This is a driver update for Asus and Medion notebooks with NVIDIA Optimus technology. This driver fixes the following issues with the pre-installed driver on the system: Fixes incompatibility issue with Intel IGP (March) driver Performance and functionality improvements. Nvidia Optimus is a computer GPU switching technology created by Nvidia which, depending on the resource load generated by client software applications, will seamlessly switch between two graphics adapters within a computer system in order to provide either maximum performance or minimum power draw from the system's graphics rendering hardware.
NVIDIA Optimus refers to a dual graphics configuration found on laptopsconsisting of an Intel integrated GPU and a discrete NVIDIA GPU.
There are different methods to take advantage of the NVIDIA GPU, which depend onthe driver version supported by your hardware.
In order to determine the correct driver to install, it is not enough to look atthe 'Supported Products' list on NVIDIA's website, because they are notguaranteed to work in an Optimus configuration. So the only way is to tryinstalling the latest nvidia, rebooting, and looking at the kernel log. Ifyour device is not supported, you will see a message like this:
which means you have to uninstall nvidia and install the legacy nvidia390.
A summary of the methods supported by Void, which are mutually exclusive:
- only available on
nvidia - allows to switch to the NVIDIA GPU on a per-application basis
- more flexible but power saving capabilities depend on the hardware (pre-Turingdevices are not shut down completely)
Offloading Graphics Display with RandR 1.4
- available on
nvidiaandnvidia390 - allows to choose which GPU to use at the start of the X session
- less flexible, but allows the user to completely shut down the NVIDIA GPU whennot in use, thus saving power
- available on
nvidiaandnvidia390 - allows to switch to the NVIDIA GPU on a per-application basis
- unofficial method, offers poor performance
- uses the open source driver
nouveau - allows to switch to the NVIDIA GPU on a per-application basis
nouveauis a reverse-engineered driver and offers poor performance
You can check the currently used GPU by searching for renderer string in theoutput of the glxinfo command. It is necessary to install the glxinfopackage for this. For the first two alternatives below, it is also possible toverify that a process is using the NVIDIA GPU by checking the output ofnvidia-smi.
PRIME Render Offload
In this method, GPU switching is done by setting environment variables whenexecuting the application to be rendered on the NVIDIA GPU. The wrapper scriptprime-run is available from the nvidia package, and can be used as shownbelow:
For more information, see NVIDIA'sREADME
Bumblebee
Enable the bumblebeed service and add the user to the bumblebee group. Thisrequires a re-login to take effect.
Optimus Drivers Windows 10
Run the application to be rendered on the NVIDIA GPU with optirun:
Nouveau PRIME
Drivers Optimize
This method uses the open source nouveau driver. If the NVIDIA drivers areinstalled, it is necessary to configure the system to usenouveau.
Nvidia Optimus Drivers Windows 7
Set DRI_PRIME=1 to run an application on the NVIDIA GPU: