dv6t-61XX / dv7t-61XX Switchable Graphics Discussion

that doesn't make sense to me as HP tried doing that when dialed into my PC. I played along with them the second time they tried (but I knew it was going to fail). they are so clueless! Right on the ATI website there is a caution about using the catalyst driver from them on any unit that has switchable graphics. they state one must get the driver from the mfgr of the laptop.

 

That's all it is, a warning. Its not like we didn't see the warning, just didn't care. It like the bridge out ahead sign, I doubt that would stop anyone.
Any damage caused by that is pretty moot, we probably gotten a new laptop after a year or two before it would be noticable.

That warning applies to those that can switch with Intel or special OEM specific cards.

 

So is there just some simple way to test the Radeon graphics card without having to run any sort of new high tech games?

 

3dmarkvantage? that might do it, well if it works lol.

 

I guess I could just use GPU-Z. I just want to make sure my graphics card works before my 21 days are up. Won't that at least check the card and tell me about it?

 

At this point GPU-Z if your ati card is actually working....if you test any games you will know if it is...I'm on my desktop atm, I'll plug in my dv6 and give details in a couple of mins

That said, seems like there is a crysis 2 demo out, you said you don't want to test your gpu but this might give you info

 

The GPUZ thing is iffy in terms of switchable graphics.

I don't know of a simple way to test, sorry.

 

With the new dynamic switching I'm guessing that you have to actually instal something that accesses the GPU? That has been the only way I have been able to test it :/

 

Yeah, so it turns out that I was removing the driver, but then windows was putting it back in place when I restarted after removal. So I thought I was installing 11.5b clean, but I was indeed installing it over 11.4.

Whatever the case, I removed everything ATI then restarted then removed the driver that windows put back in place in DM. I installed 11.4 from swsetup, restarted and installed 11.5b. As far as I can tell, it works great.

I'm happy to say that switching works fine, and I can focus on other things now!

SC2 demo finished downloading last night and it ran at the highest HIGH (the highest settings you can go) @ 1920x1080 without a hiccup. Nice!

 

And so the question still lies can the new dv6/7t 6100 still have the manual switching now? Or be happy with auto switching until further updates?

 

question. after you installed 11.5b have you tried running 3dmark11? the 11.5b driver is giving me some weird flickering thing when running the tests.

 

I have the same thing, but the benchmark still works (never ran 3dmark11 before, thought it was normal... )

 

alright. apparently windows keeps on putting back an ATI driver with automatic switchable graphics no matter how i try to uninstall it. I have not tried to do a driver sweep in safe mode - because i'm now completely converted to the automatic switch, it is seamless and awesome, with the only drawback being i can't overclock the card.

 

What I did to avoid that problem was to uninstall the drivers then disconnect from the internet. It seems that Windows detects the "new device" on its own and decides to download the appropriate driver, which brings you back to the beginning.

 

Ok, I am sorry I have read the whole thread and I am confused. I tried installing the 11.5 hotfix and am currently on it. I just got my dv6 today. I have been running the original witcher and within 10 minutes my laptop gets hot to the touch. The underside is pretty hot for only playing 10 minutes on medium settings. I am wondering if my 6770 is kicking in or not and have no idea how to check it. I tried GPU-Z but don't know how to monitor what is being used. I also tried MSI afterburner and while I am in game the GPU usage spikes but fan speed stays constant at 30. I don't know if that means it is just maxing out the Intel graphics or using the 6770. I am really lost and anyone that can help I would really appreciate it.

 

So, somethings really unexpected...

1) You can apparently switch GPU in the middle of the application with auto switching. First time I ran SC2, it was at about 20fps on medium at 1280x720. I figured it must be wrong, so I minimized and went to switchable graphics, and switched sc2.exe to high performance, restored SC2 window, and it jumped up to 60fps - all without me closing SC2 at all.

2) Benchmarking is screwy with the new graphics card. I had to disable checking system info in help in order to finish 3DMark 11 (or else it hangs after loading physics test). Score is significantly worse than the old 6000 version, despite being 2gb vs 1gb (1548P vs 1600P) with the same driver (11.5b).

3) Not sure why, but I guess I have to attribute it to the 2gb instead of 1gb, gaming performance is radically improved. In the beginning of the first mission in SC2, I'm running both 6000 and 6100 side by side at ultra everything, disable mouse lag, and 1360x768 full screen. 6000 gets hovers around 40fps, whereas the 6100 (with the 2gb card) hovers around 50fps. Identical setup, drivers (11.5b), everything.

