This is true, but nonetheless many computers are guaranteed to work only up to an ambient temperature of 35 degrees Celsius.
In my opinion, this is an incredibly stupid design choice.
After being once caught by surprise, now I check carefully for a specified working temperature of at least 40 degrees Celsius, whenever I am buying any laptop or desktop computers.
This, for example, disqualifies all Gigabyte small computers. Moreover, any computer which does not specify explicitly the maximum working temperature must be automatically disqualified, because it is overwhelmingly likely that it has been designed for 35 degrees Celsius and not for any higher temperature.
Some computers are guaranteed to work normally up to 35 degrees Celsius and to work with reduced performance between 35 degrees Celsius and 40 degrees Celsius, for instance many Intel NUCs. This is perfectly OK.
Just checked the Lenovo PSREF for my MIL-STD-810H certified Zen3+ Thinkpad:
Operating Environment
Temperature[1]
Operating: 5°C (41°F) to 35°C (95°F)
Storage and transportation in original shipping package: -20°C (-4°F ) to 60°C (140°F)
Storage without package: 5°C (41°F) to 43°C (109°F)
Humidity
Operating: 8% to 95% at wet-bulb temperature 23°C (73°F)
Storage and transportation: 5% to 95% at wet-bulb temperature 27°C (81°F)
Altitude
Maximum altitude (without pressurization): 3048 m (10,000 ft)
Notes:
1. When you charge the battery, its temperature must be no lower than 10°C (50°F).
So if you're in a really hot climate that might not be enough. Rn it's 31°C here in the shadows and idling SoC temperature is ~45°C.
In that case, just go for a rugged laptop ala Getac. The S410 is specified for -30° to 65°C (-20 to 145 °F) operating ambient temperature. Whether you are is on a different spec sheet...
I suppose some of it can be attributed to general unpleasantness of 37°C and impatience that comes with it, but I have another data point:
A while ago my laptop started running around 10°C hotter than it should have - turns out the iGPU was going wide open throttle for no apparent reason.
What I found was that CPU-intensive tasks slowed down as well, because those 10°C make a huge difference in terms of when the CPU starts throttling.
I wasn't bothered by this too much, even though I had to disable turbo altogether, until the first heat wave of the season hit - +10°C from the iGPU combined with +10°C from the heatwave slowed the device to a crawl - it was the first time I briefly saw it hit 102°C - that is actually above the usual safety threshold.
I think people in different climates either have A/C or are used to different levels of performance.
Apple's new chips are a GODSEND for laptops. My old Intel laptops would nearly instantly thermally throttle under any trivial load without air conditioning at full blast and a fan aimed at the machine.
I also live in Asia (Vietnam) and my previous two laptops have had Intel chips (current: MSI GE66 i7+3070, previously an old Clevo with a 970m). I've never had noticeable thermal throttling even when running in very hot summers in rooms with barely functioning AC (which is basically every room here). My northern European body struggles - a lot - but I haven't seen my laptops being much bothered. I do a lot of intense 3d work, I would notice if it started throttling. Maybe the problem was your laptop?
My laptop idles at less than 20°C above ambient, so usually in the high 40s, but the fans already speed up when it reaches 60°C - at 37°C I have just a few degrees of wiggle room until inevitably it starts cooling more aggressively.
It's a genuine question though. I've got a ThinkPad P14s (gen2) sporting a AMD Ryzen 7 PRO 5850U CPU. The fans start spinning under sustained workloads (compiling, watching 4K youtube in fullscreen) and that at a room temperature of about 22°C. + 15°C seems non trivial. Granted I could just go outside today and test it out but I am not _that_ curious.
What are your measured CPU temps though? "Fans start spining under sustained load" is a pretty useless metric as that's pretty normal buhavilor unless you had a fanless M1.
I have a Lenovo with a 5800U and temps are just fine. Never goes over 70C when benchmarking Cinebench at max boost on all cores. Pretty sure you're good if you at least dust the cooler regularly and repasted it correctly at least once since you bought it.