix is so simple (I do this all the time btw), why waste people's time?
  - sichtlinkair 5y ago
    Because there's enough people who don't understand it that it's worth trying?
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
itsdsmurrell 5y ago
Medium is the worst.
cactus2093 5y ago
Why medium specifically? You’d have to ban just about every news and media outlet.
- swyx 5y ago
  news/media livelihoods depend on that paywall, i'm fine with that. medium literally exists to just put a wall between you and the authors content. nobody's making real money blogging on medium. and HN is an audience of developers, for whom standing up their own blog is trivial. ironically dev.to is shadowbanned on HN (understandable because lots of blogpspam), when medium is the one that gives readers a terrible reading experience.

aashay123 5y ago

I have two 1440p monitors with MBP 16". Using hidpi fixed the high wattage issue when I connect one monitor. But when I connect two 1440p monitors, I still see GPU wattage at around 20W. Any idea what could fix this? Note: Mac lid is closed during all of the testing and usage I am doing.

MonaroVXR 5y ago
Difficult to find out and it's difficult to compare an AMD GPU with an Intel or NVIDIA one at this point. Because they do things differently and the laptop that using is doing things differently too. And... about those other laptops, they do things differently too. (ASUS Zephyrus vs a Legion 7 differs a lot.)

xlii 5y ago

I was having exact same problem and done a ton of research on the issue. Ultimately y I decided to buy eGPU which solved my problem. It seems that Radeon is taking a lot of power even on idle screen and with low load. This increases temperature which in turn creates environment where throttling on CPU happens so not only Macbook gets hot but also it’s much slower. After research I found out that I can either work in clamshell mode (and I’d rather grew fond of having MBP + external monitor) or find a way to mitigate it. I decided to opt for eGPU which solved issue immediately. MacOS feel snappier, I don’t remember last time when fans started and it’s cool to touch. Not an exactly cheap solution for a i9 MBP but, eh, you do what you have to do. eGPU brings its own share of problems to MacOS (like ejecting it is not a simple thing - I always have to resort to doing this manually from console) and pulling the cable will kernel panic, but the upside is that I get quite nice connector hub and photo editing software works much nicer. I do think it’s a shame that Apple even designed MBP like that. You buy beefed out MBP (5600M wasn’t even available when I was buying it - and supposedly it fixes this issue) and it can’t handle so complex task as displaying the second monitor without launching the rocket engine.

fdroidmstrrce 5y ago
> you do what you have to do. No I don't. Are you an iOS dev?
ChrisMarshallNY 5y ago
I have two eGPUs; both of which are collecting dust. One is a BlackMagic eGPU Pro (since discontinued). The main reason that I disconnected them, is that I plan to get an M1X/M2 laptop, once they come out, and I know that the new chips don't work with eGPUs, so I might as well get used to it (Makes for simpler under-desk wiring, too). Also, the eGPUs seemed to introduce random crashes, and I don't like running on discontinued kit.
- sizzle 5y ago
  I’ll take them off your hands if interested. I need to beef up my i7 Mac mini.

fdroidmstrrce 5y ago

Hmm a few days ago I posted about the overheating issue on m1 that is being talked about on Reddit and a few other websites. I was flagged. HN is carefully curated for our FAANG overlords.

dang 5y ago
You've created dozens of accounts, mostly to go on and on about Apple for some reason. It's not surprising that HN users would flag comments that are so predictable and ranty. As for the mods: we don't care about $BigCo or "overlords", but definitely draw the line at single-purpose accounts and serial trolls.

njitbew 5y ago

After upgrading my MacBook Pro 13" (2017) to Big Sur in Dec 2020 I had a similar experience. I use a 4k monitor and everything got super slow, fans started spinning, processes got throttled, and I could barely get any work done. I later did a fresh install of Catalina and everything was fast again. I never did proper benchmarking, but my feeling was that resolution played a role. When using 1080p things were fast, but the resolution is unusable on a 27" 4k display. When using 2160p things were fast, but too small for my eyes. Any resolution in between (this implies things are being scaled?) was sluggish. Note that this is a 13" model, so the problem does not seem to be restricted to the 16" model that the author is talking about.

