Acer 8935g - Using Wrong Display Adapter

@ munkyjim @ Mars27
hello guys. sorry for not replying. i haven't tried the trick since i had some other business to do and i was gone from home. will try it next week i think when i will be more free and in case things go wrong i can reinstall the win or something. will keep in touch !

 

Hey guys!

Im fighting with this laptop and the ATI issue for years now..
The problem is, when i start up my laptop - I get into windows, when im in windows it freezes i hear a ping pong sound like i connect a usb device, and my screen starts to flicker and turns black. Wierd thing is that sometimes i will get my screen back and the ATI card runs smooth and well. I have already sended my laptop twice back to acer, to fix this problem but they keep saying that my vid card is working fine.

Hope you guys can help me, because this is really fustrating..

 

Hello guys.

Well i think i might be a step closer to the problem - Not sure.
( I installed windows 7 now ) I got the lastest bios version and driver from the acer site, but the problem i have now is. When i startup my laptop and im getting into windows, i hear al the sounds and stuff but im not getting a screen, it stays black. But when i connect it to a external display im getting screen. I tried to turn it back to the acer screen through Display options etc. but when i restart again its all as it was before.
Please can someone help me trying to figure out how to solve this problem, so i can finally use my laptop afther 2 month's of messing around with it - i've sended it twice back to acer to see if they can fix it. only thing they do is bringing it back to fabric state and letting it run on the intel than they say ''Vid card works good'' ridicilous if u ask me, Please is there anyone out there that can help me and find a good solution im really out of idea's and i don't want to send it to acer again since they don't fix it.


Thanks in advance

 

Hi mate,

Have you followed the process I put up on the previous page as I had the exact same isssue as you but following my process on page 10 is what fixed the issue for me.

Cheers
H

 

Hey mate,

Thanks for your reply,
Yea! i followed your instructions, i downloaded the 8.64.4 driver from the acer site, i uninstalled the display adapters through device manager i restarted my laptop it installed the display adapters by itself again, next thing i done is installing the display drivers. But the wierd thing is sometimes its working. but when i shutdown my laptop and the next day i start it back up. all i get is a black screen, when i put an external display on it it works i also tried to put it back to my acer laptop screen sometimes that doesnt work also. but when i restart it always turns in to be black i dont know if there's something wrong with my ati card? or my screen? but i already brought it twice to acer to repair it but they say that the vid card works good.

This is really occourd hopefully someone has something in mind to fix this.

thanks in advance

 

@ Bah8935
i am having the same problem m8. we both did the same mistake: we've updated the BIOS.
contact me on my e-mail address, maybe we can share a thing or two to help eachoter : [email protected]

saturday will do an experiment. hope it will work ...

 

Let us pray.

@ hmoodie,

I have followed the steps that u posted, it did solve the problem for a while. But when i turned off my laptop and after a while i start it back up i saw the bios etc, but when i was suppose to get in windows it went black again. I really hate this sitty laptop what a waste of 1200eur's..

Hopefully scorpion finds a way to completly solve..

Oyea! by the way - my PowerSmart button above in the right corner. isnt working when i press it it isnt turning on or off. (green light)
If someone know's how to fix that i would appreciate that aswell.

 

People,

The issue is still not solved. - Problem i keep having is when i start up my laptop and im suppose to get into windows, i get a black screen i see nothing only hearing the windows sounds.
if i swich to the intel im able to see my desktop etc. but if i swich back to the ati it turns black, after doing that 10 times over and over again than the ati card jumps in and runs smooth and im able to play my games and whatever.

Please is there someone out there that can help me? i got w7 64 bits now, use to had w7 32 bits - same problemn also with windows vista. got no clue how to fix this.

Help would be REALLY appriciated!!!!!

Greetings.

 

Ohyeah! quick notice..
Also my 'PowerSmart Button' in the upper right corner of the laptop isnt working or showing green light???
Installed the latest launchmanager etc! but still not working - at the moment im using HOT keys in the catalyst controll center to swich from the intel to the ATi.

Help me!

