MBP: I Believe in Miracles
March 30th, 2006In my last post on the subject of the MacBook Pro noise dilemma, I dismissed with borderline contempt the notion that “opening and closing Mirror.widget” was a reasonable workaround for the CPU whine problem. I felt pretty certain after my experiments with tweaking CPU usage that any workaround would necessarily equate to equivalent CPU usage or battery draw behind the scenes.
I may yet turn out to have been right, but I’m now using the “Mirror Widget Hack” (MWH) instead of my own QuietMBP. Why? I just got the feeling that my machine was running hotter, mooing more, and generally behaving less amicably when QuietMBP was used to alleviate the symptoms instead of the magical Mirror.widget. The damned computer feels like a wise investment when I use the MWH! I love it again (mostly). So, to all the readers who felt dismissed by my jarring rejection of MWH: mea culpa. I’m sorry.
I don’t like magic, though. At least not when I can’t understand it. I’m ready to admit that MWH does something that brings my computer into a state of calm, but if MWH can do it, surely some other piece of software, that is more convenient to run than a dashboard widget, can do the same thing. I decided to start looking carefully into what exactly happens to the computer when you apply this hack.
First of all, Mirror.widget contains no code. Well, that’s no fun! How the hell does it fix my system, then? The widget is largely implemented in the form of a special QuickTime movie “mirror2.mov” that is somehow configured to automatically reflect the incoming iSight image in real-time. Great, so I can get the same system-calming affects by opening the movie in QuickTime Player, right? Right. But as soon as I quit QuickTime Player, the noise comes back. When you close the widget, the noise stays away forever (actually until you use some app other than Dashboard that opens and then closes access to the iSight). I thought I’d try to open the widget in Safari. No dice. Even after editing the widget so it would attempt to operate despite not being in the Dashboard – it silences the noise while the movie is visible, but the noise comes back after closing the web page. Get this: even turning off the movie in Mirror Widget, by clicking the little “i” in the lower left corner causes the noise to come back. Something about the (perhaps clumsy, but beautifully, wondrously clumsy) way that Dashboard closes up shop for the widget while the movie is active causes the system to get “stuck in good mode.”
I decided to whip out Shark, Apple’s profiling tool from the CHUD toolset. I figured there must be something different about “my computer doing nothing” before and after the magic MWH. To get a fairly straightforward sample, I quiet all visible applications except Shark and the Finder. Then, with the noise blaring, I took a 2 second timed sample of “Everything.” This means all processes on the system that are using any CPU time at all for anything. Then I silenced the MBP with the MWH, and grabbed an identical 2 second sample. I did this a few times to make sure there were no statistical anomalies coloring my view of what’s going on. The difference between the two samples? Almost absofrickinlutely nothing. In fact, nothing of interest I can pinpoint after multiple sessions of sampling at different rates, over different durations, and using different sampling configuration.
The Mirror Widget is magic. I use it and love it. Be warned that as soon as you use your iSight again in another app, and then quit, the noise will come back. But other than that, I now switch my allegiance to Mirror Widget. I just wish I knew why it does what it does. Maybe somebody with more Shark skills than I can get to the bottom of this.
Update: Supporting evidence that the silence is a side-effect of a poor “cleanup” from Dashboard: opening mirror2.mov in QuickTime Player and then force-quitting QuickTime player produces the same “permanent” fix to the system. Also, opening Photo Booth (or I presume any other iSight-using app) and force-quitting it while the silence is golden will achieve the same result. Getting closer to an answer!
More: Apple’s “WhackedTV” developer sample also eliminates the noise if you add a video track in the app (defaults to iSight) and then quit. Apparently however it cleans up or doesn’t clean up upon quit is also well-suited to leaving the Mac in quiet mode.
Update 2: I decided to hack the WhackedTV example to produce the simplest possible app that can shut the MBP up and immediately quit. This would make a suitable login item, and can be manually relaunched any time the noise comes back (e.g. after using the iSight for something real). Download MagicNoiseKiller (Intel only) today!
March 30th, 2006 at 6:54 pm
Sounds like somebody’s not setting a hardware register correctly.
March 30th, 2006 at 7:01 pm
From what you explained, I’d probably say that there is no difference between opening the movie in QuickTime and in the dashboard widget, except that the dashboard widget may continue to play the movie while the dashboard is hidden and QuickTime player will not. Also it seems that connecting a USB device, or interacting with the built-in camera, somehow change the state of something on the motherboard, like for instance the system bus speed, which in turn remove the noise.
