We Turned a $600 MacBook Neo Into a Liquid-Cooled Beast

DIY liquid-cooled MacBook Neo setup with external radiator and tubing attached to the laptop

For budget-conscious shoppers, the idea of a $600 MacBook powered by Apple’s A18 Pro chip sounds almost too good to be true. And honestly? It kind of is. The new MacBook Neo delivers incredible efficiency for daily tasks, but it comes with a major catch: passive cooling. No fans, no active heat management – just a thin graphene layer and hope.

Under sustained load, the Neo thermal-throttles aggressively to prevent internal damage. That means you’re leaving a noticeable chunk of performance on the table. But two YouTubers decided that wasn’t acceptable. Jack and Alex (from the channels jakkuh and Zip Tie Tech) set out to see just how far Apple’s silicon could be pushed if heat constraints were completely removed.

What happened next surprised even them.

The simple fix that actually works (for $10)

Before going full mad scientist, the duo tried something any average consumer could replicate. They popped open the MacBook Neo, took one look at the “cooling solution” – a flimsy graphene layer – and promptly replaced it with a 2.5mm thick thermal pad placed directly on the CPU.

No soldering. No voiding warranties in spectacular fashion. Just a $10 pad and five minutes of screwdriver work.

The results? A 14% performance gain in 3DMark Solar Bay Extreme (roughly 200 points higher), along with a 3-degree drop in internal temperature. That’s not earth-shattering, but for the price of a burrito bowl, it’s a solid upgrade.

But Jack and Alex weren’t satisfied with “solid.” They wanted ridiculous.

Watch them tear into the Neo (literally)

Curious to see how a passive-cooled laptop handles a thermal pad – and later, a full liquid-cooling loop? The entire build process is captured in their video. Fair warning: you’ll witness someone cutting a hole in a brand-new MacBook with a CNC mill.

Watch the full experiment here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-c-cLV492I4

Going to extremes: liquid cooling a fanless laptop

This is where things get gloriously unhinged. The duo decided to build a custom liquid-cooling system for an ultra-thin laptop – a solution that is obviously practical for millions of users (heavy sarcasm intended).

Using a Carvera desktop CNC mill, they designed and machined a custom copper water block with micro-fins, complete with a threaded acrylic top plate and a rubber O-ring to prevent leaks. Then came the scary part: cutting a physical square out of the MacBook Neo’s aluminum chassis so the water block could make direct contact with the chip.

The external cooling loop looked like something out of a cyberpunk fever dream – heavy-duty tubing, thick brass fittings, and a repurposed smart-home pump cycling water through the whole contraption. The laptop was now a Frankenstein monster, but a beautiful one.

Benchmark records fall – and the M1 Air gets embarrassed

With the liquid-cooling loop engaged, the MacBook Neo drew a consistent 8 watts of power without a single hint of throttling. That’s the kind of sustained performance Apple’s passive design actively prevents.

In Cinebench 2026, the water-cooled Neo scored 1,938 points in the multi-core test. That’s a 21.2% jump over the stock model. But here’s the kicker – it even beat the M1 MacBook Air’s 1,836 score. According to Notebookcheck’s benchmark database, the stock Neo was already faster than the M1 Air in single-core tests (147 vs. 110 points). Now it’s ahead in multi-core too.

To wrap up the project, the team ran a final 3DMark Solar Bay Extreme test and scored around 1,540 points – officially setting a new world record for the device.

So what’s the takeaway?

Let’s be real: cutting a hole in your laptop and attaching a heavy, noisy external water pump is not a practical solution for anyone except YouTube creators with too much time on their hands. But that’s not the point.

The experiment highlights exactly what Apple silicon is capable of when you actually let it breathe. It also raises an uncomfortable question: Why does Apple keep relying on passive cooling in the MacBook Air lineup and now the MacBook Neo, especially when better thermal solutions could unlock so much more performance?

For $600, the MacBook Neo is already a compelling value. But with a $10 thermal pad – or, you know, a single fan – it could be a legitimate sleeper powerhouse. Here’s hoping Apple is taking notes.

Source: LaptopsCheck – Apple MacBook Neo $599 Game Changer?