All MacBook Pro owners,

be aware running the BOINC most of the time can cause severe damage to your hardware! Sound like a joke?
Not at all.

Due to the Apple design, the MacBook Pro heats a lot under full CPU load - don't be surprised to find your CPU is 90C/194F. The bottom of the chassis will be so hot you may risk you health if you put in on your knees ;-) Unfortunately the chassis and heatsinks are not able to throw out that much heat for a long time. Even if fans spin at full speed all the times.
In other words your MacBook Pro is prone to overheats.
I guess they balanced some CPU load/average use ratio the cooling system can deal with. It can safely run an hour or two of continuous full CPU load but no more.

And what BOIC does? I uses "free CPU cycles" - all the leftovers. This causes a constant 100% load on all processors.

The first victim is the battery - it is not able to recharge properly when overheated. After couple of months it will loose 50% of health. And on low voltage it will rather suddenly shut down the computer instead of safe sleep.
The next is the logic board - when constantly overheated it will run slightly slower, sometimes even stop for couple of seconds. Again, after couple of months some performance degradation will sustain even if cooled.
The Magnasafe connector is at risk too. This may loose connection or event melt down (fortunately I only read about it).

The good news is Apple will do warranty repair/replacement if you wont' tell them what you did to the hardware :-) Assuming your machine is still on warranty...

So, after years of crunching and warranty repair I must quit or find some "cooler" machine :-L

you could:

set boinc to use a fewer number of cores.

You could set boinc to only use X% of processor (threadmaster like, sort of) to lessen the heat if Mac didn't adequately protect their gear, when users are just using what they purchased.

I've been crunching 24/7 for 18 months straight on my 17" MBD w/ Core Duo 2.16ghz. Yeah, it runs hot to the touch, and the cores are at 80c, with the fans speed increased slightly above default speeds (via smcFanControl). But I have had no HW failures at all.

---

Dublin, California
Team: SETI.USA

Oops, forgot one important thing - my MBP is 15" not 17"

17's have a bigger chassis, can accumulate and throw out more heat.
I guess this is the size the CPU heat production/heatsinks heat performance meets. Just make sure your battery is not too hot while charging.
A usefull utility can be found here: http://www.bresink.com/osx/TemperatureMonitor.html

Anyway, the whole Apple Intel family is a bunch of very effective heaters (at very expense).
I run the BOINC on a brand new 8-core Mac Pro. I could feel it working every time I entered the room the machine was in :-)

I've been crunching 24/7 for 18 months straight on my 17" MBD w/ Core Duo 2.16ghz. Yeah, it runs hot to the touch, and the cores are at 80c, with the fans speed increased slightly above default speeds (via smcFanControl). But I have had no HW failures at all.

Lets see know the MacBook Pro has been out how long?

And all of a sudden running Boinc will kill it? Rubbish. Yes it will run hot. I know a couple of people that run other projects and they have both MacBooks and MacBook Pro, running most of the time, none of them have had a failure related to Boinc.

If your machine has really suffered as you claim, you' have either been extremely unlucky and managed to get a machine that contains totally crap parts, or you put it in an oven at 220c.

Did I say all of sudden? Couple of months?
If you don't have the problem then you're lucky or I'm unlucky, or the message is to all prospective unlucky MacBook Pro 15" owners. Whatever.

It's not against BIONC. Any other CPU hungry software may do the same.
And I'm not saying this will definitely happen to you.
I run into a problem, fortunately got warranty repair and just want to share this with others just because it can happen.

At first I wasn't aware of the heat problem. I could feel it's hot, but did not think this may be produced by software.
After 8 months I found my computer is in a bad condition and got mainboard and battery replacement from Apple because of that.

After the repair I found there is almost no difference - again all fans at full speed, again the whole thing very hot. Then I went through some forums and found I'm not the only one. Extreme heat at full speed is quite common on the machines. There is a web page with MBP temp records. My machine just matches the list.

Lets see know the MacBook Pro has been out how long?

And all of a sudden running Boinc will kill it? Rubbish. Yes it will run hot. I know a couple of people that run other projects and they have both MacBooks and MacBook Pro, running most of the time, none of them have had a failure related to Boinc.

If your machine has really suffered as you claim, you' have either been extremely unlucky and managed to get a machine that contains totally crap parts, or you put it in an oven at 220c.

On a similar note, there is a problem with overheating of the AMD based Compaq v6000z laptops that causes the wireless card to disappear. The heat sink has no room for error out of the factory. When the laptop is brand new, the temperature stays at 75C when at full burn. When some dust accumulates in the fan after several months of regular use, the temperature will increase to over 80C. The processor starts thermal throttling at around 85C by cutting half of its frequency.

Such high temperatures cause the motherboard to overheat, and melts a connection to the mini-pci-express slot. The result is that the wireless card just disappears.

The only solution is to replace the motherboard, or live with it and get a usb wifi dongle.


It turns out that this is the largest discussion on HP's support forums...
Link

---

Hmm... I just thought about finding some HP machine to move the BOINC to...

Is the v6000z 1" high as Apple MacBooks?

On a similar note, there is a problem with overheating of the AMD based Compaq v6000z laptops that causes the wireless card to disappear. The heat sink has no room for error out of the factory. When the laptop is brand new, the temperature stays at 75C when at full burn. When some dust accumulates in the fan after several months of regular use, the temperature will increase to over 80C. The processor starts thermal throttling at around 85C by cutting half of its frequency.

Such high temperatures cause the motherboard to overheat, and melts a connection to the mini-pci-express slot. The result is that the wireless card just disappears.

