My 2017 macbook is basically brick. Crazy how just opening chrome sets off fans like a jet engine. How much cpu can checking gmail really use?
Foolish me is considering buying a new macbook this year. I have no choice because Apple and Microsoft will do everything in their power to ship the shittiest personal computing products every year.
The butterfly keyboard of that era was a large enough signal, to me, that high quality engineering results were compromised.
They produced a laptop that you can't type efficiently on?? That misses key strokes?! I had to slow my typing on those keyboards!
So, imagine the incredible contempt I have had for Apple for failing such a basic delivery. Still, their new silicon machines managed to turn my opinion around -- quite the 180. The speed improvement is genuinely remarkable, and the modern build quality otherwise seems excellent to me.
Yeah, 2016-2019 were severely cooling constrained unfortunately.
If you want to keep using it (maybe not as your main machine) there are some workarounds and fixes:
The simple software only way is to deactivate Turbo and/or HT. Less performance but also less power use meaning less heat. And checking gmail or browsing the web you probably wont notice much of a difference.
Or you can open it up and add thermal pads to your VRMs, finally giving them adequate cooling. Just dont touch the bottom of your macbook afterwards or rest it on your bed or couch, that thing can get hot!
I'm sorry you're saddled with an Intel Mac. The Apple Silicon Macs really changed everything. Clearly Apple is capable and willing of shipping extremely good and performant hardware, even though historically they haven't always done so. I do blame Intel for their monopoly on mediocraty for the late-10s Macbooks though.
Foolish me is considering buying a new macbook this year. I have no choice because Apple and Microsoft will do everything in their power to ship the shittiest personal computing products every year.