Anyone else with a UL30/50/80 feel a bit screwed by ASUS? I purchased a UL80Vt based off of the review here, but have been quite disappointed that the graphics drivers haven't been updated since I bought it.
I don't have a laptop I can test this with, but if you check on the ASUS download site I think they may have updated the drivers for the ULxxVt series recently. Contrary to logic, instead of going to Notebooks->UL80->UL80Vt, your best bet is to go to Notebooks->Drivers->VGA. You can find 189.64 drivers that might work on the UL80Vt. I'll ping ASUS though and see if they have any news -- I know Alienware/Dell updated the M11x with 197 drivers in the last month.
I poked around the VGA driver page you mentioned and found nothing, so I contacted ASUS support.
They confirmed that there are no driver updates, and it didn't sound too hopeful that there would be any in the future, either. The reply to my message included a suggestion to hack together the newer Nvidia drivers and included a link to this page: http://forum.notebookreview.com/asus/474538-modded...
I can't believe they would respond with an answer of "No we're not supporting our product, but there are some internet pages and have hacks to fix that"
I don't even care about the Nvidia drivers; I really just want the updated Intel IGP drivers to support Flash 10.1
Seconded. I bought the N61Jv after reading the Anandtech review, and it's a fantastic machine, but NVidia's support has been pretty abysmal. They've released a fix for the SC2 beta which was appreciated, but I can't help but feel like I'm using a very stripped down graphics driver. Particularly, I'd love to have some control over the Powermizer settings, but I can't find a way to change them using the Optimus drivers currently posted.
Seems that way, but I tried the most recent vanilla (non-Optimus) drivers and they do have power settings included. Would be nice to see that functionality for those of us with Optimus (not to mention it seems none of the problems mentioned in the review posted here have been fixed). The concern expressed by the author in that review was that NVidia would fail to do their part in keeping things up-to-date, and it seems that fear was well-founded, at least up until now.
In Linux, or Mac OS? Either way, I'm interested in the results. In Mac OS because I want faster OpenGL gaming. In Linux for battery life improvements... Either one I'd welcome.
Unfortunately, Apple doesn't allow nVidia (or any other 3rd party, for that matter) to provide reference drivers on OSX. It's up to Apple to push out 256, and if tradition holds it'll take them several months to do so.
Does anybody know if the Optimus feature work with the desktop Fermi cards? I have an HTPC which I use for gaming. I want to upgrade to Fermi, but I don't want to use it all the time due to its enormous power consumption.
Currently, NVIDIA has "no plans" to do Optimus on anything beyond notebooks. I figure that's just them saying they haven't made an Optimus enabled desktop part yet, but who knows? It would be awfully nice to get GTX 400 parts to idle at 0W while you use IGP.... SLI and other stuff would make it a lot trickier though.
I don't think Hybrid SLI is quite the same thing; that was using an NVIDIA IGP in a faux-SLI setup when you added a discrete GPU of similar caliber, i.e. the 9200 chipset with a 9200 GPU or something. Or I could be wrong. Anyway, the big deal with Optimus is that the discrete GPU completely shuts off when not in use, but it doesn't have any direct video output connections, so data is copied over PCIe into the IGP frame buffer. It seems like it should all be possible on the desktop, provided the desktop GPUs have the "Optimus Copy Engine". We shall see I suppose.
Jarred, do you know if Optimus requires anything special on the hardware side or it is all in the software drivers? Maybe, enabling Optimus on the desktop is just a matter of installing the latest drivers and enabling some registry key or similar? You guys at adandtech.com are doing a great job at popularizing HTPCs. It would be awesome if you could do a research on this (maybe with NVidia's help) and write up an article.
The secret sauce in Optimus is their Copy Engine, which allows them to asynchronously copy the data from the GPU framebuffer to the IGP framebuffer. Without it, the GPU is tied up transferring data rather than rendering, reducing performance. So as far as I'm aware, Optimus on the desktop isn't possible with the current hardware (unless NVIDIA has the Copy Engine in the hardware but it's disabled). At least, that's what we've been told.
