The mod actually reliefs internal heat, so less stress on the battery. Then again, it is possible the solder junction might see a bit more stress with heat going upwards and thermal throttling not kicking in...in theory. Also less is more - not removing the original foam pad, just adding a bit of thermal pad next to it and 2 small ones on the large spreader...aaaand cleaning the traces up from the chassis and the spreaders with alcohol prior to warranty claim and you're golden. If rendering on a stand or desk, you might use pads on the outside as well. Or...13" Pro.
I have been using the aluminum tool at my job for almost 20 years now. It constantly gets near 120 - 150C. Yes it got scratched after all this time but not a sign of discoloration
Also an idea for a future video "5 free apps for your Macbook" Since so many people seem to be new to Macs because of the M1, i think it would be helpful.
Well done. What a useful and simple mod. This will actually boost the longevity of your device, dissipating heat is a good thing. Here’s a tip for anyone concerned about their battery, put kapton tape on the inside of the lid above the battery.
This video has come out at exactly the right time! I've been a pc user for ages, and the last 48h have converted me to mac lol, definitely getting an M1 Air! Cheers man!
To those curious, I spoke to Apple Support today and asked them specifically about this, and they told we are allowed to do it, BUT if do damage it while you are putting the pads on, then you're fucked, but if you do it without issue, then it does not void the warranty.
Guy, I’m from Brazil and I’ve just bought a Macbook M1. Your videos are helping me a lot! I could learn more about my new device while I’m practicing my English! Thanks for your content.
I’m confused with your recommendation. You said if I’m gonna use it extensively, don’t mod it. But if I’m not gonna use the Mac extensively, why try to cool it down?
Thermal Pad.The gap between the CPU heatsink and the bottom panel of 2016 Macbook Pro 13inch No touch bar , is 1.5mm. I measured it with a playdough and pressed in the back plate.
The cooling pad is for scenario where the M1 is under heavy load for a very long time like you mentioned at 5:00… I’m frustrated watching you not doing that.
The heat problem in the case or the battery problem can be solved by placing the MacBook Air on an aluminium disc about 4-5 mm thick and about 200 mm in diameter. The heat is then transferred to the desk via the rear casing, which heats up considerably, via the aluminium round plate that lies directly against the casing. This worked particularly well for me as my desk has a glass top and this absorbs the heat well. Wood alone may not be so good. In my case, the centre of the disc is roughly where the CPU is. This means that the disc protrudes slightly beyond the Macbook Air.
People have to get a basic understanding, that Li-on and Li-po batteries heat up when discharged, more so if discharged more rapidly. If your Mac throttles down itself because of thermal management, this means the battery starts do discharge slower = this leads to lower temperatures of. the battery itself. When you keep discharging it at higher loads and the thermals manage to keep the temps down and processor up -> battery will heat more because of this more so than the higher temperature chassis.
@@Sly1020 well I guess thats the point with the mod, if you do do some video rendering at 4k or heavy work, it improves heat transfer. but fro people like me, its basically pointless as I never fully hit the CPU
I did this to my MacBook Air when I got it a few months ago. I don't do a whole lot of high load stuff but I do play games from time to time it does get pretty hot on the bottom but even with it one my lap I can't feel it unless it touches bare skin.
yeah its not intel levels of heat, but the heat on the base is higher as its dissipating more into the bottom, than typical, the chip is running cooler, but the heat gotta go somewhere
Based on everything I’ve heard, I think I’m good with the standard config. I don’t do any intensive gaming on mine, apart from retro or emulated. I render my church videos, which I largely derive from portions that I pre-rendered and each episode is less than an hour and it STILL does an amazing job. I also write Python code and do web development, which is nothing. It’s great as it is! It’s not just for web-browsing and e-mail. You can do a whole lot with a MacBook Air very quickly if you work smart.
The worries about the battery are in warranted considering almost everything about the m1 macbook air is the same other than the chip and the Intel m1 Macs easily got hotter than the highest temps observed in the tests.
i think for normal use case scenario, this is not gonna be a problem for the battery. apple silicon is quite powerful handling normal operations, it barely heats up. when it does heats up doing some intensive work, i would put on one of those mobile cooling devices. i bet it would outperform the heat sink in the pro models. with my current base model M2, i don’t see the need to do this mod, but i plan to do this on my next macbook if the general structure stays the same (probably)
You can burn yourself with any temp over 47c, with enough time. Bear that in mind. If you find it gets too hot, say you’re gaming, you can use much smaller thermal pads for smaller gains. For me, with punchy workloads, 2-10 mins heavy tasks every so often, it’s a pretty sweet mod. Just be sensible.
Thank you for this follow-up. I first watched the mod on MaxTech and then found your video. But neither there nor here is the single most fundamental and important question answered; namely, do the batteries touch the removable bottom case? If the batteries don't touch, then the battery is clearly NOT affected at all by the mod. But if it does touch, even though it is lower down, there of course would be heat-related concerns for people who use this machine to edit video (which is a surprisingly large and growing number of people these days). So if you could please confirm if the battery touches the bottom case, that would be extremely helpful. I could then consider more intelligently if I wish to do the mod or not. Thank you!
I think what you care about is not whether the batteries touch the case or not. What you want to know if they are heated by the mod. The batteries do not touch the case, there is an air gap between the batteries and the case, and you can tell without opening by tapping the bottom of the device. Hear that hollow sound? I did the mod on my M1 Macbook Air and tested it. After 30 min of Cinebench without the mod, the batteries finished at 44.1°C (they started at 31.8°C). With the mod, on the same 30 min test, the batteries finished at 48.9°C. The batteries don't touch the case, but they do get a little bit of the heat because all of the machine gets a little bit of it. In my case the difference is 5°C (for the batteries). I should add that I live in a tropical climate, so my room temperature in both tests was 27°C exactly (regulated by an AC). Because my room temperature is higher, I did not get the 20% speedup on this test, but I did get a 18.6% speedup. My Cinebench score on the 30 min test, with the mod applied, is 7371. Without the mod it was 6214.
You don't understand the fundamentals. With the mod there is the heat spread across the bottom, the air outside has better convection, lower heat than the inside, so more of the energy is dissipated outward from the bottom sheet. Without the mod, there's just heat accumulating on the inside with less room for convection than in a rather thin double-glass window pane, but yes, the outer layer is alu at least. The panel is probably colder next to the batteries after the mod, bcs there's less heat trapped inside. Imagine a standard Intel laptop getting new thermal paste - even the remote corners get colder, as there's less heat dumped into the motherboard and more into the thermal pipe. So if you are concerned about the batteries, you can actually apply thermal pads to those, just on the sides adjacent to the 2 motherboard heat spreaders. Also be more conservative with the pads over the chip, just apply some further away from the batteries. Or go all in on the chips and apply pads to the middle or distant sides of the batteries. Apple basically insulates/cooks the inside to make the computer seem running cold on the outside (also to meet safety standards (see LTT video on this kind of mod). I'd suggest just applying 3 pads of 1 cm^2 (ca 1/2" * 1/2"), 1 next to the factory foam, 2 on the large spreader - those pads are 30 times better than air. The body might still be cool enough with the tradeoff of thermal throttling fairly soon but still a cooler inside environment, keyboard, and batteries. A good reason for the 13" M1 Pro IMO (that one is also very late with the fan but at least has one, not to mention it can take a mod like this as well (no need for it on the 8 GB model, though - can't strain the CPU/cooling enough without 16 GB of RAM).
@@fixups6536 couldn't it be the faster CPU was pumping more energy in a shorter time outward thanks to the better cooling it got? Thus also the whole system (better CPU times mean pushing RAM/SSD usage to the limits, too, shorter time means less self cooling of the components) draining more current from the batteries? Also where and how was the heat measured...infra thermometer on top and bottom plate and the batteries themselves. Also accumulated heat from the previous session is to be taken into account. But I might be wrong, ofc.
No, 3-7 minutes is not good. Conveying all the facts is best. Folks not wanting all the facts can find a dozen UA-camrs who provide entertainment-only videos that skip important details the rest of us really want to know.
It's unlikely for this mod to decrease longevity. Quite the opposite. The case gets hot, which *lowers* the temperature of the chips, which should *increase* longevity. As for the battery, the chips probably get extremely hot (like 90C+) without the mod and they are right next to the batter, so an unmodded mac probably puts more heat strain on the battery that is close to the GPU&CPU. The only drawback is that you feel the heat more on your lap, but the heat is always there inside the mac.
I did the mod, and the batteries do get hotter with the mod. By 5°C approximately, on a 30 minutes Cinebench test. Obviously, it's a very intensive test, it's like a worst case. In the Macbook, there is an air gap between the motherboard and the rest of the machine. The batteries are protected by this air gap. What the mod does, essentially, is to remove the air gap between the CPU and the bottom case. The batteries are still separated, because they do not touch the bottom case. HOWEVER, the bottom case heats up, and now it can heat the batteries up by convection and radiation. And this is exactly what happens, and the batteries do get a little hotter. I do not know if it's a problem for the batteries. However, you are right about the CPU. It takes much longer for it to reach its maximum temperature of 100°C, even under load. Running Cinebench, it takes less than one minute without the mod for the CPU to reach 100°C. With the mod, it takes 7.5 minutes to get to 99°C, and 9 minutes to reach 100°C. It means that unless the user runs very long and intensive tasks, the CPU will never reach it maximum temperature with the mod applied, which is much better for its longevity and reliability.
@@fixups6536 that would mean that because you’re drawing power longer the battery now becomes the stressed bottleneck. Upside could be that battery is replaceable, while the cpu/gpu aren’t.
@@janimalius Well that's a very good point, and honestly I had not thought about it. You mean that the batteries had to provide more energy, because the CPU could run at full speed longer, which makes them hotter and shorten a little bit their life. However, that's not what's happening in my tests, because the Macbook was plugged in and the batteries were charged at 100% before the test. So I believe the amount of heat they have generated during the test was very small, and most of the temperature difference was due to the mod letting a little bit more heat go from the CPU to the batteries. But you are right about the batteries being more stressed in the case the computer is not plugged in. I should have done that before/after test, but I can't do it anymore, because I don't want to undo and then redo the mod.
@@fixups6536 hm. Two things: 1. the cpu runs cooler, because it can channel heat to the case, which now transmits more heat to the outside. 2. The battery probably gets warm from the case then. As long as it’s not too warm this shouldn’t be an issue.
According to a website I saw 45c vs 35c will make your battery wear 30% faster. So 2 years of one cycle each day if we do 1000 total cycles vs 2.7 years But the original is still hotter than 35c. I assume it's only 15%? It's just a guess. And that's for EVERY CYCLE not just some of those cycles
for extreme used not recommend, i think. but for daily use and workhard sometime its save for everything. i mod my mba and use medium video editing, so far no problem...
Critics of this mod need to remember that this is a laptop. If you really need to serious rendering or number crunching, switch to a desktop. Laptop portability trades sustained performance.
For relatively short renders or computations, this is a very good mod. Without it, running Cinebench, the CPU reaches 100°C in less than a minute. With the mod, it took my CPU 7.5 minutes to get to 99°C, and 9 minutes to get to 100°C. The CPU throttles when it reaches around ~99°C, so if your computation lasts between 5 and 30 minutes, with the mod you gain between 15 and 20% of performance (that's what I measure in my tests). If you never do renders or long multi-core computations, the mod does not make any sense for you. If you do renders or long computations often, it does not make sense either, because the bottom case gets really hot (almost 60°C!) and it also heats the batteries up (by 5°C in my tests). But if you are in between, it's a very good mod.
Some say the display also heats up which sounds dangerous. Have you measured that? Also do you still have this mod and use the air? Is it showing any signs of wear?
This is good to know! My thermal pads are coming in on Tuesday and I’m pumped to get better performance! Lowkey kind nervous about the long term effects… I’ve turned my MacBook Air into my primary editing machine. 😅😅😅
Using more surface helps in spreading the heat over a larger area, so the part of the case that gets hot will reach a lower temperature. I'm getting close to 60°C on a small area of the bottom case on a 30 minutes Cinebench, and I guess you may reach higher temperatures because you are not spreading the heat.
@@fixups6536 i bet mine is as good as yours. I ran 1 hr test once and get the same result in the the video. There is no need to put too much pads in it. M1 doesn’t generate too much heat.