Forcing the processor to do more work does the thing too, but as you said drains more power and makes the book hotter. So I’d sugest you make an app that communicate constantly with any internal or external device on the computer. It *may* need to be on a specific interface (like Firewire or USB). Hum, does the noise stops when playing a sound? You could try playing continously no sound at all.
I hope this gives you ideas, but you probably already figured or tryed most of it by now I suppose. Oh, and I don’t believe in magic when it comes to technology. :-)
March 30th, 2006 at 7:21 pm
Bah, you’re all making things way too complicated. It’s opening a driver or ‘vdig’ or sequence grabber or something that stays open as long as the app stays open. Dashboard only plays movies, I suspect, via WebKit’s QuickTime plug-in.
I imagine that once WebKit opens the movie plug-in and the ‘vdig’ and all that, it probably doesn’t close it until WebKit itself is closed down. Dashboard never closes WebKit because every widget uses it, so the QuickTime plug-in and components and stuff stay open. QuickTime Player and other apps clean up when they close windows, but Dashboard’s “window” never closes.
I don’t know enough QuickTime + Cocoa to grok if WhackedTV ever closes the sequence grabbers it opens.
March 30th, 2006 at 8:28 pm
I think this is a power supply issue. Not in the sense that the power supply is broken, but any successful hack thus far means altering the amount of power flowing through the system. The CPU idleness is a red herring. This explains why Shark doesn’t give you any useful info.
March 30th, 2006 at 9:09 pm
Michel: It’s more complicated than just hiding the Dashboard widget. The noise cessation continues even after the widget is closed. This is very significant because every dashboard widget in the dashboard actually comes with its own process. Basically every widget is a separate instance of the Apple “DashboardClient” tool, and all of those instances happen to be aggregated in a consolidated UI by the Dock process that we call “The Dashboard.”
Matt: I think you’re probably on to something with your theory about the vidg or something being ultimately responsible for the change in system behavior. Anyway, unless somebody else wants to figure everything out and post it all at once, I’m just sort of following a “post what I know as I learn it” policy here, and all I know so far is that opening a video sequence grabber and quitting does the trick. Stay tuned for better details :)
Scott: I think you’re probably right. It makes sense especially considering the wide variety of things that cause a noise cessation, and the observation you made about some USB devices silencing the noise. On that note – it’s worth observing that the built in iSight is in fact a USB device, so perhaps when its driver is “left open” or whatever is happening, it’s somewhat equivalent to leaving a USB flash drive plugged in, in that it continues to draw some power from the system.
I’m inclined to think at this point that whatever power is being drawn from this latest workaround is less than my previous hack. I don’t have any hard evidence to back that up but I feel that the machine stays cooler and the fans are less active. It makes sense that if some extra power draw is being caused by the video digitizer, it’s probably a constant draw that happens to meet the requirement with more exact finesse than the clumsy, constant activation of the CPU.
March 30th, 2006 at 9:44 pm
This reminds me of a story about magic.
March 30th, 2006 at 10:30 pm
I don’t have a MBP otherwise I would check myself but I am wondering if you do the MWH and then restart Finder (because I think that restarts the dock) would the noise come back?
March 31st, 2006 at 3:28 am
I for one just open iChats preview by clicking on the camera icon in iChat when I have the noise. Just simpler, gives you a mirror if you like too, but most of the time i put it in the dock.
March 31st, 2006 at 6:33 am
Thanks for the continued work on this. Apple tends to shake my faith in the Mac platform with stuff like this, but the Mac community often brings it back :)
Only vaguely related: My Mirror widget has stopped working, even if I download and reinstall it. I get a question mark lego block icon instead of the movie. mirror2.mov itself works fine. Maybe a WebKit issue…not sure…
March 31st, 2006 at 8:13 am
Nathan: I didn’t try specifically quitting the Finder, but I did try killing the Dock. It doesn’t bring the noise back. So far all indications are that when the MWH kills the noise, it’s a system wide change that can only be undone by having another application use the iSight and then close it up properly.
Dominik: keep in mind that the Mirror Widget Hack and my derivative above do not use any CPU time. Opening iTunes preview on my MBP uses about 20% CPU (according to top) even while it’s in the Dock! Also, the green light being on is distracting and implies to me that more battery is being used than necessary.
Dave: Sorry to hear about your Mirror Widget woes. Hopefully if you were just using it to shut the Mac up, you can use MagicNoiseKiller in its place.
