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You really need to put a disclaimer in these videos. If you look at the comment section you will notice that some people are angry at Apple for not installing thermal pads in the Macbook Air. Please explain in the video that Apple are not a bunch of clowns, and that they isolate the processor from the top and bottom case on purpose, to protect their users from burning themselves, as other computer manufacturers do as well. I have done this thermal pads mod 2 years and a half ago on my M1 Macbook Air. I have also done something similar a few weeks ago on my 2017 12 inch Macbook. I take full responsibility for this, and I know what I'm doing, as you are, but the truth is that both devices have become unsafe to use. I'm getting around 65°C (149°F) under the Macbook Air at full load after a while, and up to 70°C (158°F) under the 12 inch Macbook using Xcode and running an iPhone simulator. You have to be clear about the fact that Apple is doing the right thing, and that modding the Macbooks with thermal pads can be amazing, but carries some risks.
@MaxTechOfficial - any chance you guys could do a video on the adoption of Macs in the 3D market (both CAD & Creative Design)? Apple has struggled here in recent years but Apple Silicon Macs have made great strides in the last year with stacks of ports (ARM+Metal but MetalRT?) and the intro of Vision Pro seems to be piquing the 3D community's interest. There are some TH-camrs trying this but they're less thorough/consistent than you guys and there's lots of detail missing. Just a thought that, when product releases slow down, you could dig into the App communities.
Basic laptop cooler is $20. I bought one to use w my 2018 MBP bc World of Warcraft would get too hot. The M3 Pro 14” isn’t as bad w the heat but I still use it when I’m playing WoW. Nothing else needs it tho
And you can open the laptop..... this is pointless you might as well get a mac mini if you can't use the screen or keyboard and get a cheap air for travel.
He addresses this right in the video: the Air is thinner and lighter while traveling, then you can drop it on a cooling dock while at your desk. For a lot of people, this is a great solution. Signed, a person with both an Air and M1 Max Pro who prefers the Air.
You can make one of these for like $25. Get yourself an old intel pentium CPU heat sink. These are basically just machined blocks of aluminum with fins. If you want a fan, you have the extra bonus of these being able to mount fans directly on them. Otherwise you can go completely fanless, or even get something like a Dell Dimension heat sink (used in fanless systems) which is literally just a machined block of aluminum. $10 plus shipping. Grab yourself an extra thermal pad to put between it and the mac book air. $10-15. Place thermal pad on aluminum heatsink. Place macbook on top of thermal pad. Elevate macbook with something so that it rests level with cooling block. Success.
Thanks for the idea. I am currently waiting for my base model M3 to arrive, and have some old heatsinks stashed in my workshop (I have kept them around since the late 90s thinking they might be good for something...) Some are large blocks and others are quite low-profile (removed from motherboard chipsets). They have the footprint of a small matchbox and around half the height. I think I might make use of them in this fashion lol
coming back with my own results: So I went out and purchased a $15 simple cooling sink for an old pentium processor I believe, from StarTech on Amazon, including a 60mm fan. (Socket 478). It's an elongated heatsink so i'ts not concentrated on only one small square. I applied thermal pads inside the macbook, but really only on the middle section. Then Thermal pads on the flat side of the heatsink. Purchased an additional USB 5V to 3pin Molex connector, built myself a stand and put everything together. I'M BLOWN AWAY. Finally I can play games via Crossover with no heating issue. The machine is cool to the touch. Unbelievable! Even after 1 hour of gaming. Considering how cool it's running, absolutely no worries about battery life. It's a stationary set up though. I order to avoid heating issues, I will use battery saving mode when not stationary with cooling. Usually my macbook M2 Air would throttle after 10 minutes and get very hot. Glad I went this route, even though the svalt stand really looks better. but $279 is just too much.
To most of the average users, if you only need M2/M3 Air for study, browsing, watching content and other stuff not involving heavy load on graphics, which majority% people will do, you won’t need to worry about thermals. I use my M3 Air for music production too with studying and all other normal stuff, haven’t faced issues.
This is exactly what I did before i watched this video, add the thermal pads to my M2 Macbook Air. However, there was a concern about battery health because now the entire lower case of the macbook air gets warm from the thermal transfer, and the case will warm up the macbook air battery. Any temperature above 53 Celcius is bad for the battery. My solution was to tape the inside of the macbook air back cover with thermal protective film so that the cover does not transfer the heat back to the battery locations. I managed to keep the battery temperature at or lower than 53 celcius, while still keeping the benefits of the thermal pads. I also put my m2 macbook air on top of a laptop cooler that uses a fan to cool the macbook air, thus achieving what this video also achieved.
Any references for this thermal protective film or insulator material? Are you talking about the golden fiberglass tape to wrap around engine pipes? Or something with more insulation?
@@alvesricardo Search MaxTechOfficial/this channel for the video that shows you exactly how to do this. That's the one I used to learn how to do it. Luke Miami's channel also has a video on how to install the thermal pads. Those 2 videos are very good, but there are other videos, too.
I don't know about the M2/M3, but the M1 MacBook Air requires two magnets to trick it. The hall effect sensors seem to be hidden in the speaker grilles, at the bottom corner of the shift keys. My 2015 MacBook Pro only needed one magnet to trick it.
I'm a game developer who regularly works on large projects that demand both the GPU for testing the game in simulators and the CPU to build projects in Unity, Xcode, and Android Studio. My MacBook Air M3 was suffering a lot due to throttling, often reaching more than 95 degrees Celsius. This modification made my top temperature go down to 86 degrees Celsius. The MacBook is running approximately 11 degrees Celsius cooler on average. The batteries never reached more than 41 degrees Celsius in the worst-case scenario. I totally agree that this modification is not something you should consider if you are not a heavy user. But if you do use heavy tasks like video encoding, game development, or building projects, you will get way more out of your hardware by doing it. Additionally, it cools down much faster when I finish heavy tasks. It used to take forever to bring it below 80 degrees Celsius; now it's almost instantaneous. Thanks for the tip. I just used only one thermal pad as recomended in the video description. Thanks for the video.
@CharlesBarros what a does a game developer do with MacBook Air M3 to perform simulation? This is the wrong tool for your line of work. Get a MacMini and call it a day. A MacBook Air are for web browser-type people.
@@Traumatree I have a regular desktop for work at my house, but I'm also a businessperson who has to travel a lot. During my travels, my tool of choice is the MacBook Air because it is lightweight and handles my development needs very well.
@@CharlesBarros So you also travel with this chunky cooling block? It seems to me a macbook pro is easier to carry than macbook air + external cooling system. Unless you only use the cooling block at your house, which means that you macbook air is your do-it-all machine?