@@kris2501100 Yes I'm pretty sure you get the same heat dissipation, however it is possible that the hottest point on the bottom case has a higher temperature if the thermal pads have less surface. That's a minor point anyway: we should avoid touching that area when the computer is doing a very long and intensive task.
@@fixups6536 aluminum can dissipate heat horizontally quickly. Thermal pads have much higher thermal resistance. I won’t bother worrying about hotspots on the bottom plate.
I can see a fan attached to the bottom not working well but what about a large block of aluminum and another thermal pad? I bought everything to try it. Perhaps I will
I have stupid maybe but probably working idea. If you put this modded MacBook on some big radiator. It possibly could suck heat faster than just a fan-stand for laptop. Like radiators in gpu's etc. it can be also radiator with a fan. And probably because of that it would be heatlhier for Mac. I'm very curious how that kind of compassion would look like. Feel free to try it if you like it too : ) (only just please tell me when you do it, I would love to watch it).
2mm thermal pads work for the non-recessed part (that's what I have used). For the recessed part, you need to use a 3mm thermal pad, or you can stack two 1.5mm ones.
I never knew about this mod, this is very nice! and I saw the one with the notebook stands, but I imagine WHAT IF, those smartphones coolers would work on the modded Macbook Air! I got the Idea from seeing a Razer Phone Cooler Chroma video! :D
Apple has a reason to make the macbook air "worse" in thermal. If the heat leaked too fast from the SOC, the maximum temperature of the case in burst usage (normal usage) will be much higher compared to the "intentionally worse". Basic PDE can explain it.
@@berlin03030 yep, you should not do this. 1. Void the warranty 2. For burst usage, higher maximum temperature The only advantage is better temperature when on sustained load, but in that case, you should consider buying a macbook pro
@@berlin03030 btw, regarding the PDE, you can ask any of your friends who study maths, physics or engineering, they will explain to you. The comment section is too short.
@@broccoloodle "For burst usage, higher maximum temperature". The CPU is dramatically cooler with the mod, especially on short computations. The difference of temperature on the case is negligible in this scenario. For long, very long multi-core computations, the case will be hotter, and the mod does this by design to extract the heat from inside the machine, and the speed gain is around 20%. A very good compromise, if you ask me.
Hi, I wonder how the mod m1 mba doing after 1 year plus.... maybe you can make the video of it, it would be interesting. Because people still love m1 macbook air until now. you will help a lot and convince a lot of people who don't have that much money. Thanks if you want to make the video again.
Im running some Docker containers on the Macbook Air, figured the sweet spot is probably only to cover the CPU .. not gaming so unless I do some ML figuring the 1.5mm pad is probably overkill for me right? WRT The battery I think without modding there is probably more thermal stress on the battery - although it might not be throttling back when it gets hot .. its still removing more heat via the chassis instead of trapping it inside. (IMHO as a mechanical engineer)
This mod does nothing but raise the sustained power dissipation capability. If you bounce off the the thermal throttle limit of the CPU you might want this mod, but the intense loads it helps are not common. If you do run such intense loads you could do even more outside to contribute to cooling with a fan or even setting it on it's side or on a wet rag on a heat sink. It would be interesting to reproduce the mods capability with an external solution. You could have a game throne for your MBA that keeps the case at room temp for no throttling.
You cannot do that externally. Inside the M1 Macbook Air, there is an air gap all around the motherboard. The simplest way to get that heat to escape is to close that airgap with thermal pads.
Doesn't U.S. law protect you from warranty rejection over issues like this? The FTC warned companies like Nintendo, Sony and Microsoft about this with their consoles just a few years ago.
I'm thinking about buying the 8/256 M1 MB Air for starting a youtube channel where I'd work with mostly 1080p and maybe 2k videos. I was thinking about doing this mod and using kapton tape on the battery to avoid damage, and using external fan when rendering the videos. Do you think this is a good idea?
Hi, nice video! How much does gaming improve when applying this thermal mod? Is there any fps increase? Did you test anything to compare what it was before/ after? I am really interested in doing this mod too!
Basically the point is there is no need for this mod. You are basically increasing the battery temperature and making it too hot to the point it has to be use on the desktop. Why not get a mac mini unless you want to risk your $1k investment (Air).
I am surprised that laptop cooler has not much effect on the thermals. May I suggest using PC case fans instead, maybe static pressure fans because of the small space between the fans and the laptop base. See if it works better.
What if I were to put the thermal pad on the battery itself? Granted I kinda sound stupid saying that but I would like to hear yours or other peoples opinions.
UPDATE: I did this mod and have had my macbook sitting on my laptop fan which has 4 fans running constantly, noise isn't noticeable, and while exporting videos from resolve that are 1-2 hours long the cpu/gpu package never gets over 65 degrees. this is being read by the system through istats menu. considering the render that he did only 36 minutes before the mod, I think having the mod and laptop cooling fan would definitely help me because I have been using my MacBook to re encode my videos so that I can edit them on my PC. although there is only a 1-2% difference in performance for longer tasks like that, when the full time to encode is 1,2,3+ hours long 1-2% can mean quite a bit. Also considering I already have a cooling fan, its not like I'm going to be spending any more money than before.
My i3 MacBook Air gets hotter than the modded M1 does and all I have to do to get it there is open three safari tabs and have Spotify running in the background.
If you use a laptop cooling pad you won't just be increasing heatsink thermal mass, you'd have air blowing onto the bottom cover and taking away the heat that goes there. As for why Apple does not do this: it's not even just liability for injury, if it was just liability you can just write a warning on the device that it is not a literal LAPtop. What actually stops Apple - and many others, like why Dell would flip the motherboard on gaming notebooks so it just radiates upward through gaps in the keyboard or why Lenovo puts a lot of ventilation over the heatsinks past the fan intakes - is because there are actually US federal regulations on surface temperatures on electronics. Essentially, you can't even use thermal pads on a desktop PC to use the chassis as a heatsink. Yes, there are passive cooling PC cases, but those do not typically get sold as a complete computer and even when they do the market is very, very small, so statistically, that reduces the likelihood that anyone buying them doesn't understand how that works. So yeah. I'm less concerned that Apple does not do this and more miffed that Dell/Alienware gaming notebooks have the motherboard flipped. It doesn't help as much for cooling the CPU and GPU, it just heats the keyboard deck more, and if you're using the gaming notebook's built in keyboard you're probably not at home and not using a laptop cooling pad under it either. Won't be a problem if you're not gaming on it outside your home, but if you live in a hot enough climate just using these in a place without A/C is enough to make the keyboard deck uncomfortable (even if it's within federal guidelines).