 

I posted a new thread on the forum, but think no-one may notice it so hopings its ok to post in here, as its purely about 8935g. Basically does anyone know how this laptop performs wrt dpc latency? I'm thinking of getting one this week, but needed to know this before buying..

anyway tool to check is here...hopefully it gives a good result:

http://www.thesycon.de/deu/latency_check.shtml

(its a tiny download, and perfectly safe tool btw, and you may find it interesting to see how the latency is affected by different operations, hardware configurations, as this is something that affects both audio and video streaming)

Anyway apologies for double posting, and thanks in advance,

Conrad

 

well what can i say i am confused from all this!!tomorow i am getting my so callesd fixed 8935g!!i don't know what to do!install or not install windows 7 64-bit that is the question.....!anyone has any idea because i am going nuts...!thanx in advance!!

 

Hi guys,

I've been following this thread for some time now in the hope that someone may come up with something which would help me in my quest for solving my problem related to the ATI and intel displays. Unfortunately i am still getting the same problem as Bah8935 and scorpion 2001 despite following the instructions by hmoodie (thanks nonetheless!).

Following advice from another thread (can't remember where, it's been a while now!) i upgraded my bios to the latest version from acer's website (which is v.3207). I then in safe mode have followed hmoodie's steps to uninstall intel and ati cards. however after following the next few instructions, whenever i attempt to install any ati driver (i have tried a few) the screen will go blank during installation and automatically switch to the external display (because i assume the ati starts taking over). (nb. This took me an age to work out that it was switching to the hdmi external as in vista switching the graphics never caused the display to move away from the primary screen!)

Firstly i tried windows 7 32 premium os, then i tried a windows 7 64 professional os and still the same. i have now decided to reinstall vista (32-bit) which came with the laptop however i am now getting the same graphics issue with this os! so now i'm stuffed! i went from vista where the switchable graphics worked fine to windows 7 where its messed up and back to vista where its still messed up!

So... seeming as people seem to have had success with hmoodie's steps i can only imagine that this is a bios problem. therefore: @hmoodie - which version of the bios do you have? and @scorpion and bah8935 - which versions of the bios do you have? and have you had any luck with your 'experiments' over the weekend?

my last question is whether you can roll back the bios to a previous version? if so, how safe is it? i've heard its definitely not recommended, however as acer still have three previous versions on their website prior to mine perhaps it may be ok in this instance? Perhaps if scorpion, bah8935 and myself rolled back then ours would work as well.

i just can't believe i've had so many problems with this aspect of the laptop. acer really have messed up big time with this one. unless this can get sorted, what a waste of money! cheers for any help you can give! sorry for the long post!

 

Hey mate!

You really have the same problem as i do!!
I've also tried the experiments that u did, first of all i've also updated and downgraded my bios. and went from w7 to vista but i keep still having the same problems.

My laptop works better with windows 7 than vista now.
In windows vista i cant use the swichable graphics.
in windows 7 i can, using the launch manager + the newest graphics driver.

But the problem i still keep having is when i put on my laptop after a while it boots up i see the bios screen windows loading screen but after that the screen turn black and i only hear the windows sounds, after that im swiching btween the 2 graphics card with the powersmart key than it turns on the intel one and that works fine, but onces i swich back to the ati card it turns black BUT sometimes it will work after i couple swiches and it works as it should work.

I have tried al the bios versions from v. 3109 till v. 3207 - I am running the oldest one now wich is the 3109.

Maybe u can contact me by email and maybe we can try to figure out this problem! [email protected]

Greetings.

 

Hi Conrad,

I ran the program and ran it. It seems the "current latency" runs around 160-180 us but does jump up to 215 and down to 150ish and the absolute maximum is 372 us. I have no idea what these numbers mean (maybe I'll read up on them later) so hope that helps.

 

I haven't tried updating to the newest ati driver yet and keep wondering if I really should - because I don't really want to open a new can of worms if I don't have to.

I am running the 3207 Bios and the 8.640.3 ati driver so no switching graphics cards on the fly for me. One button to boot using ati and the other button to boot using intel. I did install the PowerSmart program from one of Acer's new laptops so by pressing the PowerSmart button, it lights up and switches power profiles (but no option to switch graphic cards).