@@MrW0rDs you don’t need this cooling block to have better performance than the stock. The thermal pad helps a lot to boost the performance by its own. 😄
Can you help me out ? I can’t decide between m3 air 15” and m3 pro 14” ! I really prefer the larger screen of the 15” but I’m concerned about the thermals issues of it. I do like gaming but I’m okay playing native Mac OS experiences such as Apple Arcade and games like resident evil, death stranding, no man’s sky that are native experiences. Doing this way will the air overheat ? I don’t see any TH-camr talking about this, all their tests are talking about 20 minutes, but what about a 2 hour gaming session, will the air get to hot and possibly melt something in long terms ?
the SVALT Cooling block alone is US$280!!!! not including fan , not inculding thermal pads , might as well spend the money to upgrade to 14inch pro , which hv better sound better screen better everything, so this video is not objective
This is SOOOOO DUMB, the mba is so lovely and small and slim and light, let’s add a literal brick to my bag to cool the thing which we know is a light duty chassis. If you worry about thermals, Max shows us what fans and air management can do. As an alternative he offers this clunky nonsense? Crazy Max.
I returned to Best Buy the 15” MBA M3 16/512 without even open it because while on transit with FedEx I saw the 14” MBP M3 16/1TB for $1849 at Best Buy as well. So ordered it immediately and it’s going to be delivered tomorrow. A 15” MBA M3 16/1TB would have been $1899…
So let me get this straight: 1. Get a 1300€ MacBook Air M3 2. Get a cooling block that costs 300€(not even premium liquid coolers cost that much btw. Let’s not talk about a piece of metal) 3. Void the warranty on a brand new machine to install thermal pads 4. Not run a single test to see temps on other components of the MacBook that may get affected by the installation of the thermal pads such as battery that has a pretty low operating temperature as you came to realise after the same thing you did back with the m2 MacBook Air (and you still suggest the same thing) All these and you sound pretty excited about the results as it is the best choice for someone that wants a stable machine. I might as well get my 2018 desktop and oc it with liquid nitrogen that will surely boost its performance. Not all options are viable you should know that
This is so dumb, the obvious answer is get a pro chassis with fans. I did, the 14” M3 12core can run on my comforter on my bed, never turn the fan on, never get so hot it fries my skin, in fact it’s never even warm from light work. My i9 16” mbp had to be on a tray which allowed the chassis to have airflow otherwise it starts to fry on any fabric surface you’d use it on like a couch or bed. I love this aspect most about the current gen MBP and Apple chipsets and their performance and efficiency. The HDR screen also truly unlocks your HDR camera if you’re a film maker or photographer something which just never happens on machines with an SDR display like the mba. The pro is a really nice machine, those ports are rad too.
i'm surprised so few people are talking about this, and all that on top of now the laptop is uncomfortable to use as a laptop because the bottom of the case will get to scorching temperatures. So basically spent 1600 to get a louder, less efficient, and larger m3 mac mini with less functionality.
@@zatorith. Under normal /casual use the laptop doesn't heats up. Unless you are doing 20+ minute renders on your lap, it will otherwise behave like a normal macbook air. If you are doing 20+ minute renders on your lap, you've got bigger issues.
Great video! I got MBA M3 24GB 1TB Midnight, my first Mac. In this configuration is faster than my desktop (i9 9900k), this should be more than enough for a such slim/compact machine. I like the thermal pads idea. Thanks.
@@haggaikathewela8910 Yes I wouldn't get the MBA with high specs because we all ready know without a way to cool, it's not going to perform well. Essentially wasted performance for one reason only, "heat."
I haven’t seen a single reviewer call out some of the limitations on the M3 Air’s inability to push certain resolutions. The scaling options on a 5k display are far inferior to what’s offered by the MBP and not one person has mentioned it in a review
This is a non issue and not a thing. “Default” resolution is still 2560x1440 hidpi which is standard. Even the pros don’t allow actual 5k resolution only up to 3k in stock “more space” I’m not sure what you’re talking about here. They do exactly the same.
@@InsaneFilms I haven’t tested out multiple external displays (mostly bc I don’t care that much and I don’t get paid to do this stuff), but on my main display (40” Dell 5k/2k), there are many more hi res options when using my M3 Max MBP vs my M3 MBA. If I force the usual resolution I use with my MBP through a 3rd party app (bc it’s not available as an option natively through Mac OS), it is low res and looks like trash. So the only options are a resolution where everything is too large and not what I like or full resolution which is way too small and also not useable.
Thats actually awesome that you can have a thin, light fanless Macbook Air on the go, dock it on a heatsink ater installing thermal pads at home, and have it faster than a MacBook Pro. Love it!
I don't think a lot of people understand how awesome it is to have something so powerful and so light. Having to actively cool it at home is a small compromise in my view.
If you haven't noticed, the thermal pad solution alone would satisfy 99.99997% of users. Serious improvement for such a little cost. I get why Apple didn't want to do it because of how hot it would be on your lap without the air gap.
While I think the $279 is way too high, at least it’ll help cool all your laptops now and future laptops in the future. That extra $ for the MBP will only help now.
I would still rather have the macbook air to use on a table top on the go and full performance at home in one of these docks. macbook pro is a chonky heavy laptop.
Their excuse is that the bottom of the laptop would get uncomfortably hot if it was directly touching the heatsink and spreading the heat. Also, they focus the Air to consumers that don't need constant performance.
@@robertoacjit’s not an “excuse” there’s consumer electronics regulations that state how hot something can be that will come into contact with skin. It’s not for the lolz 😂
This is a pretty cool solution (ha, get it?) Very creative. Though of course one thing to keep in mind if you're considering this option is that you won't get that macbook pro performance on the go. That being said, great if you're leaving your sustained workload tasks for when you're at home or at your office. Another thing to keep in mind that I think is brushed over in the video, is battery health. It's all fine when you're on the cooling dock, but when using it day to day, that thermal pad will transfer heat to the chassis and down to the battery.
hello do you make another ram comparison video for the macbook air 15", whether an upgrade to 24 Gb is worthwhile or 16Gb is enough. That would be great, thanks
When I had a Mac Air M1, it would always throttle. All I did was to get a laptop fan (laptop sitting on top with two large fans under it with a riser to get air flow. Worked for a long time too until I went to get a 16gb model and I opted for the Pro to get a built in fan. Works with the lid closed and even with a case on
that is very impressive, with just thermal pads it really help it and now I'm for sure getting a MacBook Air, I will of course get the upgraded 10 Core GPU, RAM and storage.
if you want more power buy a pro; don't mess up your machine and void the warranty with heatpads ; the heatblock is pretty cool though but not for 279 usd
Does make you wonder how an MBA would perform on a $25 active laptop cooler… or even sitting on a $10 granite tile cut to fit between the feet so it’s in contact with the base
To be noted - the upgrade is NOT free performance lying on the table - using the Thermal pads allow more heat to be dissipated to the chassis, which true, helps with cooling of the CPU, but it also makes the whole chassis hotter - which may cause issues when you want to use the laptop on your legs or on a soft surface - sometime ago, I think it was LTT who measured it, and the chassis was hotter than the legal US limits and may cause burns. The cooling block then obviously limit the moveability - cooling pads or stands have been quite standard for a while now, even for other laptops, this one looks cool though and its mass allow it to be used even without fan, which is nice for silence. But in both cases, you are making your Air less functional as a laptop, but more powerful computer overall. For some, this might be a worthy tradeoff. Personally, I'd go without the thermal pads but with the cooling block. That way you can easily take the laptop off of it and use it safely wherever, albeit with the thermal nerf.
No one is going to be doing intensive 15m+ import/exports on their lap, which would get uncomfortably hot anyway thermal pads or not. The svalte is nice in terms of aesthetics and space-saving but any cheap laptop cooler will suffice in combination with the thermal pads.
one thing everyone complains about with Macs is no upgradeability. if the air ever starts to struggle for what you need it for, just do this and suddenly its like you bought a pro anyways. if you dont need it, then save the money.
Hey Max, I just wanted to report my own test: I got the 1.5mm thermal pad (exactly the one you got) and placed it directly above the M3, another 1mm one I placed half/half left and right of the 1.5mm one. I placed the Macbook on a dedicated laptop-stand, like I usually do at home (open), and my multi-core score in Cinebench is: 678 (and I had a lot of stuff opened while running Cinebench). I'm really impressed. But I have to say these pads are a bit weird to work with. I had to really fight them to get off the clear plastic side and torn some junks from it while doing so, but at the end I was able to squish everything together into a homogeneous pad. :)
I love videos like this, thanks!! When I encoded an hour long video on my M2 iPad the other day, I placed it on a metal pan to help with the heat. Worked like a charm!
It does not improve the performance at all, because the heat is already evacuated by the fan. The thermal pads mod only makes sense on fanless designs. I have done it on my M1 Macbook Air, and recently on my 2017 12 inch Macbook with good success, but it is important to note that the temperatures on the bottom cases of both devices are now unsafe, which explains why Apple does not do it.
So its better not to do it?! But what exactly u mean with unsafe? i am afraid of the battery or to effect some other electronics inside. if this would be the ultimate solution apple would prob. have done it.@@fixups6536
1900 Euros for a 15" inches Macbook Air with 512 ssd and 8 gb Ram in Europe. Sorry but with almost 2.000 Euro thats a robbery. At the moment there are options for business/gaming laptops at the same price with rtx 4080 inside. Macbook Air was a student solutions and not a premium product. This product exists only a few price distance away from Macbook Pro to finally push you buying this. Macbook Air 15 inch with 16 ram and at least 512 ssd, shouldn't cost more than 1400 euros/dollars.
It is INSANE that someone who bought a 15" MacBook Air with only 8GB RAM + 256GB SSD for $1299 also needs to spend $279 for a passive cooler which is just a block of metal. The pricing on Mac products just proves that Mac users have more money than sense. Or you could just buy any number of Windows laptops that don't have this problem (because they have freaking fan!) with 16GB RAM + 1TB SSD for less money.
The problem is with the cooler, the MacBook Air is way bulkier than a MacBook Pro by itself. It's also not a viable option if you're using it in normal laptop mode instead of clamshell mode. If you're using the device in laptop mode, the MacBook Pro is still better in performance.
Great video! The reason I am replacing my 14" Macbook Pro with a 15" Macbook Air is simple - the screen is bigger with no weight penalty. For editing video and graphics work a 14" laptop is too small, and the 16" Macbook Pro is too expensive. Thermal pads are a cheap fix but probably void the warranty - the cooling block is crazy expensive but is silent, which I want for audio editing.
I did this thermal pad trick to my M1, and its still going hard, if you cant handle the heat of the casing after this mod, I say harden up tender foot :)
We developed a cooling stand that can achieve 98% stability and almost 20C temp drop without the need to open up the device and insert a TIM. Ours is similar to the SVALT product, but about 10x cheaper because we 3D print it using our thermally conductive plastic material. Would be happy to send you one to review!
Ye, lets pay a lot for a laptop that you have to open and put a thermal pad to it, because the manufacturer only thinks about money regardless quality. Steve Jobs, we miss you.
Hi Max Tech, is the 1mm thermal pad recommended for the 15" M3 MB Air as well? or the 1.5mm would be better. In the video you showed the 1.5mm version? But in your description you recommended the 1mm version? Thanks.
So I went out and purchased a $15 simple cooling sink for an old pentium processor I believe, from StarTech on Amazon, including a 60mm fan. (Socket 478). It's an elongated heatsink so i'ts not concentrated on only one small square and covers more of the macbook backplate. I applied thermal pads inside the macbook, but really only on the middle section where the main silicon is. Then Thermal pads on the flat side of the heatsink. Purchased an additional USB 5V to 3pin Molex connector, built myself a stand and put everything together. I'M BLOWN AWAY. Finally I can play games via Crossover with now heating issue. The machine is cool to the touch. Unbelievable! Even after 1 hour of gaming. Usually my macbook M2 Air would throttle after 10 minutes and get very hot. Glad I went this route, even though the svalt stand really looks better. but $279 is just too much. If you don't want to build a stand, just put your macbook upside down and place heatsink on top. That might impact wifi though.
Ppl are harping on the cooler for being expensive. But having worked with small design machine shops, its expensive to make something like this. Also, it would probably be beneficial to the Macbook Pro too as my fan would get LOUD especially in clamshell mode.
I mean, what you're doing is using the chassis of the Macbook Air to dump heat into, whereas before there was an air gap. I think the only issue would be if you end up using it in your lap, the chassis will get a lot warmer.
You might have added the thermal cam shots of the backplate, when stressing the CPU with and without the pads. I believe it would be very informative for prospective implementers of the hack.
These thermal pads will dissipate heat to the bottom case. Then opened the heat will be trapped on the desk and lead to swollen battery due to heat build up.
Not happening. I have modded my M1 Macbook Air with thermal pads 2 years and a half ago, and the battery is only marginally hotter under extended periods of full load (I did test it). You are right that it could happen in theory, but in practice, from my experience, it doesn't. Also, someone else in this comment section has explained that they use thermal protective film between the bottom case and the battery to further protect it, which is something that I may try some day.
I watched this video because coming from MaxTech it couldn't be a clickbait title ! And oh man I'm impressed. Great work of investigations as always. The only thing is that Apple could cancel the warranty because on those thermal pads.
This is interesting thanks for producing this. Do these pads need to be replaced after some time? Also, any safety issues with the pads such as them degrading over time? Lastly, would this void the warranty? If you could next time running this (amazing) set of tests, please address these questions also that would be awesome.
What I learned from this video, by 4:32: You can use any vertical or horizontal laptop stand as long as it allows for excellent air flow, have a fan or air conditioner blowing directly onto the MBA constantly while in clamshell mode or in (open?) normal mode to improve cooling and computing efficiency. If you are going to be doing some hardcore rendering on that MBA perhaps putting ice packs onto the bottom of the MBA will work to keep it cool while rendering. lol I don't know if that would actually cause harm, so - uh, don't do it, maybe. IDK.
Moral of the story the MacBook Air isn't made for long intensive work loads and the only way to fix this is to void you warranty, make you battery wear out more quickly, make the bottom of your laptop super hot and maybe buy a 230 dollar chunk of metal just to finally get similar performance to a MacBook Pro. You should get a MacBook Pro for extended loads and get an air if you do light tasks or short work loads.
That cooling block looks interesting. Maybe couple it with some silent noctua fans? Would be interesting to see if you could push the M3 Max more with that thing. Maybe I need to test that....
In the past I’ve use a laptop cooling pad made of aluminum and placed a small piece of thermal pad between the laptop and cooling pad. Will try with the M3 and see how it goes.
You are massively overplaying this issue, a passively cooled machine throttling when running an artificial stress test over long periods should be no surprise to anyone. The surprising thing is how little it actually throttles. I have a M3 15" Air, and under realistic workloads it stays stone cold all the time, even in clamshell using dual monitors. There is no doubt the Pro is better value for money, but I love the form factor of the Air, and if you dont play games (which is a waste of time on the Mac) there is realistically no need to buy the Pro if you prefer the form of the Air. That being said, the heat block is very interesting, but eyewateringly expensive for what it is.
Did you watch the full video? My last test was with Lightroom photo editing. The 15” air was twice as fast exporting 500 photos. As a photographer I’m usually exporting 250-500 photos and for weddings 1000-1500. Yea for those doing simple tasks don’t worry about it, but if you do push your machine you might want to help it stay cool and get full performance and even better than the 14” MacBook Pro.
My m2 MacBook Air 15 inch gets uncomfortably hot when the MacBook is under loud and the m3 is hotter then m2 and with a thermal pad will be even worse so it would be uncomfortable for heavy loads but fine for light to medium intensity tasks like web browsing or photo editing.
The pads have a downfall, which is that the heat will spread on the base. If you are using in clamshell, there is no problem but if you use in a position that you body is in contact with that bottom area, you'll feel noticeable hotter.
I remember a guy made a video on it, and then I Used istat menu to monitor battery temps with various things. Apple will actually slow down the M3 if anything gets too hot above their specs including the battery.
One question I have is what effect does low RAM have on MacBook Air M3 thermals? If so, how does it compare with your experiments with thermal pads and heat sinks?
Get it in your heads, that the air is NOT designed for constant heavy loads! Its designed for portability! Get a Pro, if you are gonna have a constant heavy load on the GPU and CPU.
Very interesting demonstration. I stopped using laptop coolers as I found that the more recent laptops from Apple (last 10 years) weren’t getting much improvement in performance from external fans. Just lifting the laptop off the desk on a cheap stand was enough for a 10% improvement for long sessions, external fans sometimes seemed to interfere with Apple’s internal cooling design. I would see temperatures slightly higher with the fans running! Using a closed laptop seemed unproductive and a good way to shorten the laptop’s lifespan, so I never did it. This changes my mind a little for future purchases.
The only thing I’d say is that the cooler block might not be realistic for many budget conscious MacBook Air buyers, because of the price. You should try that $20 laptop cooler stand or the Razer Phone Cooler peltier fan, and see what it can do!
Hi Max Tech, do you have a video showing how to add the thermal pads to the M3 Macbook Air? Will doing this forfeit the Apple warranty? Cheers, Robert.
instead of closing my macbook pro i figured out where the magnet sensor is and use a small magnet to simulate the closed lid! the computer stays cooler that way!
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You really need to put a disclaimer in these videos. If you look at the comment section you will notice that some people are angry at Apple for not installing thermal pads in the Macbook Air. Please explain in the video that Apple are not a bunch of clowns, and that they isolate the processor from the top and bottom case on purpose, to protect their users from burning themselves, as other computer manufacturers do as well. I have done this thermal pads mod 2 years and a half ago on my M1 Macbook Air. I have also done something similar a few weeks ago on my 2017 12 inch Macbook. I take full responsibility for this, and I know what I'm doing, as you are, but the truth is that both devices have become unsafe to use. I'm getting around 65°C (149°F) under the Macbook Air at full load after a while, and up to 70°C (158°F) under the 12 inch Macbook using Xcode and running an iPhone simulator. You have to be clear about the fact that Apple is doing the right thing, and that modding the Macbooks with thermal pads can be amazing, but carries some risks.
Can you please check and let us know how hot the bottom chassis gets with the thermal pads.
For the average user it is more than enough
I will be interesting to take a look on similar update for macbook pro 14 with m3 max.
@MaxTechOfficial - any chance you guys could do a video on the adoption of Macs in the 3D market (both CAD & Creative Design)? Apple has struggled here in recent years but Apple Silicon Macs have made great strides in the last year with stacks of ports (ARM+Metal but MetalRT?) and the intro of Vision Pro seems to be piquing the 3D community's interest.
There are some TH-camrs trying this but they're less thorough/consistent than you guys and there's lots of detail missing.
Just a thought that, when product releases slow down, you could dig into the App communities.
Has anyone noticed that the cooling dock is $279? This is not a cheap solution!
Basic laptop cooler is $20. I bought one to use w my 2018 MBP bc World of Warcraft would get too hot. The M3 Pro 14” isn’t as bad w the heat but I still use it when I’m playing WoW. Nothing else needs it tho
Knock $200 off that then, maybe.
Just get the thermo pad and a cheap cooler would do about the same
I mean you bought apple🤷🏻♂️what is $279?
@@brosplit way too much when $20 accomplished the same goal
I just keep mine in the refrigerator. Seems to help out a lot.
you carry that frige with you when travel? Damn, bro that's very heavy !!!
@@SeviersKain It's a mini fridge. Not as heavy as the Jackery battery pack he carries to keep it running.
So you enter in the fridge to use your MBA ? does the light switch off when you close the door ?
You are all making me laugh 😆
i just work inside a big freezer
Damn this cooler is $250+. Might as well get Macbook Pro since that will close the gap on the price difference for 16GB/512GB.
Also in that price m3 pro is worth much better or m2 pro macbook pro (if available in your country) with better performance
And get a better screen, better speakers, more ports, bigger battery.....
And you can open the laptop..... this is pointless you might as well get a mac mini if you can't use the screen or keyboard and get a cheap air for travel.
must you buy it cant u just mill one or screw one together
He addresses this right in the video: the Air is thinner and lighter while traveling, then you can drop it on a cooling dock while at your desk. For a lot of people, this is a great solution. Signed, a person with both an Air and M1 Max Pro who prefers the Air.
You can make one of these for like $25. Get yourself an old intel pentium CPU heat sink. These are basically just machined blocks of aluminum with fins. If you want a fan, you have the extra bonus of these being able to mount fans directly on them. Otherwise you can go completely fanless, or even get something like a Dell Dimension heat sink (used in fanless systems) which is literally just a machined block of aluminum. $10 plus shipping.
Grab yourself an extra thermal pad to put between it and the mac book air. $10-15.
Place thermal pad on aluminum heatsink. Place macbook on top of thermal pad. Elevate macbook with something so that it rests level with cooling block. Success.
Thanks for the idea. I am currently waiting for my base model M3 to arrive, and have some old heatsinks stashed in my workshop (I have kept them around since the late 90s thinking they might be good for something...) Some are large blocks and others are quite low-profile (removed from motherboard chipsets). They have the footprint of a small matchbox and around half the height. I think I might make use of them in this fashion lol
Nice. Which results could you achieve with core temps and consistency in long benchmarks?
coming back with my own results: So I went out and purchased a $15 simple cooling sink for an old pentium processor I believe, from StarTech on Amazon, including a 60mm fan. (Socket 478). It's an elongated heatsink so i'ts not concentrated on only one small square. I applied thermal pads inside the macbook, but really only on the middle section. Then Thermal pads on the flat side of the heatsink. Purchased an additional USB 5V to 3pin Molex connector, built myself a stand and put everything together. I'M BLOWN AWAY. Finally I can play games via Crossover with no heating issue. The machine is cool to the touch. Unbelievable! Even after 1 hour of gaming. Considering how cool it's running, absolutely no worries about battery life. It's a stationary set up though. I order to avoid heating issues, I will use battery saving mode when not stationary with cooling. Usually my macbook M2 Air would throttle after 10 minutes and get very hot. Glad I went this route, even though the svalt stand really looks better. but $279 is just too much.
To most of the average users, if you only need M2/M3 Air for study, browsing, watching content and other stuff not involving heavy load on graphics, which majority% people will do, you won’t need to worry about thermals.
I use my M3 Air for music production too with studying and all other normal stuff, haven’t faced issues.
i got the m1 pro 14", while playing league of legends fans, coding using docker, fans even never turned on ... :D
This is exactly what I did before i watched this video, add the thermal pads to my M2 Macbook Air. However, there was a concern about battery health because now the entire lower case of the macbook air gets warm from the thermal transfer, and the case will warm up the macbook air battery. Any temperature above 53 Celcius is bad for the battery. My solution was to tape the inside of the macbook air back cover with thermal protective film so that the cover does not transfer the heat back to the battery locations. I managed to keep the battery temperature at or lower than 53 celcius, while still keeping the benefits of the thermal pads. I also put my m2 macbook air on top of a laptop cooler that uses a fan to cool the macbook air, thus achieving what this video also achieved.
Great idea! Thanks for sharing.
Any references for this thermal protective film or insulator material? Are you talking about the golden fiberglass tape to wrap around engine pipes? Or something with more insulation?
+1 to @@WilloPax’s question. Curious what you used for the protective film. Was it kapton tape?
Could you share a step by step guide for this? or some youtube video you might think could be useful, showing how this can be done?
Thank you
@@alvesricardo Search MaxTechOfficial/this channel for the video that shows you exactly how to do this. That's the one I used to learn how to do it. Luke Miami's channel also has a video on how to install the thermal pads. Those 2 videos are very good, but there are other videos, too.
I put a magnet on my the side of the palm rest, the Mac thinks it's closed, so it cools down better.
Great tip! Thank you!
Remember not to close the screen while its still there
Did not work on my mbp 16 2019. I remember they have screen angle detection as well? could you send a link of your magnet?
I don't know about the M2/M3, but the M1 MacBook Air requires two magnets to trick it. The hall effect sensors seem to be hidden in the speaker grilles, at the bottom corner of the shift keys.
My 2015 MacBook Pro only needed one magnet to trick it.
idk if a magnet can destroy some of the electronics so. I know there is no hdd, but...
I'm a game developer who regularly works on large projects that demand both the GPU for testing the game in simulators and the CPU to build projects in Unity, Xcode, and Android Studio. My MacBook Air M3 was suffering a lot due to throttling, often reaching more than 95 degrees Celsius. This modification made my top temperature go down to 86 degrees Celsius. The MacBook is running approximately 11 degrees Celsius cooler on average. The batteries never reached more than 41 degrees Celsius in the worst-case scenario. I totally agree that this modification is not something you should consider if you are not a heavy user. But if you do use heavy tasks like video encoding, game development, or building projects, you will get way more out of your hardware by doing it. Additionally, it cools down much faster when I finish heavy tasks. It used to take forever to bring it below 80 degrees Celsius; now it's almost instantaneous. Thanks for the tip. I just used only one thermal pad as recomended in the video description. Thanks for the video.
@CharlesBarros what a does a game developer do with MacBook Air M3 to perform simulation? This is the wrong tool for your line of work. Get a MacMini and call it a day. A MacBook Air are for web browser-type people.
@@Traumatree I have a regular desktop for work at my house, but I'm also a businessperson who has to travel a lot. During my travels, my tool of choice is the MacBook Air because it is lightweight and handles my development needs very well.
@@CharlesBarros So you also travel with this chunky cooling block? It seems to me a macbook pro is easier to carry than macbook air + external cooling system. Unless you only use the cooling block at your house, which means that you macbook air is your do-it-all machine?
@@MrW0rDs you don’t need this cooling block to have better performance than the stock. The thermal pad helps a lot to boost the performance by its own. 😄
Can you help me out ? I can’t decide between m3 air 15” and m3 pro 14” ! I really prefer the larger screen of the 15” but I’m concerned about the thermals issues of it. I do like gaming but I’m okay playing native Mac OS experiences such as Apple Arcade and games like resident evil, death stranding, no man’s sky that are native experiences. Doing this way will the air overheat ? I don’t see any TH-camr talking about this, all their tests are talking about 20 minutes, but what about a 2 hour gaming session, will the air get to hot and possibly melt something in long terms ?
the SVALT Cooling block alone is US$280!!!! not including fan , not inculding thermal pads , might as well spend the money to upgrade to 14inch pro , which hv better sound better screen better everything, so this video is not objective
This is SOOOOO DUMB, the mba is so lovely and small and slim and light, let’s add a literal brick to my bag to cool the thing which we know is a light duty chassis. If you worry about thermals, Max shows us what fans and air management can do. As an alternative he offers this clunky nonsense? Crazy Max.
I returned to Best Buy the 15” MBA M3 16/512 without even open it because while on transit with FedEx I saw the 14” MBP M3 16/1TB for $1849 at Best Buy as well. So ordered it immediately and it’s going to be delivered tomorrow. A 15” MBA M3 16/1TB would have been $1899…
Thermal pads are basically free. On top of those just a generic cooling bad is fine if you want one. 280$ is indeed crazy.
we make a lightweight and durable plastic version for a fraction of the price (currently on sale for $34.99)
So let me get this straight:
1. Get a 1300€ MacBook Air M3
2. Get a cooling block that costs 300€(not even premium liquid coolers cost that much btw. Let’s not talk about a piece of metal)
3. Void the warranty on a brand new machine to install thermal pads
4. Not run a single test to see temps on other components of the MacBook that may get affected by the installation of the thermal pads such as battery that has a pretty low operating temperature as you came to realise after the same thing you did back with the m2 MacBook Air (and you still suggest the same thing)
All these and you sound pretty excited about the results as it is the best choice for someone that wants a stable machine. I might as well get my 2018 desktop and oc it with liquid nitrogen that will surely boost its performance. Not all options are viable you should know that
This is so dumb, the obvious answer is get a pro chassis with fans. I did, the 14” M3 12core can run on my comforter on my bed, never turn the fan on, never get so hot it fries my skin, in fact it’s never even warm from light work. My i9 16” mbp had to be on a tray which allowed the chassis to have airflow otherwise it starts to fry on any fabric surface you’d use it on like a couch or bed. I love this aspect most about the current gen MBP and Apple chipsets and their performance and efficiency. The HDR screen also truly unlocks your HDR camera if you’re a film maker or photographer something which just never happens on machines with an SDR display like the mba. The pro is a really nice machine, those ports are rad too.
i'm surprised so few people are talking about this, and all that on top of now the laptop is uncomfortable to use as a laptop because the bottom of the case will get to scorching temperatures. So basically spent 1600 to get a louder, less efficient, and larger m3 mac mini with less functionality.