I wonder if you can cut the thermal pads in half. Then you only get a partial benefit without the disadvantages? I wanna do it myself but I'm scared they could tell or that I'd forget it's there and send it for apple care I spent 180$ on
Can you try this with a cheap slim copper heatsink stuck at the bottom? I'll be sticking a riser underneath it and the plan is to help dissipation with 1 or 2 slim external heatsinks.
How does apple know that we had applied thermal pad to void the warranty as it is a reversible process. Does apple get to know that the back case was once removed?
What’s the point of doing the mod if you’re not going to game or render on it? It’s already fast for normal usage? I’d do the mod and would get apple care in any case.
Like I mentioned in the video, if you ever do any occasional rendering or gaming etc, you will see a decent boost in performance. Close to MacBook Pro levels but without the cost.
HI, have you noticed any speed gain while you only edit the footage or just in render times? I am tempted to try, but as all worried about warranty and if it is only visible speed gain in render times i would skip it. And if no glue residue is left on the heat sink by thermal pads, can they even tell that you opened the laptop?
The video recommends 1.5mm and 3mm, but I have used 2mm and 3mm. I believe the 2mm pad makes better contact with the case. The 3mm goes in the recessed part.
I wanna custom make a CNC machine or cut version of the bottom panel that has holes etc but also doesn't let the heat transfer to near the battery and keeps in in the top have of the bottom panel. I sadly am broke and a college student so I have no free time. but it'd be so cool if you could also design the bottom panel a bit like a heatsink
IMO this just isn't worth it because simply the air is already super fast. Definitely not a bad thing to do it but when it comes to the warranty I just don't think it's worth it. Once warranty goes away I might do this because I would assume it would (technically maybe not noticeably) extend the life span of the soc.
I use an external monitor and I am engineering student. I use heavy app like autoCad and most of the time using excel, browsing and Matlab for studying. Should I modding the MacBook air or not?
I will try a normal external laptop cooling pad with fan first, looking how it compares to yours since it's the same machine. I think normal cooling helps as well, only downside is you have the external cooling pad and fan. And it's probably even better if you use the internal cooling pads + external fan, may going to try this out later
There is an air gap around the motherboard of the Macbook air. For this reason, the heat cannot escape easily. Apple did this to prevent the bottom case to get too hot. Because of this air gap, trying to cool the machine with an external fan will not work. The mod closes the air gap so the heat can escape to the bottom case.
Check out Ekster using this link: ekster.com/CreatedLabs
which is better between macbook pro m1 8gb 512 or macbook air 16gb 256 with a similar price?
The mod actually reliefs internal heat, so less stress on the battery. Then again, it is possible the solder junction might see a bit more stress with heat going upwards and thermal throttling not kicking in...in theory.
Also less is more - not removing the original foam pad, just adding a bit of thermal pad next to it and 2 small ones on the large spreader...aaaand cleaning the traces up from the chassis and the spreaders with alcohol prior to warranty claim and you're golden. If rendering on a stand or desk, you might use pads on the outside as well.
Or...13" Pro.
Jakiej grubości zastosowałeś termopady do MacBooka Air M1
Jakiej grubości zastosowałeś termopady do MacBooka Air M1
Can't believe people think the case would get discolored with just 50c of heat lol. The old Intel ones hit that in 5 seconds
Giving that it's oxidised aluminium, I doubt if it would ever get discoloured unless you throw it into a smelter.
Like all of sudden the aluminium, is now not able to handle 50-60C heat, even though the intel units idle around 50C and hit the high 90C's
Yes the intel ones get hot just by watching UA-cam on safari
I have been using the aluminum tool at my job for almost 20 years now. It constantly gets near 120 - 150C. Yes it got scratched after all this time but not a sign of discoloration
My old MacBook from 2007 hits 105c of heat. And it still works . 😂
Also an idea for a future video
"5 free apps for your Macbook"
Since so many people seem to be new to Macs because of the M1, i think it would be helpful.
Bruh you’re worried about this burning your lap, wait till you put that last intel air on your lap. You can feel your skin melting away.
Holy shit, it's been 6 months already!!??? It feels like only 3 months
2022 in less than 6 months!
@@mrjla6256 in less than 3 now
Crazy…..
Well done. What a useful and simple mod. This will actually boost the longevity of your device, dissipating heat is a good thing. Here’s a tip for anyone concerned about their battery, put kapton tape on the inside of the lid above the battery.
what is it
That wont make the battery hot like insulate it right?
@@Thistasteslikeass Kapton tape is an insulator that can handle high amounts of heat.
@@dakotahchaplow7393 The battery in an M1 won't be generating heat.
@@FixTechStuff good suggestion sir
This video has come out at exactly the right time! I've been a pc user for ages, and the last 48h have converted me to mac lol, definitely getting an M1 Air! Cheers man!
To those curious, I spoke to Apple Support today and asked them specifically about this, and they told we are allowed to do it, BUT if do damage it while you are putting the pads on, then you're fucked, but if you do it without issue, then it does not void the warranty.
If you don’t have it on paper, it’s worthless.
@@volkhen0 Can you say "Saved Chat History."
@@terrybogard21 He did type "spoke"
I did this mod also, and actually u can put extra pad on that alluminum shell also and use a metal laptop stand
I said that in the previous video and people were like. No that's not usable at all. Lol.
do you mean stick the pad on the inside of the shell to be able to touch the cpu and gpu instead of directly on the cpu and gpu?
@@djboogie4561 nope, he meant on the outside of the shell to transfer it better from the shell to the aluminum cooler
@@Ezio470 oh wow thats genius, have you tried it? is it really working?
Guy, I’m from Brazil and I’ve just bought a Macbook M1. Your videos are helping me a lot! I could learn more about my new device while I’m practicing my English! Thanks for your content.
For the cooling pad. I wish you checked the battery etc temperature with the cooling pad instead of performance
I’m confused with your recommendation. You said if I’m gonna use it extensively, don’t mod it. But if I’m not gonna use the Mac extensively, why try to cool it down?
