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    Yikes, keeping it cool in XP?

    Discussion in 'Apple and Mac OS X' started by blurb23, Dec 2, 2008.

  1. blurb23

    blurb23 Notebook Consultant

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    In OS X, I've got smcFan Control to keep my temps down... but what do I do in Windows?

    I'm not even gaming, and I'm seeing temps of the GPU and CPU at 68C. The temps were taken by SpeedFan, but SpeedFan doesn't seem to be able to control the fans of the new Unibody MBPs.

    68C is just unacceptable... especially when this is just browsing. What do you guys do to keep your MBs/MBPs cool?
     
    blurb23, Dec 2, 2008
    #1
  2. whizzo

    whizzo Notebook Prophet

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    shouldn't your GPU downclock (which translates to lower temps) with the new Nvidia drivers?
     
    whizzo, Dec 2, 2008
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  3. blurb23

    blurb23 Notebook Consultant

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    I'm just running the stock Boot Camp drivers.

    I still need to get around to downloading new drivers, but I don't think drivers will completely solve the problem.
     
    blurb23, Dec 2, 2008
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  4. dbam987

    dbam987 wicked-poster

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    dbam987, Dec 2, 2008
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  5. blurb23

    blurb23 Notebook Consultant

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    I looked into that, but for some reason, that causes the brightness/keyboard backlight to absolutely just freak out.

    Is that the only option?
     
    blurb23, Dec 2, 2008
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  6. ClearSkies

    ClearSkies Well no, I'm still here..

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    Undervolt your cpu with RMClock, which will help drop temps somewhat. Windows doesn't manage the cpu thermals as effectively as OSX.

    Speedfan doesn't detect a lot of newer motherboards that have come out over the past 2 years, so it's utility is minimal these days.
     
    ClearSkies, Dec 2, 2008
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  7. brain boy

    brain boy Notebook Geek

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    You could also run Windows XP under Parallels or vmware fusion in OSX, and the latter will regulate the temperature nicely. With the latest versions of both virtualization programs, there is a minimal trade-off in performance these days vs. running Windows native with Boot Camp.
     
    brain boy, Dec 3, 2008
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  8. blurb23

    blurb23 Notebook Consultant

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    I mainly use XP for some (light) gaming. Is it possible to do that now, or do your games still come out as glorified slide shows?

    I'm mainly looking at a 4-year old game (City of Heroes), so that's not too demanding. But still.

    I remember running XP through VMWare this past summer on my iMac, and it was horrible. Took Windows forever to load, let alone run programs.
     
    blurb23, Dec 3, 2008
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  9. dbam987

    dbam987 wicked-poster

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    According to your siggy, it says you have only 1 GB of memory on your iMac. Perhaps if you upgraded it to 2 GB at the very least you could get much better performance running games and Windows XP virtually.
     
    dbam987, Dec 3, 2008
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  10. blurb23

    blurb23 Notebook Consultant

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    D'oh. I forgot to change that. It actually has 2GB, 1GB dedicated to each OS.
     
    blurb23, Dec 3, 2008
    #10