I am aware of some of the other threads on this problem, but I have tried the options found in those without success:
sudo su
cat /sys/kernel/debug/vgaswitcheroo/switch
gives
cat: /sys/kernel/debug/vgaswitcheroo/switch: No such file or directory
Could it be because my xorg.conf
is only setting up the intel device?
The /sys/kernel/debug
appears to be mounted, and I don't have any quirky boot options:
cat /proc/cmdline
BOOT_IMAGE=/boot/vmlinuz-3.11.0-15-generic.efi.signed root=UUID=8a15962e-
ad4d-4eb0-96af-37d167313e92 ro quiet splash vt.handoff=7
For modeset I have:
cat /sys/module/i915/parameters/modeset
-1
Not quite sure if that is a problem or not? But I've also tried booting with the i915.modeset=1 radeon.modeset=1
options, and verified the modeset is indeed 1. I also checked mount | grep /sys/kernel/debug
showed
none on /sys/kernel/debug type debugfs (rw)
so this is mounted correctly.
lshw -C display
shows:
*-display
description: VGA compatible controller
product: Haswell-ULT Integrated Graphics Controller
vendor: Intel Corporation
physical id: 2
bus info: pci@0000:00:02.0
version: 09
width: 64 bits
clock: 33MHz
capabilities: msi pm vga_controller bus_master cap_list rom
configuration: driver=i915 latency=0
resources: irq:60 memory:f0000000-f03fffff memory:e0000000-efffffff ioport:5000(size=64)
*-display
description: Display controller
product: Sun XT [Radeon HD 8670A/8670M/8690M]
vendor: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD/ATI]
physical id: 0
bus info: pci@0000:06:00.0
version: 00
width: 64 bits
clock: 33MHz
capabilities: pm pciexpress msi bus_master cap_list rom
configuration: driver=radeon latency=0
resources: irq:65 memory:d0000000-dfffffff memory:f0400000-f043ffff ioport:3000(size=256) memory:f0440000-f045ffff
My kernel seems to be compiled with the proper options:
grep -i switcheroo /boot/config-*
/boot/config-3.11.0-12-generic:CONFIG_VGA_SWITCHEROO=y
/boot/config-3.11.0-15-generic:CONFIG_VGA_SWITCHEROO=y
So why would vgaswitcheroo
be missing?
Best Answer
I found this
So I think it's highly likely that my system (being a very recent laptop) is
MUX-less
(i.e. only the Intel card is actually connected to the display), and although I can "switch" through theAMD Catalyst Control Centre
(should I be brave/foolish enough to installfglrx
) this really just amounts to: "High performance" -> outsource hard graphics calculations to dGPU then reroute them back through the iGPU for display, "Low performance/good battery" -> do calcs on iGPU, then send directly to display. I also have no ability to switch GPUs in the BIOS, which also suggestsMUX-less
.Thus, I probably will never be able to use VGA switcheroo.
One other consideration is that the
radeon
driver does not officially support my card yet (the 8670M code name Mars XT solar system series, not to be confused with OLAND). Thus when I boot up with open source drivers I get messages likeNo screens found
for the radeon. Given thatswitcheroo
needs radeon and intel both to there, it could be somehow failing because the radeon driver doesn't support my card.If this is true, it leads to the question of how does one switch between ATI/Intel cards (without
fglrx
) in aMUX-less
system.