March 31st, 2006 at 12:01 pm
Daniel:
Indeed. MagicNoiseKiller works like, well, Magic. Ran it this morning and haven’t heard a peep from the machine since. Thanks. You may want to make a page for it and put up a Paypal donate button somewhere…
March 31st, 2006 at 1:24 pm
Dave: I’m glad the magic works for you :) I have taken your advice and added a summary page for all posts related to the MBP noise, and also included a donate button. Good idea!
March 31st, 2006 at 6:48 pm
I have the whining on my MBP only when on battery power. After checking Apple discussion boards there seems to be a quick temporary fix until a reboot that worked for me:
As many already know if you start photo booth (iSight) or anything else that draws power the whining goes away. However, when you close these programs or disable what’s drawing the power the whining comes back! Well someone found out that if you open photo booth, take a picture, click on the picture you took and then close photobooth the sound stays muted (Note: you must click on the picture)! However, on reboot you have to go in a click on the pic again to stop the whinning.
April 2nd, 2006 at 3:52 am
I have done a quick check on battery consumption using both quietMBP and MagicNoiseKiller and my results (highly unscientific, but may give a rough idea) indicate that the latter option indeed seems to be more efficient in terms of power consumption. Without using any of the noise cancelling options, my battery lost 4% of its charge over 10 minutes while surfing the Internet. Using quietMBP with the slider set at 140 resulted in a loss of 6% during the same period of time, also while surfing the Internet. Finally, when I used MagicNoiseKiller, the reduction in battery life was 5% over 10 minutes. For the record, the battery time left shown in the tool bar after 10 minutes running on battery was 3:27 without noise cancelling software, 3:05 with MagicNoiseKiller (in one occasion, I got 3:12) and 3:03 with quietMBP. I also found that with MagicNoiseKiller the computer is quieter than with quietMBP (with the slider set at 140).
Anyway, thanks for your efforts in trying to find a solution for this (sometimes very annoying) issue. I hope Apple releases some sort of permanent fix for this soon.
April 2nd, 2006 at 11:24 am
Hopefully this will remain to be a miracle, not a temporary event. I had a hissing noise on my MB although I was not sure if it was louder than other MB’s. Because I am a new convert, two days ago, I was transferring 15GB audio lecture files from my Dell laptop to MB that was running on battery. Because I wanted to drain the battery, I pressed “stop copying” button when 1 minute remained. However, the file transfer did not seem to be stopped because I was moving large-size files, and MB’s power was out. I think it gave my MB some electric shock, and since the rebooting after charcing the battery, the noise almost dispeared. Although I could still hear sort of “high frequency,” it was not the high pitch noise any more that had bothered me. It was very interesting. However, I do not want other MB users to attempt to do such a thing.
April 2nd, 2006 at 1:20 pm
I am sitting at a very quite spot in the school library and found that the “high frequency” is still annoying. It could be stopped by MagicNoiseKiller or Mirror widget like the high-pitch noise. I was planning to get my MB fixed during the summer vacation, but it might be more difficult to get Apple to fix it because I do not high-pitch noise, but some frequency noise. Maybe I should get the high-pitch noise back.
April 2nd, 2006 at 5:03 pm
Doesn’t all this indicate it’s a fault with the iSight drivers or Hardware.
April 3rd, 2006 at 5:11 am
I’ve got a hunch that this has to do with one processor sitting idle. The video software Mirror widget is activating is probably taking advantage of the “dormant and whining” processor, making it work ever so slightly and thus stopping the noise…
My2cents / John
April 3rd, 2006 at 12:13 pm
If that were true, then using the “Processor” preference pane that’s part of the developer performance tools to disable one core would make the noise happen all the time. So that’s easy to confirm or rule out.
April 3rd, 2006 at 1:59 pm
MagicNoiceKiller worked perfectly with 10.4.5. However, with 10.4.6, the hack doesn’t seem to work anymore on my MBP.
April 3rd, 2006 at 2:21 pm
I have the same problem, upgrading to 10.4.6 the hack doesn’t work at all. Application opens and close itself but the noise remain.
Thanks!
April 3rd, 2006 at 6:01 pm
I found that opening and closing the Comic Life application essentially does the same thing on my MBP–that is, it shuts it up. Some people have said it doesn’t work on their computers, so YMMV.
It does come with the complimentary 30 minute reduction in battery life, so it’s just as “good” as any other software hack thus far.
April 3rd, 2006 at 9:27 pm
Tonight I got the high-pitch noise back. The noise is louder and more annoying. This is a good news for me because I can let guys in the Apple Center hear it unless they are deaf. Bad news is that I don’t have time to bring MBP to the center until the middle of May. By the way, will Apple be able to fix this? My MBP is 8612 model, and Apple hasn’t adressed a problem of 8612 yet.
