Asus Eee PC 1015PN - graphic cards: Optimus and ION

[mtron]

As you guys might have heard ubuntu developer summit is currently taking place. One of the Panels was hybrid-graphics support in ubuntu.

session notes are here http://pastebin.com/FJg5Dzk4

This is a good round up of the current development state.

Our EeePC's are build with a mux-less hardware design so when running in Optimus mode the video output is routed via the integrated (IGP) chipset and the more intense graphics work is offloaded to the discrete GPU.

Ironhide (formerly known as Bumblebee) is currently the best/only way to provide MUXless systems support. Presently only NVIDIA discrete GPUs are supported.

Still the known problems with Ironhide in Optimus mode persist ( preformance lost, HDMI out not possible ) but the long-term plans look very promising:

Kernel & Xorg
The kernel DRM work required for sharing GPU objects is not too complicated, according to Airlie [1].

The biggest blocker at the moment is that the X server has limitations which prevent using GPU’s without attaching a screen to them. Airlie proposed changes to the X server on the xorg-devel mailing list [2], and he has been doing some work on this area [3].

Upstream (NVIDIA/AMD) Schedule
Once the X server re-architecting is finished and released, the drivers just need to add support for the new ABI in order to work. Highly dependant on when the actual X server release is, of course. Aaron Plattner from NVIDIA has already showed interest in helping with the redesign work [4], so it’s likely that at least NVIDIA has support for it right from the start.

[1] http://airlied.livejournal.com/71734.html
[2] http://lists.x.org/archives/xorg-dev...ch/020557.html
[3] http://cgit.freedesktop.org/~airlied...drvmodelv2-wip
[4] http://lists.x.org/archives/xorg-dev...il/021225.html

So to sum this up:
ubuntu won't do anything and wait for "upstream" to fix this issue. a developer helping at the xorg side would have been a huge step but the only planned action for precise is to "add a early boot startup script to switch the alternatives if user has switched gfx in bios".

Well this might save us 3 lines of code in the switching script

[mtron]

when I switch to nvidia graphic card my tv is shown on the nvidia settings panel, but I get nothing on the display

Hello!

First: use gnome-classic or xfce / lxde Desktop environment for this. unity and gnome-shell both don't play nice with multi-desktop setups currently. You need to set up your workspaces to show 4 Desktops on a 2x2 grid.

Now in nvidia-settings go on the "Xserver Display Configuration" Tab and click on your tv (it gets a red border if it's selected) under the image go on Configuration and select "Seperate X-screens".





go to the "Save to X Configuration File" button on the bottom of the screen. This is tricky since the button is below our small display and in gnome-shell or unity you cant just scroll down to the next desktop and see the desktop overlapping window. This should work with xfce / lxde though so use "STRG+ALT+DOWN" and switch to the lower workspace to get to the button & press it.

If you still have problems to get to the "Save to X Configuration File" button use the jupiter panel applet and switch the resolution from 1024x600 to 1024x768. Now the whole nvidia-settings dialog should fit on one desktop





A popup dialog will open and ask for a file name, enter

/etc/X11/xorg.conf.asus1015pn.nvidia

and press save. To start an application on the TV screen add the following line at the bottom if your .bashrc file:

gedit ~/.bashrc

alias tv="DISPLAY=:0.1"

Now logout & back in. Your TV should show you the XFCE desktop wallpaper now and to start an application on the television open a terminal and prefix the app you want to launch with "tv". E.g. if you want to run xbmc on the tv:

tv xbmc

[berardi1111]

W: Failed to fetch http://ppa.launchpad.net/mtron/eee10...source/Sources 404 Not Found

W: Failed to fetch http://ppa.launchpad.net/mtron/eee10...amd64/Packages 404 Not Found


I continue to receive the above messages when following the steps on the site. Can someone please point me in the right direction? I'm no Linux Guru but I know what a 404 error is... is there a new site to use? I am using instructions from the making ubuntu rock site to install graphic switch utility.

Also earlier it was said that it was related to natty, but I am running oneric and I am not explicitly calling the above URL, those error messages occur when I issue the commands:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:mtron/eee1015pn && sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install eee1015pn-acpitools

Appreciate any further pointers you may have! =)

[mtron]

you are trying to install this package on ubuntu natty 11.04.

