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    Optimus and Alienware OSD

    Discussion in 'Alienware 17 and M17x' started by Firmteacher, Jan 29, 2021.

  1. Firmteacher

    Firmteacher Notebook Enthusiast

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    I have a ranger with a 4940mx and a 980m and a 60hz display, I found out the only way to make the Fn+F5 key combo to restart the computer with the Dedicated GPU running, when I did so the computer was running with a windows basic VGA driver.

    Is there a fix to this? I was looking to mess with games with optimus off to see the performance gains/temp differences but the nvidia driver wouldn’t show up unless I restarted back into the normal configuration.

    Using bios A17, I couldn’t find a similar problem when searching.
     
    Firmteacher, Jan 29, 2021
    #1
  2. Baqir

    Baqir Notebook Evangelist

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    when you turn off intel gpu using FN+F5. you need to install graphic drivers again also hardware ids might have changed at least in my case it did so you have to modify gpu drivers nvdmi.inf file
    for me
    hardware ids for nvidia intel
    gpu enabled was
    05AA
    after disabling it was
    05AD
     
    Baqir, Jan 29, 2021
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  3. Firmteacher

    Firmteacher Notebook Enthusiast

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    Oh what, that’s weird. I’ll have to give it a shot.

    Will I need to reinstall it each time?
     
    Firmteacher, Jan 30, 2021
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  4. Firmteacher

    Firmteacher Notebook Enthusiast

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    Okay so I giving this a try, it changed the hardware ID. Swapping between the two modes messes with the driver though which is really really weird.

    The dGPU mode currently has the 980m running properly then switching back to optimus mode gives me a error code 18.

    I’m assuming I’m going to need to keep reinstalling the driver each time I switch?
     
    Firmteacher, Jan 30, 2021
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  5. Baqir

    Baqir Notebook Evangelist

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    yes every time you switch in either mod you need to install drivers again.
    kinda frustrating but this is only solution i know so far.
     
    Baqir, Jan 31, 2021
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  6. Firmteacher

    Firmteacher Notebook Enthusiast

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    That really is frustrating... I guess if I never plan to update the driver and I keep the .inf file with both hardware IDs it’s not soo bad but stil
     
    Firmteacher, Feb 6, 2021
    #6