Macbook Pro Graphics Switching...

icedbullet

icedbullet

icedbullet

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Joined
8 Sep 2008
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Birmingham
Hey all

I just got the 15 inch macbook pro and I wanted to know more about the automatic graphics switching between the dedicated gpu and the intel hd graphics.

How do you know its switched? There are no messages and nothing appears in the taskbar to illustrate the gpu switch has occurred. Is there anyway to have some kind of notification so I know when I'm running on battery which apps are going to initiate the dedicated gpu?
 
As above. By default gfxCardStatus will tell you which card is running. Better still, you can force it to use just the one. Great if you want to save battery power while on battery [especially since stuff like Skype can trigger the more power-hungry NVidia].
 
I wouldn't always force it into Intel when you think you only need that though, sometimes you'll find the system legitimately using the NVIDIA GPU and comparing the estimated battery life left between the two, the NVIDIA GPU will come out with more estimated time left.

I was experimenting with this, some applications will activate for no reason and forcing it into the Intel GPU there will improve the battery life, but when I was using Photoshop CS5 (has GPU acceleration), I checked the battery life with the NVIDIA GPU running and then swapped over and then looked, and the gap in favor of the NVIDIA GPU was surprising.

It isn't just there for when you need performance, because some things will have the Integrated GPU working too hard, using up more power - when the discrete GPU could do it with less power and less heat generated.
 
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