The only solution is to replace the motherboard, or live with it and get a usb wifi dongle.


It turns out that this is the largest discussion on HP's support forums...
Link

Hmm... I just thought about finding some HP machine to move the BOINC to...

Is the v6000z 1" high as Apple MacBooks?

On a similar note, there is a problem with overheating of the AMD based Compaq v6000z laptops that causes the wireless card to disappear. The heat sink has no room for error out of the factory. When the laptop is brand new, the temperature stays at 75C when at full burn. When some dust accumulates in the fan after several months of regular use, the temperature will increase to over 80C. The processor starts thermal throttling at around 85C by cutting half of its frequency.

Such high temperatures cause the motherboard to overheat, and melts a connection to the mini-pci-express slot. The result is that the wireless card just disappears.

The only solution is to replace the motherboard, or live with it and get a usb wifi dongle.


It turns out that this is the largest discussion on HP's support forums...
Link

I think that it is a little bit thicker...
Here are the dimensions from hp's website...
35.70 cm (L) x 25.70 cm (W) x 2.54 cm (min) H / 3.96 cm (max) H

So it is an inch thick with the lid open and 1.25 inches with the lid closed...

---

I run the BOINC on a brand new 8-core Mac Pro. I could feel it working every time I entered the room the machine was in :-)

My 8-way intel mac pro is a poor heater compared to my quad G5 tower. Now THAT is a serious room heater!

Looks like you are mac guy. Come join Team MacNN. We're #17 over all!

---

Dublin, California
Team: SETI.USA

When I get a laptop, I expect it to be able to perform work for extended periods of time without breaking down. At least they could have a mode that blasts the fan at high rpm when the temperature goes up. What's so hard about that other then added noise...

We all want thin, light laptops, with the newest, fastest CPU.

At some point, you either have to make the laptop thicker or take stuff out to get a big enough duct to carry the air. If the duct is too small, speeding up the fans won't help.

... but the CPU should throttle before the whole computer overheats.

---

When I get a laptop, I expect it to be able to perform work for extended periods of time without breaking down. At least they could have a mode that blasts the fan at high rpm when the temperature goes up. What's so hard about that other then added noise...

We all want thin, light laptops, with the newest, fastest CPU.

At some point, you either have to make the laptop thicker or take stuff out to get a big enough duct to carry the air. If the duct is too small, speeding up the fans won't help.

... but the CPU should throttle before the whole computer overheats.

Yes, I could go with thicker up to some point. Check out old dell 9100. That was so thick that it was uncomfortable to type on. Actually I am just annoyed that in Compaq's on HP's laptops some chip on the motherboard overheats and actually MELTS.

---

When I get a laptop, I expect it to be able to perform work for extended periods of time without breaking down. At least they could have a mode that blasts the fan at high rpm when the temperature goes up. What's so hard about that other then added noise...

We all want thin, light laptops, with the newest, fastest CPU.

At some point, you either have to make the laptop thicker or take stuff out to get a big enough duct to carry the air. If the duct is too small, speeding up the fans won't help.

... but the CPU should throttle before the whole computer overheats.

It does, but sometimes it's not enough. It even stops if too hot. I played Warcraft for four hours, it got so hot it started to freeze for several seconds. I had to put it on a brick of ice to continue...

:-) Looks I found a solution:

there is a series of optimizers found at http://tbp.berkeley.edu/%7Ealexkan/seti/
God bless you Regents of the University of California :-)

The seti_enhanced-i386-v8-core2-nographics.zip boost computations by 25%
Now I can limit CPU usage to 80%, get the CPU temps down to 70C/158F and do the job in the same time as before without melting everything up :-)

Looks like you are mac guy. Come join Team MacNN. We're #17 over all!

I am. Why should I join your team? Convince me ;-)

Looks like you are mac guy. Come join Team MacNN. We're #17 over all!

I am. Why should I join your team? Convince me ;-)

That optimized app you are using? It comes from alexkan, a member of our team. You could join our team to give some back.

---

Dublin, California
Team: SETI.USA

Looks like you are mac guy. Come join Team MacNN. We're #17 over all!

I am. Why should I join your team? Convince me ;-)

I only have AMD processors(windows and linux), so take this as you will.

The reason to join Team MacNN is so you can have access to the large knowledge base when it comes to "all things MAC". Be with users in the "same boat" as it were. They are one of the earlier teams and from all appearances, still going strong and lead (if not the only) in the development of faster apps for Macs.

Ofcourse, you can get the apps without being a team member.

... but the CPU should throttle before the whole computer overheats.

It does, but sometimes it's not enough. It even stops if too hot. I played Warcraft for four hours, it got so hot it started to freeze for several seconds. I had to put it on a brick of ice to continue...

If it doesn't throttle properly with temperature, and the thermal systems can't get rid of heat under extended load, and it isn't actually broken, then this is a major design flaw.

---

Although I don't have a MBP, I do have a laptop. I noticed after I started running SETI 24/7 on it, it did get pretty warm out of the cpu pipe. What I did to help with the heat was to put 3 glass tea-light holders under it, 2 at the corners under the screen and one at the front.

It provided a lot more air for the fan, less absorbed heat from my desk and, more exposure to cool the bottom panel in general. Not sure if it will help you folks, but may be worth a try.

My PowerBook G4 runs 23 hours a day and I get one to catch up. No problems. Bottom is warm, not hot to touch. Last winter it was my lap warmer when the cold winds shook the rafters.

And my Mini-Mac just chugs along with exhaust air barely over skin temperature. If it was warmer I would check the temperature, but its not worth the bother IMHO.

duke