MacBook Pro overheating (13 2.4GHz Late 2011)

[Du1point8]

My macbook pro seems to go into melt down, its spec is:

13"
2.4GHz
Late 2011
Upgraded 1TB HDD (Original Toshiba failure).
Upgraded 16GB RAM
Brand new Anker battery (Original was due a change).

Issue I now have is that certain things are causing the CPU usage to jump to 95-110% and cause the fans to kick in, I have got Macs Fan Control to allow the fans to kick in at 50 degrees an try to limit the max temp to 85 degrees.

This is annoying as I know the thing runs hot anyway as the unibody is the heat sink, but Im looking at trying to fix this before frying something.

I have got Safari running and its mostly this which goes into beast mode, I thought it was originally the hidden trackers and crap that are running in the background, so I turned them all off, it seemed to work for a while, but now safari just jumps to 100% every now and again for no bloody reason.

Help, I don't want to fry this laptop and have to find another.

Would making more space, like take out the superdrive help with the heat?

Would getting a cooling pad help?

[Du1point8]

Chrome won't work on the wifi network Im on (work) and Firefox is reserved for other activities as it has all my proxies installed and Im not turning them off and on every day.

Safari is being a PITA... I thought I had turned off flash, but will check.

Genius person in Sydney suggested I should format the HD and start again using Time capsule.

Would rather do that as a last resort.

[Du1point8]

Evolved said:

Check activity monitor, it should be the first thing to check when looking for resource hogs.

Thats the issue, seeing Safari at 100% all the time is not going to show me anything so that doesnt help.

I know its safari, safari knows its me that is going to kill it, I want to know how to get inside safari and get it to behave.

New one I have just done that will probably bite me in the arse is go into System Preferences > Flash Player > Storage > Click ask me instead of allow anyone.

Seems to have calmed down a touch now.

(Safari still gets a 1/5th way across on a load, then has a think before finishing).

[Du1point8]

Also turned off JS... will turn it on when back home and can do more tests.

[Du1point8]

ZesPak said:

What OS are you running? My 2011 MBA had similar issues on El Capitan, reverted it to Yosimite before giving it away which solved the overheating/fan issues.

El Capitan 10.11.4.

Since removing Flash players ability to store random ste without asking me, its calmed down and 10 times better, the fans still kicking in earlier than before as I have the fans coming on at 50 degrees (Macs Fan Control).... however mine is chugging away running a scan looking for viruses and is now calmer. Even though that is quite intensive and I have safari running too.

So I would remove the flash player ability and it kind of behaves.

[Du1point8]

Evolved said:

Running trying to find virus's? With what?

In 22 years of using macs I've never once had a virus and certainly never had to search for one.

This cleans up all the phishing viruses I get into one location.

Never click on the emails and have rules in place, but some always get through so I like to clean up every now and again.

[Du1point8]

Olivero said:

When you last opened it up did you clean the fans of dust? Well worth doing.

You might also want to instal CleanMyMac to give your machine a good once over.

Thats not the issue, its when using browsers.

However I have found another issue with the mac.

The solution is to turn Flash Player off... however the little fker turns itself back on again.

Specifically, I have it set to ask me to approve whether a Flash plug-in or player can store data on my computer. For a while it works. Then, at some point, I find it has changed to Allow Sites to save data on my computer when I did not set it as so. Why is this happening?

I do not know, could the program be that stty that when I clear out history/data stored/cached data... that Flash innocently resets itself, in which case that is a stty bug and sounds like Adobe know about it but do not fix it claiming that the clear out resets the settings, doesnt do it on any other settings on the macbook or any other browser based systems... Only Allow Sites to save data on my computer.

Sounds suspect to me.

[Du1point8]

Mr Pointy said:

Would it be possible to create a second Firefox profile that had different proxy settings so you could leave your original one alone & select profile as required?

I'm not sure if the settings can be different between profiles but it might be worth a try.

I think that that is possible, I went for the easier option and just removed flash player and its purring like a kitten now.

Last straw came when I had to do a restart (15 minutes ago) after installing an update and the fans started up like it was taking off again, looked at flash player and it had reset itself from block all websites to allow all websites to storage data on my laptop.

Not having that anymore and uninstalled flash player, if I need flash player for a website I will not be installing it and the company that owns the website will not be getting my business... Flash player is just a shoddy piece of crap.

[Du1point8]

Blanchimont said:

There's an app in the Appstore you can get called (i think) fan control plus or something like that. It allows you to monitor the temperatures, and the paid for one allows you to manipulate the fan speeds, so you can turn it up when it gets hot.

I use it quite a lot.

Macs Fan control is free and does all that too.