tomduncalf 5y ago
This matches my feeling that it’s a post-Big Sur upgrade issue, which makes me hope it can be fixed. Has anyone spoken to Apple Support regarding this?
- tomduncalf 5y ago
  See my other update: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27254237 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27254237. I did a clean install of Catalina and same issue persisted so I think I have a hardware fault.

mattgreenrocks 5y ago

2020 16” MBP with 5500M and Big Sur doesn’t have any fan issues in clamshell when using my 1440p display. I don’t use HiDPI, but it is running at 144hz. Another data point. Seems like putting more load on some part of the system prevents this, but it is very strange.

seam_carver 5y ago
I'm starting to think it's specific to 1440p60

SigmundA 5y ago

I had the issue when going from driving my two 4k monitors with usb-c directly to going through a thunderbolt 4 hub that then did HDMI out (Caldigit). After some searching it seems HDMI conversion can trigger it. Switched to a TB4 hub that did usb-c to monitors (which uses display port instead, Kensington) and radeon high side idle went back down and fans slowed down. Will be happy to move to Apple Silicon just for the lack of fan noise.

jiofih 5y ago

> this fix only works when the MacBook lid is closed Not really solved then. Everyone I know that has a 16” has the same issue. Since the top of the line model is the one most chosen by professionals, very few will not connect to an external monitor. Apple should be issuing refunds left and right after this fiasco.

seam_carver 5y ago
Thank you for your feedback. You aren't the only one who commented something like this, so I added a TLDR at the top of the article.
SloopJon 5y ago
I got a 16" MBP last year in order to WFH. I could not get it to work with an old 1920x1200 Dell monitor using DVI adapters. Months later I bought a 1440 monitor that works over HDMI and DisplayPort, but the display is fuzzy. I found some tweaks to improve it, but it's still noticeably worse than a hackintosh running High Sierra. I have felt like the performance isn't great, but I chalked it up to Docker and the Linux VM it uses. However, I also noticed that the computer was warm to the touch with fans running even when I hadn't used it for hours. I've taken to manually forcing it to sleep at the end of the day. I'm excited to try this HiDPI hack, because it may solve the power usage problem and the fuzzy display. It would be a real shame to lose the built-in display if this only works in clamshell mode, but it just might be worth it. Edit: I just realized that I can't use Touch ID in clamshell mode. That makes this a harder call.
- cyberge99 5y ago
  Make sure you use a good hdmi cable. Upgrading my cable fixed both fuzziness and delayed refresh rate.
- murermader 5y ago
  If you try it out, I would be interested in knowing if it helped with the fuzzyness. I experienced the same on a 38“ 3840x1600 display, which only looks bad in macOS. I no longer own a macbook so I can‘t do any testing on my own.

STRML 5y ago

If you have two monitors, this doesn't make much difference. I'm at 19W with HiDPI off and 20.2W with it on, with 2x 2560x1440 Dell U2515HXs.

seam_carver 5y ago
That's unfortunate, but does 1 monitor/lid closing make a difference?
- STRML 5y ago
  It does seem to, yes.

deergomoo 5y ago

This was (and is) such a big issue that I sold my 16” MBP and bought an M1 MacBook Air. The monitor issue was particularly egregious because it would cause heat and noise even at idle, but the thing gets perilously hot and loud when put under even the slightest load. I am incredibly surprised that none of the reviews seemed to pick up on it, though I suspect they may have been highly swayed by this being the first MacBook in some years with a usable keyboard. I would not be surprised if we start to see a bunch of them fail en masse in a few years time.

brokenmachine 5y ago
>This was (and is) such a big issue that I sold my 16” MBP and bought an M1 MacBook Air. This sentence perfectly encapsulates the Apple mentality. Why would they ever bother fixing it?