If you are switching ati graphics drivers, do you ever run the ati clean up program? ATI used to be terrible for updating drivers, where you would need to unistall the driver then run a cleanup software to clear it out of all the nooks and crannies (probably some registry entry or something).

Also, out of curiosity with the screen being displayed to the external by default, can you switch it back to the laptop by using the Function + F5 or F6 hotkeys?

 

Oh thanks so much, those are good numbers too (all green!), so it should be fine for all audio/video work... No doubt I'll be more permanent around here soon then, and probably in this thread about the display adapter once I start fiddling!

Thanks again, really appreciated.

 

Yes, it was all green the whole time - no big red bar spikes. I tried it while running a a movie on the alternate display and web and word stuff on the laptop display, and while running UT2004 too.

 

Ahh great stuff, thats really good news, and impressive performance, I had a new Dell at end of last year that was mostly in the red! a search for "dell studio dpc latency" brings up a nightmarish forum of nastiness! Luckily they agreed to take it back eventually... think I'll prefer this acer too...hurrah!

 

Really i would not prefer this laptop..
I has alot of issue's with the graphics..
This is really a waste of money..

When does someone FINALLY gets something to solve this issue?
cause its driving me nuts... People that got this laptop working on w7 please show up and tell me the drivers etc versions.

thx

 

Hey Bah,

For the money, the components of the machine are pretty good. The only annoyance I have is that I can't switch graphics cards on the fly and use the poweron button to use the intel and the multimedia load to boot with the other. I think that was the initial reason for this thread but I haven't tried the fix (with the new driver).

You seem to be having deeper issues. What info do you need? As stated above, I am using 3207 Bios and the 8.640.3 ati driver on Win7 64 Pro version.

I do find weird things with this machine that I don't understand though. If you are running vista, try partitioning the harddrive then reboot. On the 2 machines I have tried it on, the new partition becomes an EISA partition and is not accessible. But the partitioning works fine in Win7 so I am guessing it is a conflict with Vista - which is another reason why I avoided Vista.

 

I'm so glad I didn't buy this laptop.

The shockingly bad support from Acer described in this thread means that I and I'm sure many other people will avoid Acer in future.

The 8940g seems to have replaced the 8935g and Acer has nothing to say about the Windows 7 incompatibilities of the 8935g.

There are so many different versions of the 8935 that it is difficult to be sure of anything. I thought it was odd that "lesser" Acer laptops were starting to ship with W7 but this one - or at least dual gpu models - were not.

This one does now seem to be shipping with W7:

http://www.acerdirect.co.uk/Acer_Aspire_8935G_Laptop_LX.PDA02.157/version.asp?PID=

I don't know anything about the graphics hardware of this model (the Quad core model isn't available on that site).

But if Acer is now shipping problematic models with W7 then it should be fairly simple to fix the problem at least in theory. If the problem is now solved on identical hardware/bios models then why shouldn't W7 work on the same units which shipped a couple of months earlier with Vista?

In practice though if even a Vista reinstall on an initially well working unit is causing problems then this suggests that the the lack of access to a custom/factory Acer Windows install is causing the problem.

Quite how you would get hold of a custom activated disk image of "genuine" Windows 7 is beyond me.

This problem is either a bios problem or possibly a driver problem and one which has no fix other than an ugly workaround which works for some but not for others.

Acer's silence on this issue warns anyone against buying their hardware.

I think the only clue is going to come from someone with a working W7 shipped unit - the Quad core versions don't seem to exist with W7 - posting here with the relevant hard drive os config files and software.

The other option is pursuing legal action against Acer or the seller for selling a W7 ready PC which is not W7 ready.

 

Cheers for your responses guys.

