Is my video card working?

I created a post about this yesterday and got no replies. But I have a lot more info this time. I just got my laptop yesterday (specs below) and its supposedly equipped with an Intel HD graphics 3000 as well as a NVIDIA GT 540M. The laptop uses the optimus technology to switch graphics cards when needed. The problem is I can't tell which card is running when. My other laptop used a radeon with switchable graphics and every time it switched, the screen would flicker. You could tell it was switching video cards. Also I remember running DXDIAG in the start menu to check what card was running. When the radeon was running it would show. On this laptop it always shows the integrated card.

I've opened the NVIDIA control panel and even set the 540m as the card to use at all times but I see nothing change. I ran modern warfare 2 to force optimus to work and I saw that while mw2 was running, the 540m showed up in CPU-Z. So that seemed fine since the game was running fairly well. But why won't the video card show up in dxdiag? Even when I set it to the active card in the NVIDIA control panel? (yes I clicked apply). I'm still not sure if mw2 is using the card or not.

Even more frustrating is minecraft. I've read about this before and I heard that you have to set an exception in the NVIDIA control panel for minecraft. I did this but noticed nothing. And minecraft is running worse than mw2. I'm assuming that the exception I put in isn't working or there's something going on with the video card or drivers... But I got the latest correct drivers and its still giving me this problem. Any help here?

 

Your old computer and new computer are fundamentally different when it comes to graphics switching. The old one had a multiplexer, which is a hardware component that passes the signal from the active GPU through to the display. The new one does not, and the IGP is responsible for passing the signal to the display. This can cause some goofy things with some diagnostic utilities, mainly what you're seeing where dxdiag is reporting that the IGP is the only active GPU.

No idea why Minecraft isn't working well.

 

Ok thanks. Anyone else know anything about this?

 

Its not a well known fact but Nvidia Optimus does have certain drawbacks, and that includes failing to realise that heavy OpenGL stuff should go to the Nvidia GPU instead of the Intel IGP.
Im afraid there is not much you can do exept hope Nvidia fixes this in either a driver or in the next revision of Optimus tech.

AMD Llano did have a similar problem on the Dv6 quad with extra AMD discreet card, but that got fixed trough a bios update.

 

If I have to I just want to disable onboard graphics and enable full time NVIDIA. Know how I can do this by something other than the NVIDIA panel because that seems not to be working..

 

Have you tried adjusting this in your "Power Options"? It should be under "Change advanced power settings" once you navigate to change a power plan.

 

Check the BIOS settings, might be able to turn off Optimus/IGP through there.

 

Well, my 540m Optimus is working fine with my apps that heavily use opengl 3+.
A noticeable performance difference between my Intel HD and Nvidia card.

Try this ... Open up Nvidia Control Panel. Select Desktop -> Display GPU Activity.

This would show you a list of programs using the Nvidia Card.

 

Ok... I think I figured it out. Minecraft is running far render distance at 115FPS