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#1 2019-03-29 23:28:54

UnclePa
Member
Registered: 2018-07-06
Posts: 30  

Laptop AMD Graphics

My laptop's graphics have only been so-so but I figured that's just the way they were.  However, I was looking at the manual for my laptop and found this:

Video
Controller:
Integrated      •	 AMD A8-7100 APU with AMD Radeon R5 Graphics
                •	 AMD A10-7300 APU with AMD Radeon R6 Graphics
Discrete        AMD Radeon R7 M265 Graphics

Memory:
Integrated     Shared system memory
Discrete       2 GB DDR3

That implies to me that it actually has switchable graphics.  "lspci | grep VGA" shows "VGA compatible controller: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD/ATI] Kaveri [Radeon R5 Graphics]".

Anyone have any experience/pointers on how to switch from the integrated controller to the discrete one?

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#2 2019-03-30 00:00:26

Head_on_a_Stick
Member
From: London
Registered: 2019-03-24
Posts: 3,125  
Website

Re: Laptop AMD Graphics

UnclePa wrote:

"lspci | grep VGA"

How about

lspci | grep 'VGA\|3D'

Brianna Ghey — Rest In Power

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#3 2019-03-30 01:03:01

UnclePa
Member
Registered: 2018-07-06
Posts: 30  

Re: Laptop AMD Graphics

Exact same output.  I found an arch wiki article about this which seems to be saying that "xrandr --listproviders" should list all available cards.  However, the R5 is still the only one listed.  Edit: The wiki article has a troubleshooter for that situation but I don't have an xorg.conf file nor do I have any blacklisted modules.

Last edited by UnclePa (2019-03-30 01:05:53)

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#4 2019-03-30 10:56:27

Head_on_a_Stick
Member
From: London
Registered: 2019-03-24
Posts: 3,125  
Website

Re: Laptop AMD Graphics

Are you sure it's not listed anywhere in the plain lspci output?

Check the firmware ("BIOS") options to see if it can be enabled from there.


Brianna Ghey — Rest In Power

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#5 2019-04-01 05:00:50

ToxicExMachina
Member
Registered: 2019-03-11
Posts: 210  

Re: Laptop AMD Graphics

UnclePa wrote:

Anyone have any experience/pointers on how to switch from the integrated controller to the discrete one?

You can try DRI_PRIME from Mesa. It's the most proper way to use hybrid graphics.

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#6 2019-04-01 12:23:14

UnclePa
Member
Registered: 2018-07-06
Posts: 30  

Re: Laptop AMD Graphics

Thanks.  My understanding is that DRI_PRIME won't work if xrandr doesn't see both cards.  Even if it does, I've not found a driver that specifically states it supports the R7 M265 card.  As best I can tell, it looks like I have an unsupported system.  I got it pretty cheap and it is possible that the discrete video doesn't even work.  Neither the BIOS nor the diagnostics say anything about 2 video controllers.  I couldn't get dual boot to work when I first got it so I wiped Windows.  I think I'll have to punt on this one as far as high end graphics games go.  Not a big deal.

Last edited by UnclePa (2019-04-01 12:25:37)

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#7 2019-04-02 03:59:04

ToxicExMachina
Member
Registered: 2019-03-11
Posts: 210  

Re: Laptop AMD Graphics

Try amdgpu (not amdgpu-pro) driver. It seems your GPU is GCN 1.1.

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