@@zatorith. Under normal /casual use the laptop doesn't heats up. Unless you are doing 20+ minute renders on your lap, it will otherwise behave like a normal macbook air. If you are doing 20+ minute renders on your lap, you've got bigger issues.
The thermal pads are less than $20 and give you about 75% of the thermal benefits… just do that and save the $280.
been doing this also to non-fanless macbooks for years to improve thermals and then performance dramatically
I honestly think you guys won the silicon lottery with the m3 air, because even with bursty tasks it was faster than the pro of the same spec
Maybe apple thinks lethal only a crazy person would buy a bulky pro with slow chip, so they don’t put good silicon there anyway?
Or TSMC have made improvements with their 3nm node?
Great video! I got MBA M3 24GB 1TB Midnight, my first Mac. In this configuration is faster than my desktop (i9 9900k), this should be more than enough for a such slim/compact machine. I like the thermal pads idea. Thanks.
Thinking of getting the same how is the heat issue
Thinking of getting the same how is the heat issue
@@haggaikathewela8910 Yes I wouldn't get the MBA with high specs because we all ready know without a way to cool, it's not going to perform well. Essentially wasted performance for one reason only, "heat."
I haven’t seen a single reviewer call out some of the limitations on the M3 Air’s inability to push certain resolutions. The scaling options on a 5k display are far inferior to what’s offered by the MBP and not one person has mentioned it in a review
I would love to hear more about this.
They have Pro models for 5k tho?
This is a non issue and not a thing. “Default” resolution is still 2560x1440 hidpi which is standard. Even the pros don’t allow actual 5k resolution only up to 3k in stock “more space” I’m not sure what you’re talking about here. They do exactly the same.
@@InsaneFilms I haven’t tested out multiple external displays (mostly bc I don’t care that much and I don’t get paid to do this stuff), but on my main display (40” Dell 5k/2k), there are many more hi res options when using my M3 Max MBP vs my M3 MBA.
If I force the usual resolution I use with my MBP through a 3rd party app (bc it’s not available as an option natively through Mac OS), it is low res and looks like trash.
So the only options are a resolution where everything is too large and not what I like or full resolution which is way too small and also not useable.
@@Wonder_Wicks I’m talking about pushing to an external display
Thats actually awesome that you can have a thin, light fanless Macbook Air on the go, dock it on a heatsink ater installing thermal pads at home, and have it faster than a MacBook Pro. Love it!
I don't think a lot of people understand how awesome it is to have something so powerful and so light. Having to actively cool it at home is a small compromise in my view.
PSA: Use 1.0mm thermal pads. 1.5 imm is almost too thick, It makes screwing back the lid very difficult and almost buldges the bottom of the MBA.
is it good now, what about the battery temp?
Man thank you! I see someone in TH-cam saying the 1.5mm is better because the 1.0mm leaves an airgap. I guess that only applies to M2 or M1 MBA
I'd like to see a video that's also comparing the 24gb RAM model too, I haven't seen such yet
Same :)
yep. I'm so curious. 24gb vs the 16, and 24gb vs the M3pro MBP 18gb
If you haven't noticed, the thermal pad solution alone would satisfy 99.99997% of users. Serious improvement for such a little cost. I get why Apple didn't want to do it because of how hot it would be on your lap without the air gap.
May I have a question? I saw you used 1.5mm thermal pad. Why do you suggest 1.0mm?
Same question here! Could younplease clarify @max tech?
@@TheNapsterHack with 1,5mm is bit difficult to close the bottom lid
You forgot to mention : $279 for Svalt's cooling dock. Might as well upgrade to the MBP really
While I think the $279 is way too high, at least it’ll help cool all your laptops now and future laptops in the future. That extra $ for the MBP will only help now.
@@HypocritesExposd that is probably only justification. Or we can wait and see if it wont sell and goes cheaper :) or wait for chinese knock off.
I would still rather have the macbook air to use on a table top on the go and full performance at home in one of these docks. macbook pro is a chonky heavy laptop.
*Why doesn't Apple add the thermal pads as standard?*
Same reason that they don't put an actual heatzink, they don't want the machine to be as fast as it can be, this is how they throttle the machine
cause the laptops would get to hot to the touch for regulation.
Their excuse is that the bottom of the laptop would get uncomfortably hot if it was directly touching the heatsink and spreading the heat. Also, they focus the Air to consumers that don't need constant performance.
@@robertoacjit’s not an “excuse” there’s consumer electronics regulations that state how hot something can be that will come into contact with skin. It’s not for the lolz 😂
Easy explanation is many times, the truth.. well you guessed it right..;)
Almost $300 for a heatsink is equally ridiculous.. 😅
It's not just a video about MBA. It's a brilliant idea. Thank you so much.
This is a pretty cool solution (ha, get it?)
Very creative. Though of course one thing to keep in mind if you're considering this option is that you won't get that macbook pro performance on the go. That being said, great if you're leaving your sustained workload tasks for when you're at home or at your office.
Another thing to keep in mind that I think is brushed over in the video, is battery health. It's all fine when you're on the cooling dock, but when using it day to day, that thermal pad will transfer heat to the chassis and down to the battery.
hello do you make another ram comparison video for the macbook air 15", whether an upgrade to 24 Gb is worthwhile or 16Gb is enough. That would be great, thanks
16 is prob enough - only if you are heavy user this might be interesting
Is the Macbook Pro getting significantly better with the external fan ?
When I had a Mac Air M1, it would always throttle. All I did was to get a laptop fan (laptop sitting on top with two large fans under it with a riser to get air flow. Worked for a long time too until I went to get a 16gb model and I opted for the Pro to get a built in fan. Works with the lid closed and even with a case on
Wow, the thermal pads alone made a much bigger difference on the M3 than they did on M2 and M1, that's huge!
that is very impressive, with just thermal pads it really help it and now I'm for sure getting a MacBook Air, I will of course get the upgraded 10 Core GPU, RAM and storage.
Well done dude!🎉
if you want more power buy a pro; don't mess up your machine and void the warranty with heatpads ; the heatblock is pretty cool though but not for 279 usd
Does make you wonder how an MBA would perform on a $25 active laptop cooler… or even sitting on a $10 granite tile cut to fit between the feet so it’s in contact with the base
It also makes me wonder at how far they could push the M3 in a well cooled mac mini or a mac studio.
To be noted - the upgrade is NOT free performance lying on the table - using the Thermal pads allow more heat to be dissipated to the chassis, which true, helps with cooling of the CPU, but it also makes the whole chassis hotter - which may cause issues when you want to use the laptop on your legs or on a soft surface - sometime ago, I think it was LTT who measured it, and the chassis was hotter than the legal US limits and may cause burns.
The cooling block then obviously limit the moveability - cooling pads or stands have been quite standard for a while now, even for other laptops, this one looks cool though and its mass allow it to be used even without fan, which is nice for silence.
But in both cases, you are making your Air less functional as a laptop, but more powerful computer overall. For some, this might be a worthy tradeoff.
Personally, I'd go without the thermal pads but with the cooling block. That way you can easily take the laptop off of it and use it safely wherever, albeit with the thermal nerf.