Thermal Pad.The gap between the CPU heatsink and the bottom panel of 2016 Macbook Pro 13inch No touch bar , is 1.5mm. I measured it with a playdough and pressed in the back plate.
The cooling pad is for scenario where the M1 is under heavy load for a very long time like you mentioned at 5:00… I’m frustrated watching you not doing that.
The heat problem in the case or the battery problem can be solved by placing the MacBook Air on an aluminium disc about 4-5 mm thick and about 200 mm in diameter. The heat is then transferred to the desk via the rear casing, which heats up considerably, via the aluminium round plate that lies directly against the casing. This worked particularly well for me as my desk has a glass top and this absorbs the heat well. Wood alone may not be so good. In my case, the centre of the disc is roughly where the CPU is. This means that the disc protrudes slightly beyond the Macbook Air.
People have to get a basic understanding, that Li-on and Li-po batteries heat up when discharged, more so if discharged more rapidly. If your Mac throttles down itself because of thermal management, this means the battery starts do discharge slower = this leads to lower temperatures of. the battery itself. When you keep discharging it at higher loads and the thermals manage to keep the temps down and processor up -> battery will heat more because of this more so than the higher temperature chassis.
Mine has been fine with the mod, I even have a case on it and it never gets hot
@@Sly1020 well I guess thats the point with the mod, if you do do some video rendering at 4k or heavy work, it improves heat transfer.
but fro people like me, its basically pointless as I never fully hit the CPU
I did this to my MacBook Air when I got it a few months ago. I don't do a whole lot of high load stuff but I do play games from time to time it does get pretty hot on the bottom but even with it one my lap I can't feel it unless it touches bare skin.
yeah its not intel levels of heat, but the heat on the base is higher as its dissipating more into the bottom, than typical, the chip is running cooler, but the heat gotta go somewhere
did you notice any kind of anormal battery degradation?
First mentioned"Don't this if you are rendering or gaming;" then saying: "i saw the the biggest gains in rendering and gaming" 😂
dont do it or do it?
You can strategically place less or more thermal pads to balance heat and performance.
Based on everything I’ve heard, I think I’m good with the standard config. I don’t do any intensive gaming on mine, apart from retro or emulated. I render my church videos, which I largely derive from portions that I pre-rendered and each episode is less than an hour and it STILL does an amazing job. I also write Python code and do web development, which is nothing. It’s great as it is! It’s not just for web-browsing and e-mail. You can do a whole lot with a MacBook Air very quickly if you work smart.
From mod to problems to personal recommendations to comparison to cost, that was complete and thorogh.
The worries about the battery are in warranted considering almost everything about the m1 macbook air is the same other than the chip and the Intel m1 Macs easily got hotter than the highest temps observed in the tests.
Intel m1?
Makes the keyboard cooler.
It cannot void the warranty. You would simply remove the mod when taking it in.
Keep up with the M1 Macbook Air content, loving it!
i think for normal use case scenario, this is not gonna be a problem for the battery. apple silicon is quite powerful handling normal operations, it barely heats up.
when it does heats up doing some intensive work, i would put on one of those mobile cooling devices. i bet it would outperform the heat sink in the pro models.
with my current base model M2, i don’t see the need to do this mod, but i plan to do this on my next macbook if the general structure stays the same (probably)
You can burn yourself with any temp over 47c, with enough time. Bear that in mind. If you find it gets too hot, say you’re gaming, you can use much smaller thermal pads for smaller gains. For me, with punchy workloads, 2-10 mins heavy tasks every so often, it’s a pretty sweet mod. Just be sensible.
Thank you for this follow-up. I first watched the mod on MaxTech and then found your video. But neither there nor here is the single most fundamental and important question answered; namely, do the batteries touch the removable bottom case? If the batteries don't touch, then the battery is clearly NOT affected at all by the mod. But if it does touch, even though it is lower down, there of course would be heat-related concerns for people who use this machine to edit video (which is a surprisingly large and growing number of people these days). So if you could please confirm if the battery touches the bottom case, that would be extremely helpful. I could then consider more intelligently if I wish to do the mod or not. Thank you!
If it did, couldnt you place a very thin strip of something heat reflective over the battery
@@WhiskeyWelk a thermal pad in batt?
I think what you care about is not whether the batteries touch the case or not. What you want to know if they are heated by the mod.
The batteries do not touch the case, there is an air gap between the batteries and the case, and you can tell without opening by tapping the bottom of the device. Hear that hollow sound?
I did the mod on my M1 Macbook Air and tested it. After 30 min of Cinebench without the mod, the batteries finished at 44.1°C (they started at 31.8°C). With the mod, on the same 30 min test, the batteries finished at 48.9°C. The batteries don't touch the case, but they do get a little bit of the heat because all of the machine gets a little bit of it. In my case the difference is 5°C (for the batteries). I should add that I live in a tropical climate, so my room temperature in both tests was 27°C exactly (regulated by an AC).
Because my room temperature is higher, I did not get the 20% speedup on this test, but I did get a 18.6% speedup. My Cinebench score on the 30 min test, with the mod applied, is 7371. Without the mod it was 6214.
You don't understand the fundamentals. With the mod there is the heat spread across the bottom, the air outside has better convection, lower heat than the inside, so more of the energy is dissipated outward from the bottom sheet.
Without the mod, there's just heat accumulating on the inside with less room for convection than in a rather thin double-glass window pane, but yes, the outer layer is alu at least.
The panel is probably colder next to the batteries after the mod, bcs there's less heat trapped inside.
Imagine a standard Intel laptop getting new thermal paste - even the remote corners get colder, as there's less heat dumped into the motherboard and more into the thermal pipe.
So if you are concerned about the batteries, you can actually apply thermal pads to those, just on the sides adjacent to the 2 motherboard heat spreaders. Also be more conservative with the pads over the chip, just apply some further away from the batteries. Or go all in on the chips and apply pads to the middle or distant sides of the batteries.
Apple basically insulates/cooks the inside to make the computer seem running cold on the outside (also to meet safety standards (see LTT video on this kind of mod).