AJRF 5y ago

I had this and then got an M1 MBP and it flickers wildly on dark backgrounds when connected via USB-C. I think that's going to be my last Apple laptop.

smoldesu 5y ago
Same issue I had on my M1 Macbook Air. Guess I just need to forgo one of my monitors, sigh...

ezconnect 5y ago

Medium hijack the right click when you select a text. What a frustrating user experience.

seam_carver 5y ago

I was kind of hoping people would be commenting "Wow this fixed my issue" but I guess very few people have 2560x1440p60 monitors...

seam_carver 5y ago

TLDR: My Macbook Pro is hot and noisy when connected to a 2560x1440p60 monitor, even when the lid is closed at idle. This article outlines a partial solution that enables silent operation at idle when the lid is closed. Sorry, didn't realize paywall was default option: https://axu2.medium.com/solved-by-1440p-hidpi-macbook-pro-16-is-hot-noisy-with-an-external-monitor-f8af19c30f81?sk=29420c4689393089d905cc388248aec1 https://axu2.medium.com/solved-by-1440p-hidpi-macbook-pro-16...

wombat-man 5y ago

I have this problem. Had no problem working with the laptop open and 2 monitors for a year or so. Upgraded to big sur and now it’s an issue. I think i can manage but i hear those fans struggling.

orangegreen 5y ago

Had the same issue on my 16" before I spilled coffee all over it and broke it. A lot of the time kernal_task would take up like 400% CPU, which was because plugging the power cable into certain thunderbolt ports (on the left side) would overheat the computer. Even then I was consistently getting low performance, my fans were on all the time, and my computer was burning hot trying to power a 4k monitor and a 1080p monitor. After my 16" broke I got an M1 Mac Mini and obviously have not been having the same issues. Now my computer feels fast again. My old set up felt like I was using a Macbook Air or something.

neonate 5y ago

https://archive.md/wWsjs https://archive.md/wWsjs

rayiner 5y ago

The MBP 16” is a buggy garbage machine. It also routinely kernel panics when disconnecting thunderbolt devices. For the first month it also regularly kernel panicked waking up from sleep like some piece of shit Windows laptop, but that seems to have gotten fixed in Catalina.

hesdeadjim 5y ago

These machines are a complete joke for anyone doing “Pro” work. Endless thermal throttling driving CPU frequencies down to 2.4Ghz, low GPU performance, it’s utter bullshit. I’ve spent $5k on maxed out machines for my engineers, and it’s been a complete mess. Half of them have had to switch to a Windows machine as their primary so they can work without staring at a compiler spinning its wheels. Maybe an Mx Pro will live up to the legacy of the 2012 era, but Apple’s obsession with thinness and mediocre cooling doesn’t give me much hope for pro users.

Koshkin 5y ago
> switch to a Windows Why not Linux?
- foepys 5y ago
  WSL2 is nearly Linux. File IO is a bit slow compared to native Linux and if you want to call a Windows application running on localhost from within WSL2 it's a bit tricky but otherwise it works very well.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - yepthatsreality 5y ago
    I spent years developing in WSL and while it’s decent, it’s still not fool proof. Recently I’ve made the switch to pure Linux work stations and I have the opposite to offer: I’d rather config WINE to run a Windows app then configure and play with WSL. It’s a great tactic but Linux DE’s are so polished these days I think WSL is a poor choice.
    - foepys 5y ago
      As soon as Visual Studio can run on Linux I will gladly switch but currently my backend tooling is Windows only and WSL2 is godsent to connect .NET with cloud tooling. WSL1 was not well designed. If you only worked with WSL1, you would be surprised how well WSL matured.

dawnerd 5y ago

Apple is just awful with external displays in general. I’ve yet to find a monitor/Mac combo that doesn’t have issues. They really need to put some focus into it because Windows really makes macOS look bad in this regard.

