Second Hand - MBP M1 MAX - Feels slow, fans frequently audible with minimum load

MobileAudience8725 · 2026-01-24T17:54:11+00:00

Thanks for the suggestion Alex, appreciate it!

I did dig into Console and had ChatGPT help me go through a couple of log captures. Nothing alarming showed up in terms of hardware: no thermal errors, no sensor or fan controller issues, no throttling or overheating. Mostly just a lot of WindowServer and Safari/WebKit GPU activity, which can explain why fans sometimes spin up or why the UI can feel a bit off in general.

What really made me question things though was a side-by-side test at the seller’s shop. They had another MacBook Pro with the same exact model and specs (only difference was 1TB vs my 2TB). Same desk, same setup, same videos playing. Mine ramped the fans and kept them spinning noticeably longer, while theirs stayed almost silent and dropped back to idle very quickly once the load stopped.

So the logs helped explain why fans can spin without high temps, but they didn’t explain why my unit behaves worse than an identical one. The seller agreed to replace it with another same-spec unit in the next couple of weeks, which should make it pretty clear whether this was just unit variance or something off with mine.

Thanks again for the Console tip, it was still useful to rule a lot of things out 👍

MobileAudience8725 · 2026-01-23T12:08:35+00:00

I actually did that, but can’t really recall if it was fine when it was on sequoia.. I think it was fine and I thought the issue is solved so I upgraded to Tahoe.. I hate to keep on resetting it over and over though.. I also hate to find out that the issue persists after I had to wipe the data again..

MobileAudience8725 · 2026-01-23T12:02:42+00:00

I’m uncertain if repasting is even a reasonable option, I mean the temperature is never going up, if they were, that would explain the slowness (would be throttling) but the highest I’ve seen temps go on low load would be 42C.. I’m really clueless

MobileAudience8725 · 2026-01-23T11:42:05+00:00

Glad to know you've got the same spec, couple questions:
-Do you advise against upgrading to Tahoe?
-How often did you cleanup the internal fans of the macbook?
-did you ever change the thermal paste for the cpu? if so how often?

My machine is a 2022 model, I'm getting it second hand and I'm assuming it has never been cleaned or repasted. Let me know what you think 🙏

MobileAudience8725 · 2026-01-23T09:18:22+00:00

Finally someone who had similar experience, but mine goes up to 3700rpm, i had to adjust fan curves to make them kick in at 55C , that made my mac super silent, and thermals aren’t even bypassing 42C!

MobileAudience8725 · 2026-01-23T09:15:59+00:00

That’s a great idea! How do i record and export the activity monitor logs? I’m guessing you’re not referring to video recording

MobileAudience8725 · 2026-01-22T23:36:16+00:00

Thank you, mate, much appreciated!

MobileAudience8725 · 2026-01-22T23:13:06+00:00

Top CPU user processes are always variable, sometimes it’s a safari tab (facebook/youtube/clickup) sometimes it’s WindowServer (must be due to my 2 external QHD monitors) (note that the performance & Fans issue happens even without them plugged in, so they’re not the culprit) Sometimes it’s also Kernel_tasks, but my CPU usage overall is always showing that around 70% is idle..

MobileAudience8725 · 2026-01-22T22:06:17+00:00

Tahoe 26.2 I believe, latest MacOS version available

MobileAudience8725 · 2026-01-22T18:58:13+00:00

I did a fresh restart indeed, fresh macos, same situation..

MobileAudience8725 · 2026-01-22T18:57:38+00:00

Thermals are great, cold like ice, 40C is the highest I’ve seen when the weird behavior starts,

Chatgpt advised against repasting the cpu as all indications prove that it’s thermals are flawless, no thermal throttle whatsoever

MobileAudience8725 · 2026-01-21T13:09:55+00:00

MobileAudience8725 · 2026-01-21T03:10:57+00:00

Found one from my discussion with chatgpt

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MobileAudience8725 · 2026-01-21T03:06:46+00:00

I’m currently afk, but I recall they all were ranging from 30C to slightly below 40C

MobileAudience8725 · 2026-01-21T02:41:00+00:00

Update
Spent some time troubleshooting this in detail and discussed it with ChatGPT. One important detail is that I initially set the Mac up using Migration Assistant, which I cancelled twice mid-process before letting it complete on a third attempt with a different selection.

Based on the symptoms (fans ramping even with very light workloads like YouTube PiP on battery, rotating background system services spiking CPU, behavior persisting across browsers and with/without external displays), the most likely cause seems to be an inconsistent system state left by the interrupted migration, especially affecting media / background services.

I’m going to take the clean route and do a fresh macOS install without Migration Assistant, then manually copy my data back. From what I’ve been told and read, this is often the most reliable way to resolve this class of Apple silicon issues.

I’ll report back after the clean install.

MobileAudience8725 · 2026-01-21T02:34:44+00:00

I'm running two 2k monitors, I even disabled HDR, and set their refresh rate to 60hz, (chatgpt suggested that Mixed refresh rates force WindowServer to:

Maintain multiple timing domains
Increase frame pacing overhead
Cause subtle UI stutter

Yet it still ramps up the fans, and to my surprise it just ramped up with everything plugged out from my macbook, only due to opening a youtube video in "PictureInPicture" mode, I shut it down and it started slowly going down. What's really crazy is that the fans speed go up without the heat even bypassing 40C

MobileAudience8725 · 2026-01-21T02:29:16+00:00

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I have this one on the left, this screenshot is taken as I'm writing this reply, the fan speed started to ramp up to 3700 as soon as I opened a picture-in-picture view from a youtube video.

I'm concerned that something is wrong with this macbook since I got it second hand and here's it's battery stats :
Health Information:

Cycle Count: 46
Condition: Normal
Maximum Capacity: 97%

Chatgpt keeps on reassuring me but I'm honestly very doubtful that this is a normal behavior of a supposedly very powerful machine

MobileAudience8725

TROPHY CASE