April 4th, 2006 at 1:04 am
Thanks for MagicNoiceKiller. But after the Update to 10.4.6 it doesn’t work. And it seems that the noise is different as under 10.4.5. It is higher and so its more difficult to hear it (for me).
April 4th, 2006 at 2:39 am
The Noise is the same for me, but MagicNoiseKiller is dead so far 10.4.6. has killed it ;(
April 4th, 2006 at 6:48 am
10.4.6 a cure for whining processor? I own a Rev. E MacBook Pro (SN beginning with W8612). Before I updated to 10.4.6, I too was experiencing the whining noise everyone has been complaining about, and resorted to the magic widget. Since the OS update, the noise has disappeared. If I put my ear close to the notebook, it sounds exactly like my PowerBook G4 17″ did. It’s also woth mentioning that the (normal) processor noise (which is only heard when literally placing your ear to the computer) is now constant, unlike the whining noise I had before, which was intermittent depending on application use.
April 4th, 2006 at 7:11 am
10.4.6 did nothing for me. Whine is still there. In fact, since the 10.4.6 the MagicNoiseKiller app doesn’t work…. sigh.
April 4th, 2006 at 1:31 pm
Yep… MagnoiseKiller stopped working as of Apple Patch 10.4.6. The noise is not any worse, for me… But it is equally annoying… Browsing website especially (scrolling the website seems to modulate the noise frequency).
However, Opening and closing Comic Life still stops the noise.
April 4th, 2006 at 7:08 pm
I have an 8612 and it does have the whine. However, unlike some other people’s experiences I have not had a problem using MagicNoiceKiller on 10.4.6. It works just fine for me, no noise.
April 5th, 2006 at 9:34 pm
Thanks for MagicNoiseKiller. Works like a charm. BTW, I noticed another way to *almost* silence the whine was to plug in the power adapter. Running off of battery it was very noisy, and then almost completely diminishs once I plug the MBP in. Has anyone else encountered this?
April 6th, 2006 at 1:10 am
Hmm – well I finally installed 10.4.6 and I have good news and bad news. The good news? When I installed 10.4.6 by way of the “patch” installer, the resulting system, which was eff’d beyond belief in some other critical ways (video hosed), exhibited the problem that MagicNoiseKiller no longer worked reliably.
The bad news? When I started from scratch and installed a 10.4.6 update from the standalone “combo” installer over a fresh 10.4.5 on another partition, the resulting system responds as well as ever to MNK.
This puts me in a poor position to debug/revise the tool for those unfortunate souls whose 10.4.6 machines are rejecting it.
April 6th, 2006 at 10:09 pm
MagicNoiseKiller worked like a charm, no more noise.
But at the Apple store tonight they told me the noise was normal and that every computer makes that noise. So your solution may have made our macbooks into something less than computers ;)
April 7th, 2006 at 4:21 pm
Im the owner of 1.8 macbook pro, and I also have that annoying whining sound. However, I noticed that when im running under the winxp platform theres no whining sound (I installed winxp with bootcamp). Drivers for isight are not installed under winxp, can the noise be related with the camera-processor somehow? (because the mirror widget shuts it off in macos X).
April 9th, 2006 at 12:46 pm
For a great “off and on” comparison of the whine this works great. Use the Mirror Widget maneuver to quiet the Macbook Pro, then open up a new document in Microsoft Word. Move your pointer over the menu items and when you get to Fonts you will hear the whine in all its ugly glory. Move it off Fonts and, poof, quiet again. I’m using a Macbook Pro, 2.0, 100gig 7200, 10.4.6. Note that this only happens on my maching when it is in battery mode.
April 9th, 2006 at 12:55 pm
Addition to last post: My Macbook Pro is an 8613…….
April 9th, 2006 at 1:25 pm
Addition to the addition: I failed to mention that you need to CLICK on the menu item so the drop down menu appears, then move back and forth between them….you really can hear the difference clearly this way. Great for those people who say they “can’t hear it”
April 10th, 2006 at 6:17 am
[…] Red Sweater Blog – MacBook Pro Noise: I Believe in Miracles […]
April 10th, 2006 at 9:40 am
For me the magic noisekiller doesn’t help, but if I put up the photobot, the sound goes away, and comes back when I close the photo boot.. dont know if thats something different from the sound described here… its fairly silent wizzing sound… very highfrequent.