nvr219 5y ago
Seriously. Even with one external monitor I get things like windows "disappearing" into some in-between land, wallpaper getting messed up... It's shocking.
spacedcowboy 5y ago
Like what ? For the past year I've been WFH with the MBP (which has a 5500M gpu) driving its own panel (3072x1920), an external "wide" ~4K~ "Big-ass" (3440 x 1440) and an external "4:3" 4k (3840x2160) No problems here. [edit: display info] tanelorn ~ % system_profiler SPDisplaysDataType | grep -C1 Resolution Display Type: Built-In Retina LCD Resolution: 3072 x 1920 Retina Framebuffer Depth: 24-Bit Color (ARGB8888) -- -- V3L6W: Resolution: 3440 x 1440 (UWQHD - Ultra-Wide Quad HD) UI Looks like: 3440 x 1440 @ 60 Hz -- -- PN-K321: Resolution: 3840 x 2160 (2160p/4K UHD 1 - Ultra High Definition) UI Looks like: 3840 x 2160 @ 30 Hz
- clappski 5y ago
  3440 x 1440 isn't 4k, it's an ultrawide 1440p monitor
  - spacedcowboy 5y ago
    Fairy nuff. Substitute "Big-ass" for "4k".
  - Marsymars 5y ago
    I’ve also seen them called “ultrawide 2k”, which makes it very clear that it isn’t 4k.
- 5y ago

dontblink 5y ago

What was used to monitor the power consumption?

SloopJon 5y ago
iStat Menus: > You can tell, since the screenshot of the power draw monitoring utility (iStat Menus) is twice as sharp in the second example.

mstg 5y ago

I've had thermal throttling issues with my 16" since I've gotten it, and it's only gotten worse. I had to do a downgrade to Catalina to even be able to use it. It's so funny that a $4.3k machine can't even run Zoom or Meet properly. I also had to do a SwitchResX trick + clamshell mode to even be able to dock for a few hours (and it'll overheat again). I play an occasional Dota 2 match, that my 2014 13" handled without any issues, while my 16" just shuts itself down because of overheating (even while not docked, because of dGPU usage). I don't care if it's an AMD issue, then the GPUs shouldn't be in their machine. MacBooks used to be so good, and just work. Now not so much. I'll think twice before buying anything Apple (computer-wise) ever again. Specs: 2,3Ghz 8-core i9, 64GB RAM, AMD Radeon Pro 5500M 8GB

tqkxzugoaupvwqr 5y ago
I have a MacBook Pro with the same specs. $4000 machine that runs hot with loud fans when I connect an external 4K monitor. It’s annoying af.

vaughan 5y ago

Some tips on throttling problems: First, disable turbo boost. Second, point a desk fan at your MacBook. Third, eliminate processes that peg the CPU. --- How to know when it is throttling: Download Intel Power Gadget and watch the Frequency graph. If blue line doesn't match the red line then you are throttling. Run `sudo watch -d -t -n1 thermal levels`. When any reading goes over 100, it is in throttling mode. Once it trips over 100 you start throttling. Throttling doesn't end though until this value returns below 100. This number is not directly linked to temperature either. Even though your CPU may be at a safe temperature like 80 degrees which normally shouldn't throttle, your `thermal levels` will not decrease immediately. The best way to get them to decrease is by sleeping your MacBook. Maybe there is a hard-coded delayed back-off algorithm that is a function of the time the CPU spends above a certain temperature threshold - I'm not sure. I have also read that its potentially the voltage-regulator module that doesn't have a temp sensor that this may be linked to. --- You can also do a [cooling mod][1] if you really want to but its probably going to void and warranty and its risky. [1]: https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/2018-macbook-pro-cooling-mod.2147106/ https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/2018-macbook-pro-coolin...

sneak 5y ago
The article identifies this as a GPU driver bug, not an issue with CPU or CPU throttling.
- vaughan 5y ago
  The voltage regulator module serves both CPU and GPU so the thermal issues are related.

Filligree 5y ago

One comment here is that the M1 does better. No doubt that's true; I haven't observed this particular problem. However, OSX' logic for external monitors doesn't work a whole lot better than for older laptops -- in particular, if I connect it to a monitor that's connected through a Startech KVM it remains stuck at XGA (1024x768) resolution, which reflects the EDID the KVM provides to inactive computers. It doesn't update when the laptop is selected, and there seems to be no way to reset it. Nothing else does that. IMO, it's all indicative of a prototype-level implementation.

d_runs_far 5y ago

I did a pram reset and have had zero issues. First day with the machine with a 27” 4K monitor and temps were soaring, fans going crazy with just chrome, sublime and vagrant running. PRAM reset and fans only turn on when something actually intense is happening. Latest big sur, and pretty much a maxed out machine - 64gb/1TB/ and I think the same graphics as mentioned in the article.