The premise of Hybrid SLI (Ge-force Boost + Hybrid Power) for the desktop user was to use any supported dGPU in combination with the n Force iGPU, enabling Hybrid Power to power off the dGPU when is not needed. Obviously the Optimus engine goes beyond that, but it is derived from the rudimentary Hybrid Power. A little spit and shine along with a new name does wonders for the new iteration.
I'm pretty sure they'd announced the upcoming driver revision would be the 256-series before that "fiasco" ever happened. My guess is they were just trying to convey the impression that these are a quantum leap past the old drivers. They've made big jumps in the past as well, usually to powers of two (or 1.5x a power of two).
bah, who would want optimus on a laptop! laptops are small work (not gaming!) devices with pathetic performance or ridiculous price tag... gaming is done on the desktop! which is EXACTLY where we need optimus! Come on people, nvidia and AMD both promised us hybrid power YEARS Ago and neither delivered, now nvidia has the tech but is limiting it to the laptop!
I want my desktop GPU to shut down completely when not playing a game, and use the IGP for windows... I want completely silence when not running and the power (and MONEY) savings that come along with it!
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21 Comments
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veri745 - Monday, May 24, 2010 - link
Anyone else with a UL30/50/80 feel a bit screwed by ASUS? I purchased a UL80Vt based off of the review here, but have been quite disappointed that the graphics drivers haven't been updated since I bought it.JarredWalton - Monday, May 24, 2010 - link
I don't have a laptop I can test this with, but if you check on the ASUS download site I think they may have updated the drivers for the ULxxVt series recently. Contrary to logic, instead of going to Notebooks->UL80->UL80Vt, your best bet is to go to Notebooks->Drivers->VGA. You can find 189.64 drivers that might work on the UL80Vt. I'll ping ASUS though and see if they have any news -- I know Alienware/Dell updated the M11x with 197 drivers in the last month.veri745 - Friday, May 28, 2010 - link
I poked around the VGA driver page you mentioned and found nothing, so I contacted ASUS support.They confirmed that there are no driver updates, and it didn't sound too hopeful that there would be any in the future, either. The reply to my message included a suggestion to hack together the newer Nvidia drivers and included a link to this page:
http://forum.notebookreview.com/asus/474538-modded...
I can't believe they would respond with an answer of "No we're not supporting our product, but there are some internet pages and have hacks to fix that"
I don't even care about the Nvidia drivers; I really just want the updated Intel IGP drivers to support Flash 10.1
NYHoustonman - Tuesday, May 25, 2010 - link
Seconded. I bought the N61Jv after reading the Anandtech review, and it's a fantastic machine, but NVidia's support has been pretty abysmal. They've released a fix for the SC2 beta which was appreciated, but I can't help but feel like I'm using a very stripped down graphics driver. Particularly, I'd love to have some control over the Powermizer settings, but I can't find a way to change them using the Optimus drivers currently posted.MrSpadge - Tuesday, May 25, 2010 - link
Missing power mixer settings ist just normal for their drivers.NYHoustonman - Tuesday, May 25, 2010 - link
Seems that way, but I tried the most recent vanilla (non-Optimus) drivers and they do have power settings included. Would be nice to see that functionality for those of us with Optimus (not to mention it seems none of the problems mentioned in the review posted here have been fixed). The concern expressed by the author in that review was that NVidia would fail to do their part in keeping things up-to-date, and it seems that fear was well-founded, at least up until now.ChrisRice - Monday, May 24, 2010 - link
Feels like a Linux article on this new driver may be forth coming.Cat - Monday, May 24, 2010 - link
How does the 256 driver work on the new MacBook Pros?Veerappan - Monday, May 24, 2010 - link
In Linux, or Mac OS? Either way, I'm interested in the results. In Mac OS because I want faster OpenGL gaming. In Linux for battery life improvements... Either one I'd welcome.lowlymarine - Monday, May 24, 2010 - link
