I need help with W500 switchable graphics

[Cola]

Hi all.


As I just recieved a brand new original 9-cell battery, and an OCZ Solid 3 120GB SSD for my W500, I had to reinstall Windows 7 on to it.

But here's where the trouble comes in. I only get about 2 hours on the battery when fully charged.
At first I thought it was because it was using the dedicated graphics chip on it, and then I configured it to change to the onboard chip when it's running on the battery.

The problem is, that I can't get it to change back to the dedicated graphics chip unless I reinstall the ATI driver.

Anyone have a clue of what I can do here? I'm not really that much into switchable graphics etc.


Regards
Cola

[bobones]

If you've got the correct driver (which is an ATI package for both internal and dedicated) then the Power Manager taskbar icon will have an option for switchable graphics in its menu. You need the power manager driver, power manager application and graphics driver installed. The BIOS needs to be set for switchable graphics. The menu switching should work back and forth without issue.

Until recently, there was a problem where the power consumption would increase to the level of the high performance graphics chip after resuming from standby even if the energy saving graphics option was selected. You can see the power consumption in the power manager app - should be around 12-18 watts with the energy saving and above 20 watts with the dedicated chip. I'm not sure which driver fixed this issue, but I noticed it was working correctly on my W500 with Windows 8 RTM and latest versions of everything.

Unfortunately, I don't have my W500 with me to check what versions I have on it.

[Cola]

Thanks for your reply!

Unfortunaly I haven't got the switchable graphics option available in the Power Manager menu :/

I tried following this guide, though after several failed tries, I've given up on this solution:

I got this working. It's remarkably simple.
1. Install the power manager driver and app FIRST.
2. Reboot.
3. Use the Lenovo Windows 7 driver.
4. Allow the Lenovo driver package to unpack to C:\DRIVERS\VIDEO as usual, BUT DO NOT RUN THE ATI Setup.exe.
5. Navigate to the location of the ATI package, which is in the usual C:\DRIVERS\VIDEO folder.
6. Right click on the ATI "Setup.exe", -->properties-->compatibility-->select Windows XP/SP3.
7. Run the ATI Setup.exe.
8. Reboot.

From this point, the install proceeds normally. After reboot, and a little time to load, a right-click on the battery icon provides the "switchable graphics" option. Switching does work. When the 5700GL is selected, the ATI control applet will be availailable in the usual place.

I have tried following the guide.
I have made sure BIOS is set to use switchable graphics
Aswell as following it, I've also tried resetting my BIOS to default settings, installing an older graphics driver, reinstalled both the powermanager + driver as well as the graphics adapter driver multiple times.

In dxdiag it only detects the GMA4500 integrated graphics, and in device manager, it detects both the integrated and the dedicated graphics, but the dedicated graphics, has a yellow triangle warning sign on it. The text it displays, is "ATI Mobility Radeon HD 3650 (Engineering Sample - WDDM v1.1)"



Btw. I get a single beep as I start up the laptop. Could this mean anything?


Have any of you got a slightest idea of how I can be able to fix this? If so, tell me please, I'd be very grateful to know



EDIT:
Just discovered that I get a core 10 error when checking properties menu in device manager for HD 3650.

Here's a picture showing it:
http://i.imgur.com/Yricy.png

[bighank]

Just did this yesterday after installing Windows 7


The problem is a failed switchable graphics driver install, . You have to get rid of it manually by way of removing the faulty ati driver and then re-installing the broken driver, and then resetting the ati and intel drivers manually. Steps are:
1) download the switchable graphics driver from lenovo. do a search at the lenovo site for the file . save for later use. also print out the text file that accompanies that file (just below it on the web page). read the the instructions carefully!
2) manually uninstall the ati gpu driver, through ati uninstall utility in control panel software removal option. reboot.
3) boot into bios (via F1 in startup) choose config, then display, set "graphics device: switchable graphics” to “discrete graphics” and set “OS detection for switchable graphics” to “disabled”. save; continue. the system will boot into vista running under vga, and will look awful.
4) execute the downloaded driver check where it has installed to (see installation text file, mentioned above). go there are run the setup.exe. follow instructions to the letter in the text file. reboot. ati should be up and running.
5) reboot to bios. choose config, then display , set "graphics device: switchable graphics” to “integrated graphics” and leave “OS detection for switchable graphics” “disabled”. save and continue.
6) vista will appear again in vga mode, but will start looking for intel driver. it will eventually install, and will ask for reboot. do so. intel driver will be running.
7) reboot to bios. choose config, then display , set "graphics device: switchable graphics” to “switchable graphics” and reset “OS detection for switchable graphics” to “enabled”. -or set bios to default (ie switchable graphics is default). save and continue.
you should now be able to use switchable graphics in Windows 7 or Vista, as both ati and intel drivers are properly installed properly.

These are the drivers and readmes for Windows 7

Note there is a Power Management and a Power Management Driver
You may or may not need the Power Management patch

00430us, 7vd619ww, g120kuww, g6u432ww

The same procedure works for Windows Vista with different drivers

[precip9]

Thanks for your reply!

Unfortunaly I haven't got the switchable graphics option available in the Power Manager menu :/

I tried following this guide, though after several failed tries, I've given up on this solution:

I was the author of that post. It was done on an RTM, not actual retail copy. Several of us have worked through it on this thread:

http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.ph ... 60#p692860

The instructions, with all the additions and corrections, appears at the end of the thread.

[Cola]

I was the author of that post. It was done on an RTM, not actual retail copy. Several of us have worked through it on this thread:

http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.ph ... 60#p692860

The instructions, with all the additions and corrections, appears at the end of the thread.

Tested and confirmed working!

Thanks a bunch!

Battery life when up by 50%! So I can finally actually use my 9-cell battery to give me more than 2 hours worth of battery!