The M2 MacBook Air is a passively cooled device. Passive cooling offers the advantage of more or less silent operation, and space can also be saved in the case. However, the correct design of passive cooling is essential for correct performance development, otherwise throttling can and must occur to protect the components, i.e. the thermally induced lowering of the clock frequency and thus a loss of performance.
Now it turns out that the M2 MacBook Air clearly has significant scope for optimization. So shows max tech in a recent video that the performance can be significantly increased with a small modification. The impetus for this modification was the realization that Apple does not use a heat exchanger or a vapor chamber between the mainboard and the case, but there is a plate for electromagnetic shielding – which does not transfer heat optimally.
The modification now consists of opening the case and sticking on cheap available thermal pads (affiliate link). Although the thermal pads are thicker, the assembly works without any problems.
In fact, there is a reduction in temperature and an increase in performance. In a real-world benchmark – namely the export of images to Lightroom – the time required is now only 1 minute and 56 seconds – before the modification it took almost three minutes. Even the M2 MacBook Pro is beaten by four seconds. The score also increases from 7542 to 8151 points in the synthetic Cinebench R23 benchmark.
The difference is also clearly visible in 3DMark, in which the throttling with the modification only starts in the eighth instead of the fourth run. Even if the modification can basically also be implemented by laypeople, users should consider that any warranty claims are likely to be void as a result of the modification and side effects cannot be ruled out.
I’ve been a journalist for over ten years, most of it in the field of technology. I worked for Tom’s Hardware and ComputerBase, among others, and since 2017 I’ve also worked for Notebookcheck. My current focus is in particular on mini PCs and single-board computers such as the Raspberry Pi – i.e. compact systems with many possibilities. In addition, there is a soft spot for all kinds of wearables and especially for smartwatches. I work full-time as a laboratory engineer, which is why I’m not far from scientific contexts or the interpretation of complex measurements.
Tag: macbook issue, macbook pro, macbook release, macbook macos