April 10th, 2006 at 5:20 pm
Ironically it doesn’t make the noise when I run WinXP via bootcamp…
April 10th, 2006 at 11:35 pm
MNK worked for me. I have the low-end stock MBP running 10.4.6 and the latest firmware. Still pissed at Apple though, especially after reading on this board how customer service has been treating other owners.
April 12th, 2006 at 11:26 am
I think that personally the fact that all these little software tricks can stop it for a bit means the problem isn’t that bad. I’d be far more worried if nothing fixed it at all. The fact that we can just run a simple widget and have it make the noice cease, or just running Windows XP shows that software can fix this issue. I think it’s a safe bet that Apple will release a patch or update, probably silently with a software update that will fix the problem. I personally don’t find it a huge annoyance at all, just today I was studying for an exam and was forced to check out the mirror widget because it was making it hard to concentrate!!! Does using the mirror widget hack consume more battery power or make the system hotter? It’s nice to hear it so quiet!
April 14th, 2006 at 6:05 pm
Well, this doesn’t fix anything on my W8611xxxx macbook. the noise is still present. Only using CHUD to turn off a core stops it.
April 14th, 2006 at 6:07 pm
Nathan: 10.4.6? Unfortunately my MBP is now on its way to Apple so I can’t debug the problem anymore for a while.
April 17th, 2006 at 1:56 am
I’ve got the MacBook Pro and — needless to say — the awful processor whine! Opening and closing (i.e. killing) Comic Life works though. But if Comic Life is closed/killed, how can it still affect the battery life, as Mark (April 3rd, 2006 at 6:01 pm) stated:
“I found that opening and closing the Comic Life application essentially does the same thing on my MBP—that is, it shuts it up. … It does come with the complimentary 30 minute reduction in battery life, so it”™s just as “good” as any other software hack thus far.”
Any comments?
Without the noise issues, the MBP would be a nice machine. Now it’s just irritating.
April 18th, 2006 at 11:41 am
Holy Toledo!!!!!!!!! this actually works! I was in a state of dismay after reciving my new macbook and having to listen to the high pitch drone all the time. Just plopped down the mirror widget and the noise stopped immediatly.
April 24th, 2006 at 1:11 am
This doesn’t work for mine, but QuietMBP does…
W8609xxxx serial.
April 24th, 2006 at 11:27 pm
The comic life hack worked beautifully for me. Still can’t explain it though. Wish Apple would release a SW update soon. As an aside, what kind of battery life are you guys experiencing with the MBP? I’ve just read that the 17″ version will have 5.5 hrs (max obviously). Does that mean that the battery in the 15″ one is poor? I would have assumed that the 17″ version would require a lot more power etc…
Thanks for the help though – this is an absolutely super blog.
April 27th, 2006 at 3:48 pm
Apple just posted a software update for “keyboard and mouse” related issues that I was hoping would remedy the whining problem. Unfortunately, it makes the problem worse and any of the temporary remedies such as starting and quitting the mirror.widget now do not work. I can even hear some slight high-pitched whine when the power adapter is used, which didn’t occur at all before. When running on battery, it is much more annoying than before. Try selecting something from the Dock when this occurs, and it will intermittently cut the whining if you move the cursor into and out of the Dock. I wonder if they test these updates before they post them.
May 2nd, 2006 at 11:22 am
I installed the keyboard update and now I cannot stop the whining noise with the mirror trick!!.. The high pitched noise now is worse than before
May 3rd, 2006 at 5:24 am
I also installed the keyboard update (whose to say that’s what did it) but now nothing (after I close the app) stops the whine. And also, if I’m running off the battery it is much louder. I really miss the widget hack. I’m so upset that Apple seems to have given me a fix (to another issue) that has made the whine problem worse!!
May 4th, 2006 at 11:54 am
[…] http://www.red-sweater.com/blog/108/macbook-pro-noise-i-believe-in-miracles/108/macbook-pro-noise-i-believe-in-miracles […]
May 4th, 2006 at 6:07 pm
Count me in with the unhappy updaters — the mirror widget hack worked perfectly for me until I installed the keyboard update this morning. Now nothing stops the whine except keeping the isight running constantly. Argh!!!
May 14th, 2006 at 10:33 am
Simple trick – whenever your processor is busy, noise is cancelled. Try making a photoshop effect over a big file and hear it for yourself. I hate the noises, since I can hear them a lot.
May 14th, 2006 at 10:46 am
Dmitry: Yep, that’s the reasoning behind my other workround, QuietMBP. It lets you gobble up CPU consistently over time so it remains quiet.