@ Mars: Since installing windows7 i've never actually been able to switch graphics using the powersmart button. I've also never been able to use the media switch to power up with one chip, and the main power switch to turn on with the other, which to be fair would be an absolute relief right now! Right now i wouldn't mind if i could never switch back to the powersaving intel chip again! With windows 7 i found that my laptop would always boot up using the intel chip whatever (using my main screen), however in vista it always boots up using the ati chip (on the external screen)! its maddening!

to answer your question about function and f5. whilst running ati i could scroll through screen options using fn+f5, however as soon as i chose an option such as switch displays or something, the external would go blank but laptop would also remain blank (then after 15 seconds flickers back as i guess i haven't said 'ok' to keep display setting). in effect, the laptop screen can never be used as a clone/duplicate etc and can only be used solely when switching to intel. i haven't actually used the ati clean tool, but i guess when ive formatted each time upon reinstalling versions of windows it wipes it fully for me anyway?

i think i will go back to windows 7 with the disc that was sent as part of my 'upgrade' (downgrade?!!) and install the 8.640.3 ati driver. at least i can actually switch between displays in windows 7 rather than having to disable the ati in vista! The windows 7 64-bit pro was actually issued for a dell and so i want to try hmoodies steps again using my version (32bit premium). each time i keep hoping it will just starting working but...

For those who it does seem to be working for, is there anything, no matter how small, that you think you may have done differently which could have ended up making yours work? i.e. installing programs from acer's website etc. It appears that this may be something that acer will never get around to fixing properly... i should have stuck to a desktop, at least then i could have just replaced the gpu!

cheers for your help so far!

 

The laptop itself is a good buy when you look at the components. When I bought this one, the comparable Dell was $400 more. The Sony was about the same price difference for slower processor, etc.

As far as support goes, Acer like just about every other company is crap and with almost every machine I have owned in the last 25 years, there is something not quite right. In most cases, people are just ignorant to the problem and it may not effect them.

Most companies don't even support very basic things such as partitioning a hard drive. Same as your internet provider will generally not supply support for your hub/router.

 

@coopertrooper

I am guessing that the two different problems are a result of two different models of 8935g machines. Some of us seem to have an easy fix and others such as you are stuck in some other problem. The fact that you can't boot using the multimedia key suggests something else is going on.

When I loaded Win7 Pro on my machine it was from a separate source - not Acer. So none of the Acer software was loaded when I installed the OS. Again the only problem I have is that I boot using the multimedia key so the Ati card is used.

If you are going to do a reinstall, then I would go into the BIOS and reset it to the factory defaults, then format the hard drive and do a complete reinstall.

 

hello guys.

the Acer is not a that bad, at least after they bought ETEN and Gateway they've started to produce good products. well, better than they used to be.
but the problem is the support of the company. it's almost 0. not 0, but almost. the drivers they've offer for the users for Win7 are s*it, and they haven't resolved a lot of bugs with the laptop - but that's an issue which can be repaired in time.

the problem we are having - most of us, including me - is the BIOS. in my case i have no POST screen ( don't have time to explain, pls search with wikipedia what POST screen means if you don't know ). my Intel GPU is useless, and the ATI comes in my aid as soon as i log in in windows.
whoever has ideas with " changing the drivers and installing them in a specific order " is more than wrong. basically, the BIOS is the one which influences the OS , not the OS the BIOS ( yes there are some cases where you can do changes in BIOS from the OS , but that's another story ).

in my case and in the case of those who don't have a POST screen, the poor video card ( intel ) doesn't know how to display the imagine on the display. it knows how to display it on an external display but not on the laptop's display. weird, but that's the BIOS.

my hunch, and i bet 10 euros or dollars on this, is that the PhlashBIOS is a s*ity program , and the BIOS versions from the web sites are not well tested. there are ppl with the same laptops as us who don't have an issue, but some - like me - have great issues.

it took me 5 h to downgrade the BIOS to it's original version ( had problems with Win 7 but also the WinPhlash refused to flash the BIOS with the version i wanted ( they were all downloaded from the Acer Support Website ) .
and i only manage to downgrade the BIOS through MS-DOS, through Win was impossible.

i have decided to take the laptop to Acer Support and i will go personally and will try to speak with a tech personnel and tell him exactly what's wrong with it. i don't want to do this by phone or write a piece of paper. but this will be only after 20th of February, since i need the laptop ... will keep you informed if the guys from Acer will help me and will provide me a good solution .

meanwhile, my recommendation is to : NOT UPDATE THE BIOS. leave it alone !

@ Mars27 : man , pls contact me at [email protected] i want to talk to you to see if you have more ideas.
@coopertrooper85 : also contact me at the e-mail from above. maybe we can share some information which can help us both ...

