8600M GT - anyone has the working fine?

[k0tuk]

Hi!

I`m using Linux Mint Felicia and i have Nvidia 8600M GT 512 RAM video card... I`m a Linux fan, but i have been fighting with Nvidia drivers for a long time... I had to throw away my beloved Compiz and it`s effects because of the very well known powermizer issues. I than switched to XFCE4, enabled transparency, locked Nvidia at 2nd Powermizer level with

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options nvidia NVreg_RegistryDwords="PerfLevelSrc=0x2222"

And now it works (and looks!) quite good. Standart XFCE4-panel may be used as a dock, Conky is nice and i don`t need any desklets with it...

But still i miss Gnome and Compiz...

So my question is: Maybe somebody has 8600M GT that works fine? maybe some specific drivers? Kernel? Distro?
Any info is appreciated.

P.S. i can use Gnome and Compiz with my card being locked at 2nd level, but it starts to overheat. With some basic effects enabled it jumps to the 80C.

P.P.S. This is my own thread, copied it from Nvidia forum.

[Husse]

You deserve an answer
I've not heard of the problem, but I now use ATI in my main computer (and have a 6600 GT 256 MB in my reserve)
Do you know if this is restricted to this specific card?
It is a desktop - right?
What about an extra fan in the casing? If you go for it think hard about where you put it and which way you have it to blow (in - out)

[k0tuk]

No, it`s on my acer 7720g laptop. I`ve heard that not all Nvidia users have it, for some of them (minority) the Powermizer works ok. Since it is on laptop, i doubt i will be able to put another fan in it

I`ve now installed Arch Linux 64 (i`m also keeping Mint for now), and newest Nvidia drivers. I also opened my notebook and gave my Fan a good cleaning ( but it wasn`t dusty ). So far so good, compiz works OK, although the card never reaches full performance. And it`s Temperature is always around 60-65C. I`m not a videocard guru, so i don`t know - is it normal if it is always in this temperature?

P.S. thanks for the answer

[Husse]

60-65 C is quite ok but lower is better
Is this one of those laptops with two graphics chips?
If so that could be the cause - some conflict somewhere
Run lspci and post here
I don't promise anything but I might find something for you

[viking777]

I have the 8600M GS card also on an acer notebook and it works with everything I throw at it. (although I don't use Compiz maybe that makes a difference?).

Until I read your post I had never heard of 'Powermizer', and I am pretty sure I don't have it installed. Having a quick look around I found this site which, although it is a Windows forum, does seem to have some relevance to you as there are reports of people having overheating problems with this device enabled. Unfortunately the thread is 14 pages long and I do not have the inclination to read all that so I can't tell you what, if any, conclusions they reached. You might like to read it though, maybe you could figure out how to adapt it to a Linux installation.


http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=261929

[k0tuk]

I`ll run lspci as soon as i get to my notebook at home. I`m not sure about two graphic chips, but i guess it is: i`ll post a picture of my notebook "guts" later.


@viking777
Well, if you have driver version 100 and later, you do have powermizer. Maybe you are one of those lucky guys who has it working like it should be. The point of powermizer is to save notebook`s battery power, by switching video card modes - from lowest, when it`s performance is weak ( and also power consumption is low) to highest ( which also takes a lot more battery). It should work like this: when you are not running any 3-d apps, card is in the mode 0, when you start running 3-d apps, it automatically switches to modes 1, 2 or 3. The idea is good, but it`s not working for everyone. For me, it is taking it too long to switch between these modes, so all the 3-d effects in compiz look horrible. When the card is in lower modes, internet surfing becomes impossible, because 2-d support sux. Tab switching is also slow, page scrolling is horrible, flash "hangs" browser.

It`s not a problem to switch powermizer off, since there are a lot of topics already about this issue and there are known additional options for nvidia`s config files to disable it. But switching it off is not a best way: video card always works at max performance, it`s Temperature is always >=70 C(for me), the fan is working at full speed, battery dies after ~50 minutes. I just want to fix it.

Maybe BIOS update would help? I see that there are Bios updates available for my notebook at Acer`s website. I`m just a bit afraid to install them because i might screw something up

[k0tuk]

Ok, here is lspci from my Arch Linux

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00:00.0 Host bridge: Intel Corporation Mobile PM965/GM965/GL960 Memory Controller Hub (rev 03)
00:01.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation Mobile PM965/GM965/GL960 PCI Express Root Port (rev 03)
00:1a.0 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801H (ICH8 Family) USB UHCI Controller #4 (rev 03)
00:1a.1 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801H (ICH8 Family) USB UHCI Controller #5 (rev 03)
00:1a.7 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801H (ICH8 Family) USB2 EHCI Controller #2 (rev 03)
00:1b.0 Audio device: Intel Corporation 82801H (ICH8 Family) HD Audio Controller (rev 03)
00:1c.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82801H (ICH8 Family) PCI Express Port 1 (rev 03)
00:1c.1 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82801H (ICH8 Family) PCI Express Port 2 (rev 03)
00:1c.2 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82801H (ICH8 Family) PCI Express Port 3 (rev 03)
00:1c.3 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82801H (ICH8 Family) PCI Express Port 4 (rev 03)
00:1d.0 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801H (ICH8 Family) USB UHCI Controller #1 (rev 03)
00:1d.1 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801H (ICH8 Family) USB UHCI Controller #2 (rev 03)
00:1d.2 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801H (ICH8 Family) USB UHCI Controller #3 (rev 03)
00:1d.7 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801H (ICH8 Family) USB2 EHCI Controller #1 (rev 03)
00:1e.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82801 Mobile PCI Bridge (rev f3)
00:1f.0 ISA bridge: Intel Corporation 82801HEM (ICH8M) LPC Interface Controller (rev 03)
00:1f.1 IDE interface: Intel Corporation 82801HBM/HEM (ICH8M/ICH8M-E) IDE Controller (rev 03)
00:1f.2 SATA controller: Intel Corporation 82801HBM/HEM (ICH8M/ICH8M-E) SATA AHCI Controller (rev 03)
00:1f.3 SMBus: Intel Corporation 82801H (ICH8 Family) SMBus Controller (rev 03)
01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: nVidia Corporation GeForce 8600M GT (rev a1)
05:00.0 Ethernet controller: Broadcom Corporation NetLink BCM5787M Gigabit Ethernet PCI Express (rev 02)
06:00.0 Network controller: Intel Corporation PRO/Wireless 4965 AG or AGN [Kedron] Network Connection (rev 61)
07:00.0 FireWire (IEEE 1394): Ricoh Co Ltd R5C832 IEEE 1394 Controller (rev 05)
07:00.1 SD Host controller: Ricoh Co Ltd R5C822 SD/SDIO/MMC/MS/MSPro Host Adapter (rev 22)
07:00.2 System peripheral: Ricoh Co Ltd R5C592 Memory Stick Bus Host Adapter (rev 12)
07:00.3 System peripheral: Ricoh Co Ltd xD-Picture Card Controller (rev 12)

I`ll post my Mint next

[k0tuk]

Here is the one from Mint:

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00:00.0 Host bridge: Intel Corporation Mobile PM965/GM965/GL960 Memory Controller Hub (rev 03)
00:01.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation Mobile PM965/GM965/GL960 PCI Express Root Port (rev 03)
00:1a.0 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801H (ICH8 Family) USB UHCI Controller #4 (rev 03)
00:1a.1 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801H (ICH8 Family) USB UHCI Controller #5 (rev 03)
00:1a.7 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801H (ICH8 Family) USB2 EHCI Controller #2 (rev 03)
00:1b.0 Audio device: Intel Corporation 82801H (ICH8 Family) HD Audio Controller (rev 03)
00:1c.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82801H (ICH8 Family) PCI Express Port 1 (rev 03)
00:1c.1 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82801H (ICH8 Family) PCI Express Port 2 (rev 03)
00:1c.2 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82801H (ICH8 Family) PCI Express Port 3 (rev 03)
00:1c.3 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82801H (ICH8 Family) PCI Express Port 4 (rev 03)
00:1d.0 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801H (ICH8 Family) USB UHCI Controller #1 (rev 03)
00:1d.1 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801H (ICH8 Family) USB UHCI Controller #2 (rev 03)
00:1d.2 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801H (ICH8 Family) USB UHCI Controller #3 (rev 03)
00:1d.7 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801H (ICH8 Family) USB2 EHCI Controller #1 (rev 03)
00:1e.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82801 Mobile PCI Bridge (rev f3)
00:1f.0 ISA bridge: Intel Corporation 82801HEM (ICH8M) LPC Interface Controller (rev 03)
00:1f.1 IDE interface: Intel Corporation 82801HBM/HEM (ICH8M/ICH8M-E) IDE Controller (rev 03)
00:1f.2 SATA controller: Intel Corporation 82801HBM/HEM (ICH8M/ICH8M-E) SATA AHCI Controller (rev 03)
00:1f.3 SMBus: Intel Corporation 82801H (ICH8 Family) SMBus Controller (rev 03)
01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: nVidia Corporation GeForce 8600M GT (rev a1)
05:00.0 Ethernet controller: Broadcom Corporation NetLink BCM5787M Gigabit Ethernet PCI Express (rev 02)
06:00.0 Network controller: Intel Corporation PRO/Wireless 4965 AG or AGN [Kedron] Network Connection (rev 61)
07:00.0 FireWire (IEEE 1394): Ricoh Co Ltd R5C832 IEEE 1394 Controller (rev 05)
07:00.1 SD Host controller: Ricoh Co Ltd R5C822 SD/SDIO/MMC/MS/MSPro Host Adapter (rev 22)
07:00.2 System peripheral: Ricoh Co Ltd R5C843 MMC Host Controller (rev 12)
07:00.3 System peripheral: Ricoh Co Ltd R5C592 Memory Stick Bus Host Adapter (rev 12)
07:00.4 System peripheral: Ricoh Co Ltd xD-Picture Card Controller (rev ff)