Not sure what to make of these things... Completely opposite of what I expected. Especially #2 and #3... They kinda contradict each other...

 

Little confused, is there anyway to be able to overclock a dv6tqe 6100 series? I have tried going from stock to 11.5a to 11.5b and I still dont have the ability to over clock through MSI afterburner or Sapphire trixx. May someone provide instructions?

 

So I had a bit of an interesting experience with the 6770m in my dv7t-6100 (bacon). I installed the 11.6 beta drivers over top of the built in drivers. It completely broke CCC and the Switchable graphics panel, however, it seems that everything I run is defaulting to the Radeon GPU. I downloaded and ran 3DMark Vantage AFTER installing the 11.6 beta drivers and without selecting a performance GPU (because I couldnt get to the switchable graphics panel) I loaded it up. GPU-Z stated that my Radeon flipped into the 3D clocks during the 3DMark Vantage tests.

I'm currently reinstalling the base drivers to verify my results.

 

Hey, I wonder if 11.6 would make the DV6 also default to the Radeon. that would fix the issue I had with a DV6 that I recently sent back for refund--I really want to buy another one as soon as the graphics is sorted out.

Can someone with the latest version of the DV6 give it a try and let me know if you are able to force the Radeon to stay on?

 

Be careful installing the 11.6 drivers if you have a 6100 revision. I currently am having issues reverting back to the base drivers so that CCC/Switchable Graphics panels will work at all.

 

I just want to make sure my 6770 is actually kicking in and works and I have no clue how to do that really. I am downloading the sc2 demo right now and I am guessing if it weren't switching the demo would hardly run.

Just made me wonder initially since the original witcher is a 2 year old game and it got so hot within 10 minutes.

 

Well I've attempted to reinstall both the ATI and Intel drivers on here a number of different ways and I still cant get the CCC and Switchable graphics panels to work. I might have to re-image the machine. Fortunately I havent put much on it yet.

 

with 11.6, can u change 3D settings?

 

cant u do a System Restore?

 

I'll give it a shot. I've never had real great luck with system restores.

 

System restore fixed the CCC/Switchable graphics issue. I'm reinstalling 3DMark Vantage (since the restore removed it) to see which card it defaults to.

 

Well, the ATI clocks still switched to the 3D clocks in GPU-Z when I ran 3DMark Vantage without specifying which card. I'm going to explicitly set it to the power saving card to see if it makes a difference.

EDIT:

Well changing it to power saving definitely ran it on the intel graphics, it got half the performance. It doesnt seem like the 11.6 drivers made a difference in terms of defaulting which cards, I think it just broke CCC/Switchable graphics panels. Although it did give better performance. But not being able to switch graphics may prove a problem if it doesnt select the correct one by default.

 

Turn off Norton Product Tamper Protection if you have Norton, as well as the Virus protection, before invoking System Restore. Otherwise, when the computer restarts, you'll get an error that System Restore failed. Also, in my experience, going back too many days can cause issues.

 

Nah I dont use Norton, its just a system hog. I use MSE.

 

Just a little warning about updating drivers.

Windows have feature that backup previous version if you opted to update instead of doing a clean install. It would automatically load the previous if you uninstall the current version or the user ask to revert.
However, this does not apply to the software part of the driver.

 

So I just tried loading the starcraft demo and it said my video card was not recognized and to adjust the video settings. Does that mean my 6770 is not kicking in?

*Also I used FRAPS to measure my FPS and I was only getting 15-20 fps in medium settings. Normal?

* One more edit sorry. I do still have the switchable graphics option and when I set sc2 to high performance I immediately saw an improvement to 45-50 fps on high settings

 

+1, this has been my experience as well... Maybe people will actually believe me now that the switching does not require shut down and restart of an app to kick in! It's certainly a lot more complex than the first gen manual switching! As long as it works though, it's great! Ditto on the benchmarking and SC2 performance as well. I didn't have another DV6/7 to compare against, but I can tell you it maxes everything out with the FHD screen and still runs smooth! Personally, i think the 6770m is the absolute best compromise between gpu power and battery life (switchable graphics plays a big part) that you're going to get right now.

