Want to Prevent a Mac Meltdown?  Better Get Temperature Monitor!

March 23rd, 2008 at 3:00 PM - Columns and Opinions by John F. Braun

Product Link : Temperature Monitor 4.5 (Freeware)
Company Link : Marcel Bresink Software-Systeme

As Mac processors become faster and more sophisticated, the need to properly manage the temperature of your machine becomes important. Unfortunately, about the only way youill know that your Mac is getting too hot is hearing the fan(s) turn on, and in extreme cases, the machine shutting down to prevent overheating. Fortunately, the latest batch of Macs contain numerous temperature sensors that are continuously checked; you just need a way to view the values of these sensors. Enter Temperature Monitor...

Temperature Monitor Graphical History Display

Temperature monitor can show you the value of the temperature sensors in your Mac, so you can understand what factors, be there environmental or computational, can cause your Mac to get hot. These values can be displayed in a number of ways. The most basic display shows the name of each sensor, and the value in the unit(s) of your choice. But things get interesting if you choose to a graphic view, which can offer the benefit of showing temperature values over time, from hours to days, as well as the minimum and maximum values. This is a great tool for being able to identify what factors may help heat or cool your Mac. For those with an Intel Core Solo or Core Duo processor, you can install a driver for extended x86 support, which can display the value of sensors within the processor itself.

But wait, thereis more! Temperature Monitor also has a System Information feature, which provides a wealth of information about other portions of your system, such as the processor, cache, memory, connectors, slots, board devices and more. And for those who would like to monitor the temperature of remote computers, you can purchase their more sophisticated Hardware Monitor application, which includes a Hardware Monitor Remote component that allows remote monitoring of temperature and other values.

So make an effort to understand what makes your Mac hot (or cool) and check out Temperature Monitor today!

Have any other hot Mac Gadgets you think John should look at? Just send him an email.

John is a software engineer who works in the corporate R&D group of a Fortune 500 company, focusing on imaging and printing technologies. He has AS, BS and MS degrees in various computing disciplines, so his friends and colleagues are somewhat surprised that he’s a Mac enthusiast.  After spending the day developing in an environment comprised largely of PCs, and watching colleagues wrestle with the horror that is Windows, he’s glad to come home to a MacBook Pro and PowerMac G5 at the end of the day.