May 20th, 2006 at 2:53 am
you can get rid of the whine temporarily by downloading the CHUD tools from the first system install CD. then, go into system preferences and de-select the second core. no whine when running in solo mode
May 20th, 2006 at 10:01 am
Question for those with the whine. Do you get it when plugged in, on battery, or both? My 17 whines only when plugged in.
May 21st, 2006 at 8:59 am
I just got a MacBook Pro 2 Ghz 15.$ inch model (serial W8617) last night. I heard nothing until I started running it off battery. Then it whined like mad when the CPUs were idle. EXTREMELY irritating and unacceptable. I tried the Dashboard mirror widget and that seemed to stop it. Thought I’m not entirely sure since I plugged it back in and also plugged in a USB wireless mouse which may also be what silenced it (heard that using USB devices will shut it up).
May 23rd, 2006 at 10:39 am
Fascinating thread. My experience has been quite similar. 15.4″ MBP, 1.8, 1GB, 7200, SN W8616 etc… The opening/closing photobooth hack worked until the keyboard update…now it doesn’t. Ironic that Apple would defeat our efforts to correct their hardware problem. I vote for the theory that it’s caused by some sort of power management issue. If you have been waiting to purchase that bluetooth mouse you’ve always wanted, do it now, because the hiss disappears when bluetooth is active. I use the Logitech V270 (does not require any external USB connector). Perhaps somebody should make a bluetooth bracelet that keeps the MBP bluetooth active whenever you use it so as to shut it up. Probably eats a bit of power… Ah, and BEWARE you don’t allow your MBP to wake on bluetooth, for it will awake while in its case and cook itself otherwise. In fact, I would recommend shutting it down whenever you put it in the case…it did cost you $2000+…Good luck.
May 24th, 2006 at 9:06 am
I have purchased a new MBP 15.5″ screen with 1.83ghz processor. I experienced the same things at this posting like everyone else also including 3 dead pixels right smack in the middle of the screen. So I check my serial number and its a series W8612. I thought this serial wasn’t suppose to cause problem but eventually it did. It was getting very hot after about an hour of use. The screen was making that buzzing noise and was eliminated only by turning the brightness to max or min level all the way. So i upgraded the firmware to that SMC 1.0, still no luck and try almost everything posted here on these sites. Opening photobooth and leaving in the background, closing it and all sorts of stuff like that. So I finally gave up and went to the store to exchange for another one with the same series of serial number, W8612. So far an hour into using this notebook haven’t experience the buzzing of the screen and the heat issue. It does run warm but not that you can’t touch it. Also i haven’t downloaded any SMC firmware or updates yet. I will wait out and see if the newer series number do solve some of these problems. I wouldn’t risk udpating the firmware and the problems started appearing again.
May 25th, 2006 at 1:41 am
Is the whine related with CPU or GPU activity? Do you see any difference if you launch apps that only use the GPU (like ChocoFlop or other CoreImage applications) as opposed to PhotoShop being emulated?
I am afraid of buying a macbook pro because of this whine issue. It would make me mad. I hate noises of that kind.
May 25th, 2006 at 7:46 am
Jonas: The GPU doesn’t seem to affect the whine. For instance running a Quartz Composer composition doesn’t eliminate the whine.
May 28th, 2006 at 3:37 pm
As far as I can tell, the CPU whine is probably not hardware related, but has to do with the way OSX regulates the CPU via kext files. The reason I say it’s not a hardware issue specifically is because when running windows under bootcamp the noise is completely eliminated. Moreover, when I messed up the permissions on a certain SMC file so that the system couldn’t load it the noise was eliminated as well without the need for the mirror widget or the “magic” one. However, I don’t recommend modifying the permissions of the SMC file as a permanent fix. When I modified this file OSX lost all ability to regulate the core frequency, resulting in full frequency processing all the time. This full frequency processing made the MBP very very hot.
For those who are putting a lot of creedence in the serial numbers, I wouldn’t bother with that. I have a W8616 model and it has the CPU whine. It’s my firm belief that the problem is mostly, if not entirely software related, so I’d expect they will eventually correct the offending kext files to solve all of our problems.
With the current SMC update, I higly recommend using the “magic” fix, because it doesn’t require altering the kext file and it doesn’t hot the isight camera.
Again, my theory that it’s not specifically a hardware issue is supported by the fact that windows does not have a cpu whine. Install bootcamp and WinSp2 and see for yourself.
