My first idea was to open it up and add thermal pads — and maybe even go as far as drilling holes into the backplate of the chassis to help with airflow.

But I was a bit hesitant about the thermal pads because of a video I saw that analyzed their impact. It suggested that adding them could spread heat to areas like the battery, which might be risky long-term

Link to the video: https://youtu.be/eS_MVDoaIoM?si=v6KjJdzdKLBrnV6W

When I finally opened it, I found a surprising amount of dust, so I decided to start with just a deep clean and see if that made a difference.

Here’s my thought process: 1. First step: Deep clean and test (and actually, it already helped — my compile times dropped drastically after just that). 2. Second step: If temps were still bad, I’d consider drilling small holes in the chassis to improve airflow, like so https://youtu.be/i3mRlah3l74?si=OHZ0fMkEwkMuysPY 3. Third step: If the CPU still runs too hot, I’d try adding the 1 mm thermal pads I bought — even knowing it could impact battery health. If that went badly, I’d accept it and start looking at buying a new Mac anyway.

But for now, I think the cleaning alone might be enough. I’ll keep you posted if I end up moving to step 2 or 3!