 

If you have no post screen (and no option to access the same) then the PC has a fault and surely is covered by warranty?

Why are some people having the problem and not others?

Production of the Quad model has, as far as I can see, ceased.

Some models are now being shipped with W7 but I can't tell if these are the dual gpu models.

Some are still being shipped with Vista!

Toshiba delayed shipping of the X500 in UK/Europe because of the need for a bios fix and problems with Blu-ray.

There is still no fix from Acer for the 8935g and the product range has now moved on.

This problem is not going to be fixed guys - unless Acer is embarrassed in to doing something through negative reviews on the sites that matter. I can't find any mention of a W7 incompatibility problem on the main review sites for a PC that up until a few months ago was the Acer flagship.

I can't understand why Vista works well (although some people say that even non oem installs of Vista show the problem) but W7 does not.

What is the explanation for this problem? Is it a HAL problem with W7? If the problem is affecting some Vista installs surely it isn't a HAL problem and something much simpler - there must be an oem driver at work that is solving the problem for some and not for others.

If there was a way of obtaining an un-activated disk image of a working W7 install this would at least test whether or not there is a bios problem.

Can you not return the in warranty system citing the W7 failure (and the upgrade promise) as the reason for breach of contract?

 

well, i want to go to Acer as soon as possible.
if they can't fix my laptop i will ask for my money or another Acer ( 8940 or 8942 ) since i don't trust the model anymore.

 

There no one working powersmart manager for switchable graphics, because not this app do the VGA switch. I grabbed all the driver from a brand new 8935g (originally supplied with Win7 IA64). After totally uninstalled the ATi driver, and install the new, I got a new menu point(Configure switchable graphics), you could make the switch with it, or the powersmart button(Powersmart isn't installed!!). And it's working! (Windows 7 Ultimate x86).
This driver is for x86 and IA64. Size is 173MB so I have to find a bigger suitable web storage to share it all of you. The working ATi driver ->>
http://rssd.fw.hu/8935g.zip

 

Thanks mykos, glad to know it isn't just about the powersmart. I've not installed win7, though I have 2 8935g's one arrived with win7 upgrade applied on top of the vista (I didn't actually want them to do that), but was surprised when switchable graphics worked on both. This gives me even greater confidence it'll all be ok, when I install win7 from scratch. Absolutely delighted with these laptops.

 

Just Installed XP and have had similar issues. Used logmein to help fix.

Installing ATI drivers, caused screen to go blank on normal power on. Using media power button booted to visible screen using ATI graphics.

I wrongly assumed intel gma 4500 drivers were included in "chipset drivers" and it was not possible to install them from the computer once booted with ati graphics. So like other here stuck with the black screen issue.

However, installed logmein, and then powered up normally, so computer could be remotely used to install intel graphics driver. It bluscreened at end of install but on next boot was able to extend desktop to intel graphics (it seems to be stuck thinking it is using ati or something), reboot, then use as primary monitor, reboot, and then remove ati adapters from extended desktop. final reboot. And then all was ok. Power button starts intel driver, media button starts ati driver.

Unfortunately I can find no powersmart for xp, so it'll never be switchable on the fly I think.

Thought this might be useful info for anyone wanting to use xp. Also thought maybe logmein approach mught help others to see what is occuring in their blacked out situations in win7 64 etc...

 

I know this is kind of a bump but for those still experiencing problems:
My 8935G came with vista 32bit (in october '09), first thing i did was i removed the vista and installed win7 ultimate 64 bit. I had some problems with the video card because i wanted the newest drivers. I tried installing the latest drivers modded with mobility modder but it didn't work.

What I have now: I didn't change the original BIOS and uninstalled all video drivers. Then I installed the acer drivers (8.64.3) and well... it works, also the power save button.
I have never seen the 8.64.4 drivers on the site so maybe that's your problem?

Well so i got it to work but i'm still not happy: is there any way to use the normal newest driver for the HD 4670 with calalyst control center? Even if it means removing the low performance intel-chip option?
Another problem: when playing high demanding games like crysis and prototype etc my screen goes green, red, yellow, white and black and so on after playing for a while and my laptop gets stuck. It even occurs when playing older games like battlefield 2. Is this temperature related? I guess so but a fan under my laptop doesn't prevent the problem.