That's funny, I used Norton back in the day, and it was indeed a horrible resource hog. I actually went as far as running no AV software for a while, because it slowed things down so much. Then I went to McAfee while Comcast first had them on tap... Again, still slow, so I switched over to MSE, because it was less of a resource hog. Now that Comcast has switched to Norton, I decided to give them another chance. Personally, I find the current iteration of Norton to be less of a resource hog and more responsive than MSE 2, which was decent, but it definitely delayed startup and shut-down times longer than Norton. MSE is also getting mixed reviews in "independent" testing... MSE delivers mixed results in antivirus tests

It might be worth giving Norton a second look at least for the free trial period (17 months total). I was surprised by how far they have come.

 

the last 3 versions of Norton have been very fast to install (about ONE MINUTE) and don't hog many resources. Norton is totally revamped from what it used to be.

 

I considered it, but I dunno. I kinda like how MSE merges with Windows Defender as well to not have a second piece running at the same time, plus I always figured that who knows better than MS what is wrong with their own OS.

I used to be an Avast user, I still like it, but I had switched to MSE because of reviews I read from an independent antivirus tester. I dunno, I may reconsider. I just dont like paying for AV/Antimalware when there are good products that are free (AVG, Avast, MSE, etc)

But as with you, I've still got that sour taste in my mouth from the horrible Norton SystemWorks days.

 

what it sounds like is the same damn problem I had with mine--and HP couldn't fix it, so I sent it back. good luck getting a fix for yours.

 

That is what I was worried about, but when I set sc2 to high performance I saw a big improvement.

 

ah, so it's not totally broken! The only game I ever play on my laptop is FSX (and FS2004) and that's how I discovered mine never switched to Radeon. If HP could have made it work with just that one game, I would have been golden.

 

At least I THINK lol. I am a bit of a noob so I really don't know how to make 100% sure it is on. After a short amount of play though it is really hot.

 

when I played FSX on my first DV6 (the one that SG worked on), I always turned on the Antec dual-fan cooler to high speed--that kept the laptop cool.

 

Sounds like I need a cooling pad for sure then. BB has a Targus for $30 that has good reviews.

 

Hey Beradon, do you still have the numbers you got for both performance tests? I'm curious as to just how much of a boost you got because, depending on the numbers, I'd rather have good performance over switchable graphics.

 

I dont, I didnt let them complete but the FPS on the first test was noticeably different.

 

My DV7T is here now.
Now what to do? What to check?

 

Hey, how can I get apps to recognize my 6770m? For instance, I am using Dolphin right now to emulate Gamecube, and you can choose which GPU u want to use, and 6770 doesn't show up in the drop down. Same happens in CPU-z, it only shows the intel.

 

Right now it looks like the solution is just to wait for new drivers. I was trying to confirm the same thing in a Elder Scrolls: Morrowind, and I really still can't tell which GPU I am using, as it is an older game that's more limited by the CPU.

 

You're confident that this will be fixable by drivers? HOpefully so

 

I also hope this is a simple driver/software fix

 

Alright - I am a little confused by all of the information in this thread. Just to clarify, I have the dv6tqe-6000 model with the manual-switching graphics and stock HP drivers. I would like to upgrade my exsisting ATi/AMD graphics drivers (1gig Radeon HD 6770M) to the current version. Is there a path to do so without losing or breaking my abiltiy to manually switch graphics options?

Thanks!

 

The dynamic switching, the CCC is looking for a set of library functions that is not found in the current common driver package.

So you're not going to lose your manual switch by overwrite with the new one.

Basically, stock to latest. I never figured out why the need to update a then b when their sha hash for the driver is the same with a different string in their config file and a updated CCC.

Note: Do this at your own risk.

 

I have HP DV6 6020ST notebook it has AMD 6770m and Intel HD 3000 VGA.

I have installed "ATI Catalyst Application Profiles" yesterday, and i see the Dynamic Switchable Graphics tab. i have set my games for high performance and the other ones power saving gpu. i have played some games and it was working correctly.

But then i have installed new 11.5b hotfix drivers, and that application profiles section are totally gone.

i have tried to uninstall all drivers, then installed latest stable, new version cap5 applications profile but its not came back again.

All ati drivers uninstalled. all ati folders deleted. system scanned with driver sweeper on safe mode. and installed drivers from hp website. but same problem happened. i only have "Fixed Scheme" for GPUs based on power source. i dont have "Dynamic Scheme"

How can re-enable the ATI Catalyst Application Profiles again?