FD
May 28th, 2006 at 4:15 pm
my new MacBook (unpro) is affected by the cpu noise as well. QuietMBP doe a trick of at least allowing a consistent noise so im not continually distracted, I will soon (or whenever the intel-compatible patches are available) be setting up this computer as an audio workstation. Hoping to not get the same problems as the Logic user. Thank you for your work.
June 3rd, 2006 at 9:47 am
I just got a 2.16GHz MacBook Pro and the only time I can hear the whine is when the computer is asleep and plugged in.
June 8th, 2006 at 9:55 pm
Just received my (Apple refurbished) MBP on 6/6. The machine was in great condition, aside for the whining noise :). MagicNoiseKiller, nor any of the other isight-related hacks work for me after they’ve been quit or forced quit. The whine is indeed silenced while they are open.
QuietMBP on the other hand, does indeed work.
The other thing that works is the “pedestal” I have from CoolerMaster called NotePal. It’s metal with two USB-powered fans. When plugged in, no whining noise, so I would agree with the direction that this is mostly power-related in some fashion.
I’m not sure that 10.4.6 is the cause for MNK not working for me, as I’ve had it installed since getting the machine, but I really hope Apple releases some kind of update or firmware upgrade for this soon. It’s extremely annoying.
June 18th, 2006 at 5:58 am
MagicNoiseKiller still works great for me on 10.4.6. But you must not download the Keyboard Update. If you have then this may help…
————-
“I think I found a solution (used some information from xlr8yourmac.com). Apparently, the keyboard update replaces the file /System/Library/Extensions/IOUSBFamily.kext
If you have a backup of this file, just restore it and the whine will be gone. Since I never make backups of system files, I did a quick Google search, and luckily Apple provides this package for downloads (actually targeted to programmers, but no problem). Download it from http://developer.apple.com/hardwared…/usbdebug.html
————-
I switched the file and MagicNoiseKiller works.
ryan
June 27th, 2006 at 2:58 pm
I’ve noticed that QuietMBP doesn’t work as well as it did after the new update (10.4.7). I used to be able to keep it at 150, but now it’s just annoying. The most comfortable setting now is 100. :mad:
June 28th, 2006 at 9:06 am
> Benjamin
I did notice the same thing after installing 10.4.7… ihave to set quietmbp to between 100-120 to silence the beast now (could go as high as 180 before) My machine is numbered w86240 so its quite new and the problem is still represented… hoping apple will prove worthy their quality status and release a firmware/whatever update to fix the issue…
June 28th, 2006 at 8:40 pm
Here is some new Mirror widget voodoo to keep the magic working after the 10.4.7 update. I was pretty unhappy to lose the Mirror hack after I updated, but then I found this info on an Apple Discussions thread, and it works for me.
1) go to the Dashboard and open Mirror widget.
2) close Mirror widget, but don’t leave the Dashboard.
3) while still in Dashboard, close the laptop lid, putting the computer to sleep. This is the exciting new step that pleases the widget gods.
4) open the lid and wake up the computer. The noise should be gone.
Hope it works for you.
July 2nd, 2006 at 3:42 am
‘New’ mirror hack worked a treat. Thanks.
July 4th, 2006 at 9:36 am
Nice. Now we have to rely on the camera hack gods to be pleased with us before we can be ensured of noiseless sanity.
July 12th, 2006 at 9:47 am
is there an update so that this “magic” will work on 10.4.6?
July 12th, 2006 at 9:58 am
Andy: I’m afraid not. I gave up on the Magic and switched to QuietMBP :(
July 18th, 2006 at 12:23 am
this mirror widget thing works by leaving the isight on even after closing the dashboard. for me the whine always goes away when using the cam
July 24th, 2006 at 5:47 am
Does anyone mention before that the MacBook (not Pro) has the whining too? Mine is a white 1,83 Ghz and ist whines…
July 25th, 2006 at 4:06 pm
I don’t actually have a MB or MBP, but I do have a PowerBook G4 (17″, 1.33 GHz model) and PowerMac G4 (Digital Audio, originally 733 MHz, upgraded to 1.467 GHz) that both exhibit similar symptoms from time to time. The whine is much quieter on the PowerBook than on my tower, but in both cases the solution is the same: I open System Preferences->Processor and uncheck the “Allow Nap” checkbox.
The Processor system preference is on both of my systems but I’m not sure where it came from. I know it wasn’t there originally; perhaps TinkerTool or the Developer Tools stuck it there.
I’m not sure if the Intel processor will allow you to disable processor napping in that manner, but it causes an immediate and abrupt end to the processor whines of my G4s the moment the checkbox is unchecked. Hopefully the Intel ‘Books will let you do the same and make my comment useful.
– D
July 25th, 2006 at 4:08 pm
Hi Dan – the Processor panel comes from Apple’s CHUD performance tools. Unfortunately the Intel chips don’t seem to support the napping feature.
August 18th, 2006 at 2:40 am
[…] Ursprungligen skriven av jopo Vet inte om det diskuterats här tidigare men i ett tyst rum hör jag fortfarande det där väsanda (eller vad man ska kalla det, "hissing"?) när processorn ldlar .. slår man på photobooth så försvinner det eftersom processorn då får mer att göra. Finns det någon riktig lösning runt det ljudet? Det är ingen lösning på problemet, men du kan alltid testa MagicNoiseKiller eller QuietMBP för att sysselsätta processorn. Båda programmen är egentligen till för MBP, men kan kanske fungera för MB. […]
December 12th, 2006 at 10:41 am
I have a MacBook Pro purchased at the start of June (serial number 8617…); the mirror trick doesn’t work for me. The noise disappears when running e.g. photo booth, but even if I force quit photo booth with the camera running, the noise comes back. MagicNoiseKiller also doesn’t work at all, as far as I can see.
I have the whine which is *really* irritating as I use the machine a lot for looking at PDFs of notes whilst in the library. There seem to be 3 regions of noise:
almost no usage (e.g. looking at a PDF in Preview): quiet
little usage (e.g. scrolling said PDF): whine
more usage (e.g. opening an application or whatever): quiet(er)
I realise I’m posting later than most of you; has apple sorted this problem somehow, or are you all just getting used to it?
Richard
December 12th, 2006 at 3:15 pm
Hi Richard – if you follow the series of posts to the end, you’ll find The Quiet Mac, which summarizes my more-or-less successful resolution, and also points to some of the evidence that Apple has pretty-much resolved the problem in newer machines, and can replace a logic board to great success on older machines.
February 12th, 2007 at 4:50 pm
“I have an 8612 and it does have the whine. However, unlike some other people”™s experiences I have not had a problem using MagicNoiceKiller on 10.4.6. It works just fine for me, no noise.”
Hmm. this is interesting, my friend has a mac, even though you cant hear a wine, if i plug head phones in i can hear the same noise that u are describing. (the modulation in the pitch that is) when ever the cpu is working.
June 14th, 2007 at 11:40 pm
The whining sound that you hear on Macbook Pros generally comes from one of two possible sources.
1) The first possible source for the whining sound you hear is the connection to the display from the motherboard. The computer runs on 12 Volts, whereas the display runs on only 5V of current. Thus, the current needs to be changed. This is done by a piece of hardware located above the F12 and Eject buttons on the standard Macbook Pro keyboard.
2) The second and most likely source of the sound is from the inability of the logic board to handle the changes in power requirements that the two processors draw upon. When the processors are churning away, the logic board has a pretty easy time handling the distribution of power to the processors. This is why opening up a program like photo both will reduce the whining sound (The program draws on a lot of processing power, the processors require a consistent and “more quiet” flow of power, and the noise is reduced).
However, as soon as you close photo booth the whining will come back, this is because not all of the capabilities of the Intel processors are being called upon, and quite frankly the logic board just can’t shut off the power all the way. Hence, your second processor (chip, core, “brain”- or whatever you call it) begins to whine. If you listen over the F,G,H, and D keys you should be able to hear this.
Now you know the problem…Wanna know the solution???
Well I really don’t know..I just recommend spilling copious amounts of water or alcohol on the machine…see what happens!
NOT. DON’T BE STUPID. NEVER WASTE A GOOD DRINK.
Instead,
1) open the pack of CDs that came with your computer. Or you could download CHUD off the internet..
2) Look for the CD that says “Developer Tools” on it…it may be called CHUD
3)Insert Disc
4)Run Disk
5) Run the program known as CHUD
6)Install all the little programs…really they are ridiculously small…just put them in the Application folder and forget about them.
7)Go to system prefs
8)Go to processor
9)Check “SHOW CONTROL IN MENU BAR”
10) Click the little icon and change it to one processor
11)Enjoy the silence =P
That should do it…Peace Out.
June 15th, 2007 at 1:06 am
Nate: Congratulations on having perhaps the longest comment on this blog :) But there are two problems with your advice:
1. I paid for two processors, not one.
2. Battery life when running on two processors is actually (confusingly) better than when running on one.
July 17th, 2011 at 1:51 am
Promoting your blog to get instant traffic is actually easy. Posting good topics on do follow forum related to ur blog also helps to.