No one is going to be doing intensive 15m+ import/exports on their lap, which would get uncomfortably hot anyway thermal pads or not. The svalte is nice in terms of aesthetics and space-saving but any cheap laptop cooler will suffice in combination with the thermal pads.
$290 for cooling???? why not just buy a macbook pro at this point ?
Versatility. He talks about this. You can take the much lighter Air or set it up at a desk for heavy tasks. IMO a great tradeoff.
So pro in fact means propeller 😂😂😂
one thing everyone complains about with Macs is no upgradeability. if the air ever starts to struggle for what you need it for, just do this and suddenly its like you bought a pro anyways. if you dont need it, then save the money.
Hey Max, I just wanted to report my own test: I got the 1.5mm thermal pad (exactly the one you got) and placed it directly above the M3, another 1mm one I placed half/half left and right of the 1.5mm one. I placed the Macbook on a dedicated laptop-stand, like I usually do at home (open), and my multi-core score in Cinebench is: 678 (and I had a lot of stuff opened while running Cinebench). I'm really impressed. But I have to say these pads are a bit weird to work with. I had to really fight them to get off the clear plastic side and torn some junks from it while doing so, but at the end I was able to squish everything together into a homogeneous pad. :)
I love videos like this, thanks!! When I encoded an hour long video on my M2 iPad the other day, I placed it on a metal pan to help with the heat. Worked like a charm!
I want to know what's the performance like for a MacBook Pro with thermal pads.
It does not improve the performance at all, because the heat is already evacuated by the fan. The thermal pads mod only makes sense on fanless designs. I have done it on my M1 Macbook Air, and recently on my 2017 12 inch Macbook with good success, but it is important to note that the temperatures on the bottom cases of both devices are now unsafe, which explains why Apple does not do it.
So its better not to do it?! But what exactly u mean with unsafe? i am afraid of the battery or to effect some other electronics inside. if this would be the ultimate solution apple would prob. have done it.@@fixups6536
1900 Euros for a 15" inches Macbook Air with 512 ssd and 8 gb Ram in Europe. Sorry but with almost 2.000 Euro thats a robbery. At the moment there are options for business/gaming laptops at the same price with rtx 4080 inside. Macbook Air was a student solutions and not a premium product. This product exists only a few price distance away from Macbook Pro to finally push you buying this. Macbook Air 15 inch with 16 ram and at least 512 ssd, shouldn't cost more than 1400 euros/dollars.
The question I have is by closing the air gap are you going to increase the possibly of damage to the logic board from light drops.
It is INSANE that someone who bought a 15" MacBook Air with only 8GB RAM + 256GB SSD for $1299 also needs to spend $279 for a passive cooler which is just a block of metal.
The pricing on Mac products just proves that Mac users have more money than sense.
Or you could just buy any number of Windows laptops that don't have this problem (because they have freaking fan!) with 16GB RAM + 1TB SSD for less money.
The problem is with the cooler, the MacBook Air is way bulkier than a MacBook Pro by itself. It's also not a viable option if you're using it in normal laptop mode instead of clamshell mode. If you're using the device in laptop mode, the MacBook Pro is still better in performance.
Nice mod but sadly batteries will degrade faster lithium ion batteries degrade faster more they are exposed to higher temperatures.
But..without the mod, the cpu is spreading all the heat inside anyway-
Great video! The reason I am replacing my 14" Macbook Pro with a 15" Macbook Air is simple - the screen is bigger with no weight penalty. For editing video and graphics work a 14" laptop is too small, and the 16" Macbook Pro is too expensive. Thermal pads are a cheap fix but probably void the warranty - the cooling block is crazy expensive but is silent, which I want for audio editing.
I did this thermal pad trick to my M1, and its still going hard, if you cant handle the heat of the casing after this mod, I say harden up tender foot :)
We developed a cooling stand that can achieve 98% stability and almost 20C temp drop without the need to open up the device and insert a TIM. Ours is similar to the SVALT product, but about 10x cheaper because we 3D print it using our thermally conductive plastic material. Would be happy to send you one to review!
Hi there! We'd love to try it out. Please email us using the email address in the About Us section on our channel
@@MaxTechOfficial Great, thank you! Email sent, please let us know if not received.
Hi Max, which software are you using to monitor your cpu clock speed?
Ye, lets pay a lot for a laptop that you have to open and put a thermal pad to it, because the manufacturer only thinks about money regardless quality. Steve Jobs, we miss you.
Hhhhh don’t be silly
It so it doesn't burn your lags
Thermal pad*
Thermal pads, not thermal paste. And the bottom of the chassis will probably get a lot hotter.
Should've come that way from factory!!
Hi Max Tech, is the 1mm thermal pad recommended for the 15" M3 MB Air as well? or the 1.5mm would be better. In the video you showed the 1.5mm version? But in your description you recommended the 1mm version? Thanks.
So I went out and purchased a $15 simple cooling sink for an old pentium processor I believe, from StarTech on Amazon, including a 60mm fan. (Socket 478). It's an elongated heatsink so i'ts not concentrated on only one small square and covers more of the macbook backplate. I applied thermal pads inside the macbook, but really only on the middle section where the main silicon is. Then Thermal pads on the flat side of the heatsink. Purchased an additional USB 5V to 3pin Molex connector, built myself a stand and put everything together. I'M BLOWN AWAY. Finally I can play games via Crossover with now heating issue. The machine is cool to the touch. Unbelievable! Even after 1 hour of gaming. Usually my macbook M2 Air would throttle after 10 minutes and get very hot. Glad I went this route, even though the svalt stand really looks better. but $279 is just too much. If you don't want to build a stand, just put your macbook upside down and place heatsink on top. That might impact wifi though.
What a scam product to cost more than $250 for just a CPU cooler ??? You can get same result but cost you just around $30.
Did pads on a 3090 a few months ago, so that looks easy. Might be time to grab one.
270$ heatsink is silly, thermal pads and a 10$ fan stand will get you 90% of the benefit, I have been gaming on a thermal modded M1 air since 2020...
Ppl are harping on the cooler for being expensive. But having worked with small design machine shops, its expensive to make something like this.
Also, it would probably be beneficial to the Macbook Pro too as my fan would get LOUD especially in clamshell mode.
I mean, what you're doing is using the chassis of the Macbook Air to dump heat into, whereas before there was an air gap. I think the only issue would be if you end up using it in your lap, the chassis will get a lot warmer.
You might have added the thermal cam shots of the backplate, when stressing the CPU with and without the pads. I believe it would be very informative for prospective implementers of the hack.
These thermal pads will dissipate heat to the bottom case. Then opened the heat will be trapped on the desk and lead to swollen battery due to heat build up.
Not happening. I have modded my M1 Macbook Air with thermal pads 2 years and a half ago, and the battery is only marginally hotter under extended periods of full load (I did test it). You are right that it could happen in theory, but in practice, from my experience, it doesn't. Also, someone else in this comment section has explained that they use thermal protective film between the bottom case and the battery to further protect it, which is something that I may try some day.
Does adding thermal pads void Apple care warranty?