I'd suggest just applying 3 pads of 1 cm^2 (ca 1/2" * 1/2"), 1 next to the factory foam, 2 on the large spreader - those pads are 30 times better than air. The body might still be cool enough with the tradeoff of thermal throttling fairly soon but still a cooler inside environment, keyboard, and batteries.
A good reason for the 13" M1 Pro IMO (that one is also very late with the fan but at least has one, not to mention it can take a mod like this as well (no need for it on the 8 GB model, though - can't strain the CPU/cooling enough without 16 GB of RAM).
@@fixups6536 couldn't it be the faster CPU was pumping more energy in a shorter time outward thanks to the better cooling it got? Thus also the whole system (better CPU times mean pushing RAM/SSD usage to the limits, too, shorter time means less self cooling of the components) draining more current from the batteries? Also where and how was the heat measured...infra thermometer on top and bottom plate and the batteries themselves.
Also accumulated heat from the previous session is to be taken into account. But I might be wrong, ofc.
I really like your quick videos. Just some feedback. 3-7 min is good.
No, 3-7 minutes is not good. Conveying all the facts is best. Folks not wanting all the facts can find a dozen UA-camrs who provide entertainment-only videos that skip important details the rest of us really want to know.
I was actually really looking forward to this information! Thank you for making this video and all of your other absolutely amazing work!!
Correct me if I'm wrong, but it doesn't generate more heat with the mod. It just displaces the same amount to the chassis...
No it gets more hot but at the process it makes the cpu cooler
It's unlikely for this mod to decrease longevity. Quite the opposite. The case gets hot, which *lowers* the temperature of the chips, which should *increase* longevity.
As for the battery, the chips probably get extremely hot (like 90C+) without the mod and they are right next to the batter, so an unmodded mac probably puts more heat strain on the battery that is close to the GPU&CPU.
The only drawback is that you feel the heat more on your lap, but the heat is always there inside the mac.
I did the mod, and the batteries do get hotter with the mod. By 5°C approximately, on a 30 minutes Cinebench test. Obviously, it's a very intensive test, it's like a worst case.
In the Macbook, there is an air gap between the motherboard and the rest of the machine. The batteries are protected by this air gap.
What the mod does, essentially, is to remove the air gap between the CPU and the bottom case. The batteries are still separated, because they do not touch the bottom case. HOWEVER, the bottom case heats up, and now it can heat the batteries up by convection and radiation. And this is exactly what happens, and the batteries do get a little hotter.
I do not know if it's a problem for the batteries. However, you are right about the CPU. It takes much longer for it to reach its maximum temperature of 100°C, even under load. Running Cinebench, it takes less than one minute without the mod for the CPU to reach 100°C. With the mod, it takes 7.5 minutes to get to 99°C, and 9 minutes to reach 100°C. It means that unless the user runs very long and intensive tasks, the CPU will never reach it maximum temperature with the mod applied, which is much better for its longevity and reliability.
@@fixups6536 that would mean that because you’re drawing power longer the battery now becomes the stressed bottleneck. Upside could be that battery is replaceable, while the cpu/gpu aren’t.
@@janimalius Well that's a very good point, and honestly I had not thought about it. You mean that the batteries had to provide more energy, because the CPU could run at full speed longer, which makes them hotter and shorten a little bit their life. However, that's not what's happening in my tests, because the Macbook was plugged in and the batteries were charged at 100% before the test. So I believe the amount of heat they have generated during the test was very small, and most of the temperature difference was due to the mod letting a little bit more heat go from the CPU to the batteries.
But you are right about the batteries being more stressed in the case the computer is not plugged in. I should have done that before/after test, but I can't do it anymore, because I don't want to undo and then redo the mod.
@@fixups6536 hm. Two things: 1. the cpu runs cooler, because it can channel heat to the case, which now transmits more heat to the outside. 2. The battery probably gets warm from the case then. As long as it’s not too warm this shouldn’t be an issue.
According to a website I saw 45c vs 35c will make your battery wear 30% faster. So 2 years of one cycle each day if we do 1000 total cycles vs 2.7 years
But the original is still hotter than 35c. I assume it's only 15%? It's just a guess. And that's for EVERY CYCLE not just some of those cycles
for extreme used not recommend, i think. but for daily use and workhard sometime its save for everything. i mod my mba and use medium video editing, so far no problem...
Critics of this mod need to remember that this is a laptop. If you really need to serious rendering or number crunching, switch to a desktop. Laptop portability trades sustained performance.
For relatively short renders or computations, this is a very good mod. Without it, running Cinebench, the CPU reaches 100°C in less than a minute. With the mod, it took my CPU 7.5 minutes to get to 99°C, and 9 minutes to get to 100°C. The CPU throttles when it reaches around ~99°C, so if your computation lasts between 5 and 30 minutes, with the mod you gain between 15 and 20% of performance (that's what I measure in my tests).
If you never do renders or long multi-core computations, the mod does not make any sense for you. If you do renders or long computations often, it does not make sense either, because the bottom case gets really hot (almost 60°C!) and it also heats the batteries up (by 5°C in my tests). But if you are in between, it's a very good mod.
@@fixups6536 your comment is very make sense.. thanks… and if I do gaming on mba M1.. for 4-5 hours.. how to turn heat down… any idea?
@@LDRepmaybe use a laptop cooling pad i think. I’m about to apply this mod too
can you do a 12" macbook in 2021 video ? and also if a mod like this makes sense for the 12", considering it's also a fanless design.
i used to have one and that shit burned me even without a mod. would not recommend
Some say the display also heats up which sounds dangerous. Have you measured that?
Also do you still have this mod and use the air? Is it showing any signs of wear?
This is good to know! My thermal pads are coming in on Tuesday and I’m pumped to get better performance!
Lowkey kind nervous about the long term effects… I’ve turned my MacBook Air into my primary editing machine. 😅😅😅
Just put a Kapton tape above where the battery is being placed, and see if it’s working for you
i only used 1.5mm thermal pads and left the recessed area untouched. cinebench multicore scroe for 10min is 7781 and it's pretty decent.
Using more surface helps in spreading the heat over a larger area, so the part of the case that gets hot will reach a lower temperature. I'm getting close to 60°C on a small area of the bottom case on a 30 minutes Cinebench, and I guess you may reach higher temperatures because you are not spreading the heat.
