Hi,  The conventional laptop design has 3 vents.  One is usually on a side or 
back face and vents the power supply.  The other two are usually on the bottom 
and  are intended to disipate the heat from the processor and hard drive.  The 
problem with these is that they usually aren't fanned.  Therefore, if you use a 
conventional laptop on your lap the heat from the processor will be dumped 
right onto your thighs.  It's very disconcerting especially if you dwell on it.

Apple's design has one fan at the rear which does for the whole laptop.  They 
get away with this by using aluminum materials so that the entire laptop 
dissipates heat.

For normal use, your laptop should feel like it's running at room temperature.  
Even if you fire up your windows virtual machine, the heat should be tolerable 
unless you try to do something really high end under windows.  Fan noise all 
the time and constant heat speaks to me of something inside your laptop.  You 
don't for example, have a guide dog by chance?  Dogs shed, and no matter what a 
good dog owner does, they will invariably be covered in dog hair.  It sticks to 
clothes, fernaturem bedding (even if you don't allow your dog on the bed)... No 
matter how well you keep things up, dog hair can get into your laptop.  That 
happened to a client of mine who refuses to use a desk, storing her laptop on 
the floor and using it laying down on the bed.  And of course, dog hair from 
clothes, bedding, and especially floor was pouring into her laptop all 
unbeknownsed to her.

I believe in laptop coolers myself because of my experiences with turion 
notebooks, but you shouldn't necessarily need one for your mac.

Best,

Erik Burggraaf
User support consultant,
Now posting occasionally on twitter at eburggraaf,
1-888-255-5194
http://www.erik-burggraaf.com

On 2011-06-08, at 9:33 AM, Allison Manzino wrote:

> Hi all,
> 
> I hope everyone is doing well. My apologies for my absence as my Macbook has 
> been sent for repair to Apple. It is now back, and I have a question. I don't 
> know if any of you have ever experienced the heat factor. My MB was 
> overheating and losing a charge, this is why it has was sent back to Apple. 
> The tech person at Apple told me not to have the Macbook on anything soft 
> like my lap as it would cause overheating and may have been the source of the 
> problem all along. In doing research, I came across a post about chill mats. 
> These are mats that  are designed to go under your Mac with a USB cord and a 
> fan. The one I just purchased contains a USB cord and a fan, the premise is 
> you plug the USB cord in and when the fan senses the Mac getting hot it turns 
> on and cools it down. It is supposed to keep your lap and the Mac cool. With 
> the edition of this mat, you can have the Macbook on your lap again and not 
> be relegated to a desk to table. Which I really don't understand why you must 
> place them on a hard surface, if the whole premise of the Macbook is to be 
> portable. Well, just my two cents. Has anyone ever heard of the overheating 
> issue, or the chill mats? Thank you for reading this, sorry if it is a bit 
> off topic. My apologies to the moderators if it is.
> 
> Musically,
> Allison
> 
> My birds are winged blessings, they help me soar!
> 
> 
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