[MrJazz314]

Hi, first time poster,
I recently got myself my first mac: a beautiful 15" rev C powerbook, with 80 gb, 128 mb vid card, 512 mb one slot a couple of months ago. I have since noticed that there seems to constantly be a fan noise emerging from my shining beauty. It really is annoying, i dont know whether it actually is a fan noise, or if i am going crazy and hearing things, mainly becuase everyone else reports that their powerbook is as silent as a mouse. I was just wondering what temp your pb comes on, and how audible is your fan noise.
Cheers and thanks for any help

[JKT]

It will really depend on what you are doing with your PB. Anything CPU/GPU intensive is going to cause the fan(s) to come on full blast. The left hand side fan is (relatively) noisy on my PB when it comes on whereas the right hand side one is near silent. If I'm e.g. doing something involving OpenGL (such as gaming, iTunes visuals or screensavers) the left hand fan will come on to cool both the CPU and the GPU. However, in my general use, it rarely comes on for me and the PB is "whisper" quiet.

If you think your CPU/GPU is not being used a lot so that the fan shouldn't be on most or all the time, I suggest you use activity monitor to see if there is some background app that is hogging CPU.

[MrJazz314]

thanks, but already checked the activity monitor and nothing was taxing the cpu, and the fan is on during general usage, so maybe my ears are too sensitive, or my fan is constantly running. once again thanks for the reply

[SplijinX]

What kind of surface is the PowerBook resting on? You could leave PB idle on your bed and the fan will start blaring.

[kafoochy]

I also have a 15" rev B AluminumPB and the fan doesn't come on that often, and when it does, it is much quieter than the rev A. On my computer that fan comes when the CPU is about 145 degrees fahrenheit. Use ThermographX to watch your CPU temp. If your fan is coming on at anything below that, it probably needs to be repaired, or if your CPU is running that high for normal work. During day-to-day tasks, I'm usually around 120 or so.

ThermographX:
http://www.versiontracker.com/dyn/moreinfo/macosx/20905

[bighead]

I've got a 15" AlBook and the fan runs constantly because I'm always running distributed.net. It's not terribly loud, but it's noticeable. When running, my CPU temp is always between 142 and 145 (F).

[t4r1q]

my fan comes on quite often (during surfing and gaming), it seems loud when im in my quiet room, but if im watching tv or outside i can barely hear it.