@@fixups6536 i bet mine is as good as yours. I ran 1 hr test once and get the same result in the the video. There is no need to put too much pads in it. M1 doesn’t generate too much heat.
@@kris2501100 Yes I'm pretty sure you get the same heat dissipation, however it is possible that the hottest point on the bottom case has a higher temperature if the thermal pads have less surface. That's a minor point anyway: we should avoid touching that area when the computer is doing a very long and intensive task.
@@fixups6536 aluminum can dissipate heat horizontally quickly. Thermal pads have much higher thermal resistance. I won’t bother worrying about hotspots on the bottom plate.
Did this mod on my 13inch m2 air, what I like the most about it it takes it much longer before it throttles
I can see a fan attached to the bottom not working well but what about a large block of aluminum and another thermal pad? I bought everything to try it. Perhaps I will
macbook air after this mod gets as hot as a 3d printer bed
About the warranty, there is no way apple is going to notice it, if it brakes, just remove the pads and u done
If you have any old gpus lying around that you don't use, they might contain thermal pads which you could use.
I have stupid maybe but probably working idea. If you put this modded MacBook on some big radiator. It possibly could suck heat faster than just a fan-stand for laptop. Like radiators in gpu's etc. it can be also radiator with a fan. And probably because of that it would be heatlhier for Mac.
I'm very curious how that kind of compassion would look like. Feel free to try it if you like it too : ) (only just please tell me when you do it, I would love to watch it).
Did u use 2mm thermal pads? Which brand should I buy? Any recommendations?
2mm thermal pads work for the non-recessed part (that's what I have used). For the recessed part, you need to use a 3mm thermal pad, or you can stack two 1.5mm ones.
Sir, what if apply thermal pad mod on PRO?! FANS + PADS = super chilled macbook🥶.
Air works for pro devs also 🔥🔥🔥
I never knew about this mod, this is very nice! and I saw the one with the notebook stands, but I imagine WHAT IF, those smartphones coolers would work on the modded Macbook Air!
I got the Idea from seeing a Razer Phone Cooler Chroma video! :D
Apple has a reason to make the macbook air "worse" in thermal. If the heat leaked too fast from the SOC, the maximum temperature of the case in burst usage (normal usage) will be much higher compared to the "intentionally worse". Basic PDE can explain it.
@@berlin03030 yep, you should not do this.
1. Void the warranty
2. For burst usage, higher maximum temperature
The only advantage is better temperature when on sustained load, but in that case, you should consider buying a macbook pro
@@berlin03030 btw, regarding the PDE, you can ask any of your friends who study maths, physics or engineering, they will explain to you. The comment section is too short.
@@broccoloodle "For burst usage, higher maximum temperature". The CPU is dramatically cooler with the mod, especially on short computations. The difference of temperature on the case is negligible in this scenario. For long, very long multi-core computations, the case will be hotter, and the mod does this by design to extract the heat from inside the machine, and the speed gain is around 20%. A very good compromise, if you ask me.
@@fixups6536 "For burst usage, higher maximum temperature" - on the case.
Apple 100% patching this with the new MacBooks coming to WWDC
Hi, I wonder how the mod m1 mba doing after 1 year plus.... maybe you can make the video of it, it would be interesting. Because people still love m1 macbook air until now. you will help a lot and convince a lot of people who don't have that much money. Thanks if you want to make the video again.
Im running some Docker containers on the Macbook Air, figured the sweet spot is probably only to cover the CPU .. not gaming so unless I do some ML figuring the 1.5mm pad is probably overkill for me right? WRT The battery I think without modding there is probably more thermal stress on the battery - although it might not be throttling back when it gets hot .. its still removing more heat via the chassis instead of trapping it inside. (IMHO as a mechanical engineer)
This mod does nothing but raise the sustained power dissipation capability. If you bounce off the the thermal throttle limit of the CPU you might want this mod, but the intense loads it helps are not common. If you do run such intense loads you could do even more outside to contribute to cooling with a fan or even setting it on it's side or on a wet rag on a heat sink. It would be interesting to reproduce the mods capability with an external solution. You could have a game throne for your MBA that keeps the case at room temp for no throttling.
He literally placed it on a cooling pad with a fan and it made no difference.
You cannot do that externally. Inside the M1 Macbook Air, there is an air gap all around the motherboard. The simplest way to get that heat to escape is to close that airgap with thermal pads.
Doesn't U.S. law protect you from warranty rejection over issues like this? The FTC warned companies like Nintendo, Sony and Microsoft about this with their consoles just a few years ago.
I'm thinking about buying the 8/256 M1 MB Air for starting a youtube channel where I'd work with mostly 1080p and maybe 2k videos. I was thinking about doing this mod and using kapton tape on the battery to avoid damage, and using external fan when rendering the videos. Do you think this is a good idea?
I wanna buy a cooling mat/pad alongside this so that when Im doing heavy work at home it doesn't heat the other components and cools the battery etc
Is it still worth it for daily light use? Office, web browsing etc.
Hi, nice video! How much does gaming improve when applying this thermal mod? Is there any fps increase? Did you test anything to compare what it was before/ after? I am really interested in doing this mod too!
it increases by at least 15%
Basically the point is there is no need for this mod. You are basically increasing the battery temperature and making it too hot to the point it has to be use on the desktop. Why not get a mac mini unless you want to risk your $1k investment (Air).
This mod is very useful, thank you.
I am surprised that laptop cooler has not much effect on the thermals. May I suggest using PC case fans instead, maybe static pressure fans because of the small space between the fans and the laptop base. See if it works better.
he already did this,
Did you remove the square pad that’s attached to the backplate and replaced it with the thick thermo pad or did you keep the pad in place?
Thank goodness for sponsor block skipping sponsor sections
What if I were to put the thermal pad on the battery itself? Granted I kinda sound stupid saying that but I would like to hear yours or other peoples opinions.
That could be good if the processor dosent heat all the time
UPDATE: I did this mod and have had my macbook sitting on my laptop fan which has 4 fans running constantly, noise isn't noticeable, and while exporting videos from resolve that are 1-2 hours long the cpu/gpu package never gets over 65 degrees. this is being read by the system through istats menu.
considering the render that he did only 36 minutes before the mod, I think having the mod and laptop cooling fan would definitely help me because I have been using my MacBook to re encode my videos so that I can edit them on my PC. although there is only a 1-2% difference in performance for longer tasks like that, when the full time to encode is 1,2,3+ hours long 1-2% can mean quite a bit.
Also considering I already have a cooling fan, its not like I'm going to be spending any more money than before.
What size did you use, 3 mm
Thanks for the help in your discord Liam! :)
Thanks for the video Liam 👍
Could a .5mm silicone sheet be used as a heat buffer between the battery and back case?
You are going to heat the battery up. Leave the air gap as it is.
its quite "cool" yes of course. i thnk your macbook will live longer helping it control heat.
You can damage the battery as it is rated to around 35C.
That can’t possibly be correct. It’s easy to get over that in normal usage.
My i3 MacBook Air gets hotter than the modded M1 does and all I have to do to get it there is open three safari tabs and have Spotify running in the background.
could be interesting to glue thin vapor chamber pipes inside to back plate away from the heat source
If you use a laptop cooling pad you won't just be increasing heatsink thermal mass, you'd have air blowing onto the bottom cover and taking away the heat that goes there.
As for why Apple does not do this: it's not even just liability for injury, if it was just liability you can just write a warning on the device that it is not a literal LAPtop. What actually stops Apple - and many others, like why Dell would flip the motherboard on gaming notebooks so it just radiates upward through gaps in the keyboard or why Lenovo puts a lot of ventilation over the heatsinks past the fan intakes - is because there are actually US federal regulations on surface temperatures on electronics. Essentially, you can't even use thermal pads on a desktop PC to use the chassis as a heatsink. Yes, there are passive cooling PC cases, but those do not typically get sold as a complete computer and even when they do the market is very, very small, so statistically, that reduces the likelihood that anyone buying them doesn't understand how that works.
So yeah. I'm less concerned that Apple does not do this and more miffed that Dell/Alienware gaming notebooks have the motherboard flipped. It doesn't help as much for cooling the CPU and GPU, it just heats the keyboard deck more, and if you're using the gaming notebook's built in keyboard you're probably not at home and not using a laptop cooling pad under it either. Won't be a problem if you're not gaming on it outside your home, but if you live in a hot enough climate just using these in a place without A/C is enough to make the keyboard deck uncomfortable (even if it's within federal guidelines).
I wonder if you can cut the thermal pads in half. Then you only get a partial benefit without the disadvantages? I wanna do it myself but I'm scared they could tell or that I'd forget it's there and send it for apple care I spent 180$ on
Can you try this with a cheap slim copper heatsink stuck at the bottom? I'll be sticking a riser underneath it and the plan is to help dissipation with 1 or 2 slim external heatsinks.
Would using 2mm thermal pads work? (It’s what I have to hand without ordering more)
How does apple know that we had applied thermal pad to void the warranty as it is a reversible process. Does apple get to know that the back case was once removed?
I believe one screw has that blue material that peels off when you unscrewn it, but someone with the mac can confirm
@@alethom_ that blue material is just a thread locker ... if you don't strip a screw there's zero chance for Apple geniuses to know
Another like, practical advice, bring on more like videos
Great video. Take it easy with all the hand movement. Bizarrely distracting amount of moving your hands around.
What’s the point of doing the mod if you’re not going to game or render on it? It’s already fast for normal usage? I’d do the mod and would get apple care in any case.
Like I mentioned in the video, if you ever do any occasional rendering or gaming etc, you will see a decent boost in performance. Close to MacBook Pro levels but without the cost.
and i am still thinking to do it.
HI, have you noticed any speed gain while you only edit the footage or just in render times? I am tempted to try, but as all worried about warranty and if it is only visible speed gain in render times i would skip it. And if no glue residue is left on the heat sink by thermal pads, can they even tell that you opened the laptop?
hey I have a MacBook Air, thx for this video
Battery several issues with that MOD ⚠️
will blowing strong wind on bottom hot chassis help cpu more cooler ?
So how thick should the thermal pad be for maximum performance?
how much is the thickness of pads? also what size(dimensions) is needed?
The video recommends 1.5mm and 3mm, but I have used 2mm and 3mm. I believe the 2mm pad makes better contact with the case. The 3mm goes in the recessed part.
What if I put another thermal pad on outside .. and stick it with heat absorber aluminum for processor..? Will it help on cooling down M1 bottom ..?
I press like simply for saying "Aluminium" the right way
I wanna custom make a CNC machine or cut version of the bottom panel that has holes etc but also doesn't let the heat transfer to near the battery and keeps in in the top have of the bottom panel. I sadly am broke and a college student so I have no free time.
but it'd be so cool if you could also design the bottom panel a bit like a heatsink
How about thermal pads on the heatsink and thin styrofoam over the batteries?
IMO this just isn't worth it because simply the air is already super fast. Definitely not a bad thing to do it but when it comes to the warranty I just don't think it's worth it. Once warranty goes away I might do this because I would assume it would (technically maybe not noticeably) extend the life span of the soc.
I use an external monitor and I am engineering student. I use heavy app like autoCad and most of the time using excel, browsing and Matlab for studying. Should I modding the MacBook air or not?
For AutoCAD I personally didn’t see a lot of heat even with big DWG file and multiple light app open on the side. (Team, outlook, Safaris...)
How much gain would you get if you mod a MacBook pro?
So you noticed a lot of performance gains in the areas, that you do not recommend the mod for if you do that a lot. Ok.
Can this also affect battery life in positive way?
Interesting question. I've always heard a cold lipo battery isn't a good thing and it can get pretty cold where I live!
Waiting for the 1 year review 👀
I will try a normal external laptop cooling pad with fan first, looking how it compares to yours since it's the same machine. I think normal cooling helps as well, only downside is you have the external cooling pad and fan.
And it's probably even better if you use the internal cooling pads + external fan, may going to try this out later
There is an air gap around the motherboard of the Macbook air. For this reason, the heat cannot escape easily. Apple did this to prevent the bottom case to get too hot. Because of this air gap, trying to cool the machine with an external fan will not work.
The mod closes the air gap so the heat can escape to the bottom case.
If we don’t blame Apple for not using the thermal mod, then should we blame them for using an aluminum chasy?
Is it just the basemodel? I have 16gb 512gb