Unfortunately, Apple doesn't allow nVidia (or any other 3rd party, for that matter) to provide reference drivers on OSX. It's up to Apple to push out 256, and if tradition holds it'll take them several months to do so.Cat - Monday, May 24, 2010 - link
I mean in Boot Camp, not OS X.y2kBug - Monday, May 24, 2010 - link
Does anybody know if the Optimus feature work with the desktop Fermi cards? I have an HTPC which I use for gaming. I want to upgrade to Fermi, but I don't want to use it all the time due to its enormous power consumption.JarredWalton - Monday, May 24, 2010 - link
Currently, NVIDIA has "no plans" to do Optimus on anything beyond notebooks. I figure that's just them saying they haven't made an Optimus enabled desktop part yet, but who knows? It would be awfully nice to get GTX 400 parts to idle at 0W while you use IGP.... SLI and other stuff would make it a lot trickier though.Rayb - Monday, May 24, 2010 - link
It's called "Hybrid SLI" for desktops and you would need an Nforce MB supporting that feature, at least when it was still being developed.JarredWalton - Monday, May 24, 2010 - link
I don't think Hybrid SLI is quite the same thing; that was using an NVIDIA IGP in a faux-SLI setup when you added a discrete GPU of similar caliber, i.e. the 9200 chipset with a 9200 GPU or something. Or I could be wrong. Anyway, the big deal with Optimus is that the discrete GPU completely shuts off when not in use, but it doesn't have any direct video output connections, so data is copied over PCIe into the IGP frame buffer. It seems like it should all be possible on the desktop, provided the desktop GPUs have the "Optimus Copy Engine". We shall see I suppose.y2kBug - Tuesday, May 25, 2010 - link
Jarred, do you know if Optimus requires anything special on the hardware side or it is all in the software drivers? Maybe, enabling Optimus on the desktop is just a matter of installing the latest drivers and enabling some registry key or similar? You guys at adandtech.com are doing a great job at popularizing HTPCs. It would be awesome if you could do a research on this (maybe with NVidia's help) and write up an article.JarredWalton - Tuesday, May 25, 2010 - link
The secret sauce in Optimus is their Copy Engine, which allows them to asynchronously copy the data from the GPU framebuffer to the IGP framebuffer. Without it, the GPU is tied up transferring data rather than rendering, reducing performance. So as far as I'm aware, Optimus on the desktop isn't possible with the current hardware (unless NVIDIA has the Copy Engine in the hardware but it's disabled). At least, that's what we've been told.Rayb - Tuesday, May 25, 2010 - link
The premise of Hybrid SLI (Ge-force Boost + Hybrid Power) for the desktop user was to use any supported dGPU in combination with the n Force iGPU, enabling Hybrid Power to power off the dGPU when is not needed. Obviously the Optimus engine goes beyond that, but it is derived from the rudimentary Hybrid Power. A little spit and shine along with a new name does wonders for the new iteration.supamario - Tuesday, May 25, 2010 - link
I think the reason for the jump from 19X.XX is fairly simple - to put behind the fiasco that was 196.75Xentropy - Tuesday, May 25, 2010 - link
I'm pretty sure they'd announced the upcoming driver revision would be the 256-series before that "fiasco" ever happened. My guess is they were just trying to convey the impression that these are a quantum leap past the old drivers. They've made big jumps in the past as well, usually to powers of two (or 1.5x a power of two).taltamir - Thursday, May 27, 2010 - link
bah, who would want optimus on a laptop! laptops are small work (not gaming!) devices with pathetic performance or ridiculous price tag... gaming is done on the desktop!which is EXACTLY where we need optimus! Come on people, nvidia and AMD both promised us hybrid power YEARS Ago and neither delivered, now nvidia has the tech but is limiting it to the laptop!
I want my desktop GPU to shut down completely when not playing a game, and use the IGP for windows... I want completely silence when not running and the power (and MONEY) savings that come along with it!
You have the tech nvidia, let us use it already!