This ubuntu version is not supported by the ppa. Only the latest version ubuntu oneiric 11.10 is.

[berardi1111]

you are trying to install this package on ubuntu natty 11.04.

This ubuntu version is not supported by the ppa. Only the latest version ubuntu oneiric 11.10 is.

Sorry if I wasn't clear - I am positively on oneiric the 11.10 newest kernel.

Any ideas of how I might be able to clear out whatever is making the ppa think I am on natty? I really am not, I swear

[mtron]

Hello!

Was not reading you post till the end. Sorry wont happen again If you are on oneiric this should not happen (D'ohhh) and seems to be a bug in the python-software-properties package so please submit a bugreport about this issue to the ubuntu devs.

To fix this manually change the sources.list entry.

sudo gedit /etc/apt/sources.list.d/mtron-eee1015pn-oneiric.list

if this file does not exist on your system or has a different name (e.g. mtron-eee1015pn-natty.list) Delete the other file and create a new one with the name given above.

the line inside the text file should read:

deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/mtron/eee1015pn/ubuntu oneiric main

Now reload your package info and try to reinstall

[mtron]

Hello!

I'm currently working on a new version with a settings window to manipulate the power state of the nvidia script in Optimus mode, Generate a bugreport and add custom keyboard shortcuts. Currently Keyboard shortcuts only work on gnome based desktops; Patches for other DE's are welcome

Since this is new and not extensively tested code there might be hidden bugs & malfunctions and i do not want to push it to the ppa for now. So if somebody wants to volunteer beta-testing the new code, please send me a pm.



Configuration is very easy:

Each line in the table represents a settings option and it's current status (green=on / red=off / yellow=not supported) . To change a setting double click on the corresponding line.

The available Settings currently include:

• Optimus mode: Auto Disable nvidia chip on boot
  If active (green status icon) the nvidia chip is turned off autonatically in Optimus Mode
  If inactive (red status icon) the power state of the nvidia chip is not changed in Optimus Mode
  
• Shortcut: GPU info notify-osd
  If active (green status icon) the Keyboad shortcut 'Ctrl+2' will show a notify-osd bubble with GPU Info
  
  
  The Temperature readings are gathered by using the external application lm-sensors. Install the lm-sensors package and run the auto configuration
  
  

  sudo apt-get install lm-sensors
  sudo sensors-detect

  Just press enter at each question to use the default answer. Only the last question should be answered with 'yes':
  
  

  "Do you want to add these lines automatically to /etc/modules? (yes/NO)"YES

• Shortcut: Battery info notify-osd
  If active (green status icon) the Keyboad shortcut 'Ctrl+1' will show a notify-osd bubble with the current Power consumption and remaining battery load vale.
  
  
• Shortcut: Toggle Super Hybrid Engine (SHE)
  If active (green status icon) the Hardware button to toggle the CPU state will be mapped to Jupiter's 'Toggle SHE State' Script. You need to have the jupiter power management applet installed.
  
• Log to File
  If active (green status icon) all debug output of the display-settings script will be saved in the logfile /var/log/acpi-call.log
  
• Generate Debug info
  If active (green status icon) some basic system info is written to a debug file $HOME/eee1015pn-debug.txt

If a setting does not work and the script exists unexpected, start a terminal and run 'vga-selector-gui' & reproduce the bug. The debug output should tell you the function where it failed.

[barthus]

Mtron,

this looks really, really good! Quite professional. They should include it into Ubuntu. - Unfortunately, I have not much time to try it out ... let's see may be later on.

[mtron]

Hello!

i already got 2 nice people testing, so let's see what they think. If everything works out good i will push it to the ppa in the coming days.

They should include it into Ubuntu

well, this means i need to support it for various releases over the whole support time. To be honest: i do not want to do that...

[mtron]

Hello!

I've just pushed a new version to the ppa, so eee1015pn-acpitools 0.6.7 should be installed when you run your next system update.

The changes in this Version are already explained in Post #237

A 'diff' for the previous Version 0.6.6 is provided at the bzr webfrontend

Happy Hacking