Switching on and off discrete video card

nihil39

Hi,

I own an ASUS K53SJ laptop with an intel core i3 i2310M and an nvidia gt 520M. At the moment i'm only using the integrated intel video card and it's working fine. How can i turn on the discrete nvidia card? There is no optimus technology sticker on the laptop su i guess i should not try the bumblebee method. I have no clue where to start, should i use the asus_swithceroo module?

Thanks for any answer.

candamil · Tux's lil' helper Joined: 19 Mar 2012 Posts: 84

Same problem that we have here:
http://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic-t-920122.html
and here:
http://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic-t-920148.html

nihil39 · Posted: Sat Apr 14, 2012 3:47 pm Post subject:

Have you managed at least to activate and use the nvidia card (e.g. with mplayer with vdpau support)? Remember that in my case there is no “optimus” sticker on the laptop so i don't think i can use that technology.

candamil · Tux's lil' helper Joined: 19 Mar 2012 Posts: 84

I don't have any stick neither, but I was able to use the nvidia card and optimus with the wiki I say in my thread. Anyway it drains the battery, no matter if you are using it or not. For me is absolutely necessary to turn it off completely.

nihil39 · Posted: Sun Apr 15, 2012 10:14 am Post subject:

Have you tried this method to switch off the discrete card? http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1768911

nihil39 · Posted: Sun Apr 15, 2012 10:37 am Post subject:

Try also the method described in the first post of this thread http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1791081 It's a bit clumsy but i hope it will work. I hope we can solve this issue.

candamil · Tux's lil' helper Joined: 19 Mar 2012 Posts: 84

I tried the second one, but it didn't work, I can't get bumblebee working properly because of the nvidia driver (I'm not using nouveau).
I am now trying with the first one, but I think it doesn't work. I installed the acpi_call module and I did the acpi_call echo, but after doing that, the integrated card still works, and I can still run "optirun glxgears", so I think it's not a valid method.

nihil39 · Posted: Sun Apr 15, 2012 3:04 pm Post subject:

Try with this script https://github.com/mkottman/acpi_call/blob/master/test_off.sh

candamil · Tux's lil' helper Joined: 19 Mar 2012 Posts: 84

It seems that script works. I had tried it a couple of days ago, but the system hanged and the fan started spinning at maximum speed.
Now I tried to unload the nvidia module before, and it seems everything is OK. The discrete card is still detected, so I'm not sure if it works or not. I am not able to load the nvidia module if I don't reboot

candamil · Tux's lil' helper Joined: 19 Mar 2012 Posts: 84

Yep, powertop says that the power consumption went down from 10 to almost 8W. Good news.

nihil39 · Posted: Fri Apr 20, 2012 8:59 pm Post subject:

I've tried the test_off.sh script, and it works but the fan starts to spin like hell. I blacklisted nvidia and bbswitch modules. Damn...