 

Anyone got a working solution to this problem yet?

My Acer 8935 was working just fine with an upgrade from Vista to Windows 7 32 bit for several months until it for some reason started bringing me trouble, maybe because I happened to touch the green Power Save button.

Now I'm in the middle of a blue-screen-fatal-system-error-blank-screen inferno where I'm happy to just get an image with the Intel graphics chip.

Whenever I try to remove or install ATI graphics drivers the un/installation process crashes the system alternatively turns the screen blank so I can't see what's happening where I have to fight my way back into Windows again, and it happens seemingly at random.

The worst part is that sometimes the blank screen comes and sometimes not, no matter which power button I'm using. Sometimes the 4670 adapter is visible in the device manager and sometimes not, but even in the unlikely event that it is both visible and activated the screen slowly turns flickering and garbled. At this point I can't even start the computer in safe mode anymore.

I have not updated the BIOS or anything else.

Does anyone know how to get out of this hell hole for good (except tossing this piece of sh-t Acer in the garbage and buy a real laptop, that is)?

Could the graphics card or the controller actually be broken in my case? Would sending it to repair help or will they only activate the Intel chip through factory settings and say it's working now?

 

The problem is solved

Here is a screenshot


Notice Intel is running on 8.640.4.0 and HD4670 is on 8.712.0.0 (Catalyst 10.3 Final)

Switchable graphics works so does the button which toggles the switch.

Finally we can keep up with AMD/ATI's driver updates and not rely on retarded and slow Acer support for their custom drivers

 

Hey sanke1,

Have you just overcome the problem by installing the 10.3 Catalyst package? Because when I read the release notes for that (and the newer 10.4 release) they said it is not compatible with hybrid gfx using the intel chip. Sure enough this came true when i went to install the driver package. Firstly i installed the catalyst install manager, and then when i actually came to installing the mobility driver it said i was not compatible with my hardware, or words to those effect. Can you please explain how you got around the problem in a little more detail please? I'm just unsure from what you've posted whether you have individually installed drivers or just simply used 10.3 package. I'm hoping maybe i've just made a simple error in which case i would be very grateful if you could just point me in the right direction and maybe just lay out the steps you took in simple terms... Hopefully this may help other people too.

For background: i have done a complete fresh reinstall of windows 7 home premium. My ati card is currently giving a code10 error (says it cannot start), but the intel chip has automatically updated to 8.15.10.2086 (Driver Date - 20.02.10).

Thanks in advance for any further help you can offer.

 

Here's how:

First you need to install the 8.640.4.0 driver from here
Reboot when prompted.
Make sure ATI and Intel display adapters have the same driver version 8.640.4.0 in device manager. Also make sure the graphics switching button works as well.

Now
shutdown the laptop. And start it by pressing the media button exactly like the way u press power button (The touch button to the left of HOLD on the top right of your keyboard)

When windows starts, it will find a new display adapter.
Now run the official Catalyst installer from AMD website and let it install official Catalyst 10.3 mobility drivers. Then on reboot, you will have Intel running on old driver and HD 4670 running on current driver.

Enjoy

Edit: Works with Catalyst 10.4 as well.

 

Hiya,

Thanks for the information. I would just like to add though that when *I* try to "start it by pressing the media button exactly like the way u press power button", it took me to Windows XP Loading Screen followed by the Acer Arcade Deluxe centre.

I have Windows 7 installed (upgraded it back in October 2009). Do you know how I can get to Windows normally via the media button, so that I can upgrade the drivers?

Thanks

 

What "I" did was, delete all partitions, including the Acer's hidden partition and did fresh install of Windows 7. But this won't allow you to restore to Acer's factory settings on windows failure. (I use windows 7's backup and restore to get around this problem)

 

Oh alright, thanks.

I don't think I'll be deleting the hidden partition - I know it's a piece of cake to do it - but I'm feeling just slightly a bit too unadventurous for that.

Thanks for the heads up anyway.

 

just a sec man.
you've installed the desktop version of the drivers on your laptop ????
isn't that like a NO-NO ?

