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Apple Faces Up to the MacBook Whining
Whiney Mac Fanboy writes "The Register is reporting that Apple has finally admitted to the 'high pitched whining' problems with it's MacBook line — but only to tell customers to contact AppleCare. From the article: 'MacBook Pro users have complained about numerous noises emanating from their machines since the Intel-based notebooks began shipping in February this year. Audible irritations reported by machine owners include whining sounds coming from the screen, from the body of the notebook, and from the area below the screen hinge when the laptop's running on batteries and both cores of the Core Duo CPU are enabled.'"
I called Apple, they did a few hocus-pocus troubleshooting moves (like unplugging the power cord, taking the battery out then pressing the power button) on the phone, forwarded me to a senior technical specialist who said it's a candidate, and then sent me a box to ship it back today. They claim I'll have it back early next week with a new mobo in it. Easy peasy.
Incidentally, the specialist said that the new mobo is going to be not completely quiet, but a lot better.
Now, I'm wondering if they'll put a 1.83 GHz chip in it like I had before or whether they start at 2.0 GHz like the new models do... here's hoping.
From what I've seen the problem is very widespread - however it isn't always noticed.
I'm on my third MacBook Pro (for other problems, not the noise!), and all the ones I've had have made this noise, as has every other one I've seen. However probably more than 50% of people who've listened to my machine couldn't hear the noise.
The whine is very high pitched and it seems that lots of people just don't hear that frequency. However I can tell you that if you do hear it it's like fingernails down a blackboard. It nearly drove me mad until I found QuietMBP which immediately shut it up.