@@recline69 Thanks!
it also raises the tempt of the bottom high enough it could burn your skin. apple quite literally doesn't do it for that reason alone@@ZO5150
Did you guys measure how hot the bottom gets with thermal pads?
I like your Tardis-like studio wall, I expect it will dampen noise reflections too.
Yes it actually has sound dampening foam on the back of it.
I have had my M2 air 256gb 16gb ram for over 1 year best Mac I have ever had. only do light use on it
With 512Gb is better
Just curious, why get a such nice machine to just do "light use"?
I guess a simple desk fan would do the same job..
I know this took some time to accomplish.
Mad respect for you and your team. This is amazing to see. Maybe a MacBook Air is the way to go? 😅😮😅
I watched this video because coming from MaxTech it couldn't be a clickbait title !
And oh man I'm impressed. Great work of investigations as always.
The only thing is that Apple could cancel the warranty because on those thermal pads.
Adding the thermal pads, will that break apple care coverage?
You could make a gaming test video with the m3 air, to test these different thermal solutions in gaming
Very interesting. Great job doing all the testing!
This is interesting thanks for producing this. Do these pads need to be replaced after some time? Also, any safety issues with the pads such as them degrading over time? Lastly, would this void the warranty? If you could next time running this (amazing) set of tests, please address these questions also that would be awesome.
What I learned from this video, by 4:32: You can use any vertical or horizontal laptop stand as long as it allows for excellent air flow, have a fan or air conditioner blowing directly onto the MBA constantly while in clamshell mode or in (open?) normal mode to improve cooling and computing efficiency. If you are going to be doing some hardcore rendering on that MBA perhaps putting ice packs onto the bottom of the MBA will work to keep it cool while rendering. lol I don't know if that would actually cause harm, so - uh, don't do it, maybe. IDK.
I can't find the link to the Thermal Pad in the comments, would you be able to share the link, the thickness and if we need 1 or 2? Thank you.
Seems like he is using 1.5mm ones
Thank you.. 1 or 2 pieces of the 85mmx 45mm?
@@recline69 Did you not watch the video where he addressed this concern?
so the question is why would Apple not ship the MacBook Air with thermal pads attached :-(((
Moral of the story the MacBook Air isn't made for long intensive work loads and the only way to fix this is to void you warranty, make you battery wear out more quickly, make the bottom of your laptop super hot and maybe buy a 230 dollar chunk of metal just to finally get similar performance to a MacBook Pro. You should get a MacBook Pro for extended loads and get an air if you do light tasks or short work loads.
That cooling block looks interesting. Maybe couple it with some silent noctua fans? Would be interesting to see if you could push the M3 Max more with that thing. Maybe I need to test that....
Apple is negligent for not including the thermal pads in the original design. Crazy.
Do you even understand what the thermal pads are doing? If you do, then you’ll realize the drawbacks
In the past I’ve use a laptop cooling pad made of aluminum and placed a small piece of thermal pad between the laptop and cooling pad. Will try with the M3 and see how it goes.
Doesn’t adding thermal pad ruin warranty? What’s it like just with the fan sink thingy?
He covered that in the video. With it even without the fan, it drastically reduces the air from throttling. Only downside it cost like 300 dollars.
cheap cooling pad works well too
I have that wallpaper! I think Apple was trying to be too clever in ripping off Bliss with their Sonoma design, and it didn’t pay off.
Why doesn’t Apple do the thermal pad thing stock?
because apple not care about costumers and they just want to rob people
You are massively overplaying this issue, a passively cooled machine throttling when running an artificial stress test over long periods should be no surprise to anyone. The surprising thing is how little it actually throttles. I have a M3 15" Air, and under realistic workloads it stays stone cold all the time, even in clamshell using dual monitors. There is no doubt the Pro is better value for money, but I love the form factor of the Air, and if you dont play games (which is a waste of time on the Mac) there is realistically no need to buy the Pro if you prefer the form of the Air. That being said, the heat block is very interesting, but eyewateringly expensive for what it is.
Did you watch the full video? My last test was with Lightroom photo editing. The 15” air was twice as fast exporting 500 photos. As a photographer I’m usually exporting 250-500 photos and for weddings 1000-1500. Yea for those doing simple tasks don’t worry about it, but if you do push your machine you might want to help it stay cool and get full performance and even better than the 14” MacBook Pro.
How are the bottom panel surface temps with the thermal pad mod? Still usable on your lap? Or is it a desk only kind of laptop after the mod?
My m2 MacBook Air 15 inch gets uncomfortably hot when the MacBook is under loud and the m3 is hotter then m2 and with a thermal pad will be even worse so it would be uncomfortable for heavy loads but fine for light to medium intensity tasks like web browsing or photo editing.
The pads have a downfall, which is that the heat will spread on the base. If you are using in clamshell, there is no problem but if you use in a position that you body is in contact with that bottom area, you'll feel noticeable hotter.
Is there any evidence supporting the no impact on the battery’s life span?
I remember a guy made a video on it, and then I Used istat menu to monitor battery temps with various things. Apple will actually slow down the M3 if anything gets too hot above their specs including the battery.
One question I have is what effect does low RAM have on MacBook Air M3 thermals? If so, how does it compare with your experiments with thermal pads and heat sinks?
Is it not a good solution for people work from home but occasionally need some portability?
Get it in your heads, that the air is NOT designed for constant heavy loads! Its designed for portability! Get a Pro, if you are gonna have a constant heavy load on the GPU and CPU.
oh, I've never expected the results You presented, thank you!
What does the Thermal Pads do with Apple Warranty?
Just set the MacBook Pro on custom fan curve or max it out. Use a fan control app. I do this all the time when I’m rendering.
Hey man. Thanks for all the incredible videos over the years!!! Which audio monitor do you use on the desktop?
You can turn off the built-in screen without closing the laptop. I use betterdisplay to achieve this
Great research, awesome product! Thank you!
Very interesting demonstration. I stopped using laptop coolers as I found that the more recent laptops from Apple (last 10 years) weren’t getting much improvement in performance from external fans. Just lifting the laptop off the desk on a cheap stand was enough for a 10% improvement for long sessions, external fans sometimes seemed to interfere with Apple’s internal cooling design. I would see temperatures slightly higher with the fans running! Using a closed laptop seemed unproductive and a good way to shorten the laptop’s lifespan, so I never did it. This changes my mind a little for future purchases.
Perfect! Glad to see you make this video!
The only thing I’d say is that the cooler block might not be realistic for many budget conscious MacBook Air buyers, because of the price. You should try that $20 laptop cooler stand or the Razer Phone Cooler peltier fan, and see what it can do!
For the test results you've shown. did you use a 1mm pad or the 1.5mm pad shown in the video?
Hi Max Tech, do you have a video showing how to add the thermal pads to the M3 Macbook Air? Will doing this forfeit the Apple warranty? Cheers, Robert.
instead of closing my macbook pro i figured out where the magnet sensor is and use a small magnet to simulate the closed lid! the computer stays cooler that way!
When I will buy this little beast, I will not forget to donate to your channel. Your tips are multi-dollar save.
Best channel to keep track of MAC systems ❤
What will be the result if i just use a 25 usd usb fan? Wouldn’t that solve the problem?