 

Hi,

AMD and Nvidia started publishing drivers that are supposed to work on desktop and laptop VGA cards.
Only a few manufacturers, that heavily tweak their VGA subsystems (like Sony for example) are not supported.

Michael

 

aha. i understand.
but still, the update doesn't resolve the following problem.7
like rubenb , at higher demanding games the laptop is displaying a video/screen test: red, green, blue, white, black colors and then the screen is filled with black and gray stripes.
if rubenb gave as examples Farcry, i can tell you that Call of Duty 6 has the same problem. With Tom Clancy's HAWX , i had no problem till now, although this is also a demanding game.

so, who else has experienced this problem and have you found a solution to this ?

i have to add that after the error, i've restarted the laptop and quickly entered windows, then everest to check the temperature of the GPU. although the hole process has lasted 1 min 30 maybe 2 min, the temperature of the GPU was about 73-76 degrees Centigrade. i believe because of the restart the GPU has cooled down, but i don't think it had more than 80-82 degrees. so i personally rule out the overheating. looking forward to your opinions !

 

No. I installed Official Catalyst Mobility drivers 10.4

 

Hi everyone, I just entered the same graphics nightmare loophole but with an Acer 5810TZG which ships with HD4330...

So If I understood correct, the way to go is install acer drivers, then install official mobility drivers (even when 10.5 version says it does NOT support switchable graphics) and everything should work as supposed?

Because only with the acer drivers, after install I can switch from the ATI Chip to the Intel but no the other way around.

 

where did you get those Mobility drivers ?
could you upload them and post the link ?
thanx in advance

 

This is the Official driver's page : ATI Catalyst? Mobility Display Driver

 

well, there is a certain improvement with the new catalyst 10.6 . if initially i could only play COD 6 for max 30 min, yesterday , after i've installed the new drivers i manage to play an astonishing 1 h 30 min .

now serious. is this a hardware problem or a software problem ? cause if this is keep appearing i'm going to take the laptop to acer and ask for a refund.

 

@ scorpion2001

I never had this problem with my 8935G

 

well i don't know what to say ...
today i've played COD 6 several times and had to crashes with the well known screen test. but a couple of hours ago i have played a long match and no crash ...

i really don't know what to make of it ...

 

Hey,

I had the same problem then i sent my PC to acer.. They fixed the problem by cleaning my display adapter out of DUST So the problem was overheating i think.. or i hope. After that ive played cod only 2 times, 2 hours and then 30 minutes so i cant be 100% sure.

Im using Windows 7 Ultimate x64 and never had any problems with anything except that one with COD 6... It overheated with Vista too. OH and if i switch the adapter to intel i cant switch it back without restart, i didnt have that problem with vista, but why would i use the intel's piece of sh*t?
I've installed the drivers from Acer site.

I would like to use XP but when i install the ATI drivers from Acer site, i just get a black screen after reboot I also cant make the ati adapter work with linux. ive tried like 4 different drivers and always that damn black screen.

Scorpion how do you know the temperature of your GPU? Mine has only sensors for both CPUs and harddisks.

 

hey nunk !

i have the laptop since december and i doubt it's full of dust since i keep it in low quantity of dust enviroment. still i will take down it's case to check it out.

as for the temperatures , well i use a software called Everest. i recommend this to anyone who wants to know all the things about his/hers laptop or destkp pc. you get all the temperatures , serials of the components, voltages and it has even a benchmark.

if you can't find it , just contact me on e-mail and i'll help you get it. you can find my e-mail adress in a previous post i made on this thread .

meanwhile, i spoke with someone from USA who has an Asus G73 laptop. wonderfull piece of engineering, styled after the F-117. but it's using only 1 video card, an ATI 5780 with 1 gb ddr5 . because of this the batery life is very low . max 1 h 30 if you're lucky.
but this is not the whole story. because he has an ATI , he has some strange errors when he is playing Tom Clancy's HAWX or other 3D games.
doing some research, i have found that there are lots and lots of ati owners who complain that there's an error in the drivers which is ruining their lives.
the error is called VSOD or Verticale Stripes of Death but it's also known as Grey Screen of Death. in case you don't know anything about this i suggest you should do some research on YouTube and post on the forum if you have the same problem.