Acer Laptop: Switchable Graphics using i7 & AMD Radeon

[Otase]

Only thing it didnt switch to Radeon was Photoshop CS3,
maybe because its portable version where instalation isnt required.

But maybe people are right, the real low demanding aplications doesnt seem to Switch Graphic to Radeon, as i remember opening a game (Battle Moon Wars) with low requirements + max resolution 640x480, even seting it to high performance wont use Radeon.

I can finaly notice what people are complaining about lol...

No fix for this yet?

 

[Otase]

Update released for AMD Radeon HD 6650M (04/01/2012)

Acer Support: Downloads & Support Documents - Notebook / Aspire / Aspire 7750G

 

[tomwhatley]

Update released for AMD Radeon HD 6650M (04/01/2012)

Acer Support: Downloads & Support Documents - Notebook / Aspire / Aspire 7750G

Have you installed this? I can't until I get home this evening but I just gotta know..... is it true? Can we finally, after months of waiting, use the AMD card whenever we want???

 

[Otase]

Update released for AMD Radeon HD 6650M (04/01/2012)

Acer Support: Downloads & Support Documents - Notebook / Aspire / Aspire 7750G

Have you installed this? I can't until I get home this evening but I just gotta know..... is it true? Can we finally, after months of waiting, use the AMD card whenever we want???

Im at work downloading it lol, cant try till i get home too, altough i bought an updated model in december, this was almost an year wait for an update if you check date releases xD

Note: it sure is a large download lol (341mb)

 

[MegaHtun13]

What did the update do?

I went to Acer's website and downloaded the new update for the 6650m for Aspire 7750G series laptops and I think the performance actually just got worse... Left for Dead has never crashed on me and for the first time it crashed. Now I cannot even make it past 10 minutes of game play before it crashes again. It's starting to get really annoying. Plus I still cannot set the graphics option to dedicated in the bios. It still only has the two options of switchable and integrated. I would like to know what the update actually did. Thank you for any replies.

 

[Otase]

I went to Acer's website and downloaded the new update for the 6650m for Aspire 7750G series laptops and I think the performance actually just got worse... Left for Dead has never crashed on me and for the first time it crashed. Now I cannot even make it past 10 minutes of game play before it crashes again. It's starting to get really annoying. Plus I still cannot set the graphics option to dedicated in the bios. It still only has the two options of switchable and integrated. I would like to know what the update actually did. Thank you for any replies.

I got same issue, so i reverted back to 8.861 version
Speccy crashed while trying to check graphic card specs/
also 1 Rom/game did lag sometimes for me too, sounds like the update was a flaw lol
Just do an unninstall express and install 8.861 version again.

 

[search53]

Driver updates won't change BIOS options. There is a BIOS update from (roughly) October of last year, but I doubt it changes the graphics options. I think we would have heard about it if it did.

 

[tomwhatley]

I went to Acer's website and downloaded the new update for the 6650m for Aspire 7750G series laptops and I think the performance actually just got worse... Left for Dead has never crashed on me and for the first time it crashed. Now I cannot even make it past 10 minutes of game play before it crashes again. It's starting to get really annoying. Plus I still cannot set the graphics option to dedicated in the bios. It still only has the two options of switchable and integrated. I would like to know what the update actually did. Thank you for any replies.

I got same issue, so i reverted back to 8.861 version
Speccy crashed while trying to check graphic card specs/
also 1 Rom/game did lag sometimes for me too, sounds like the update was a flaw lol
Just do an unninstall express and install 8.861 version again.

Skyrim plays fine but there are some graphical anomalies. Of course I'm in new areas of the game so I can't say for sure that it's because of the driver update. I plan on keeping the updated driver at this point, though I'm disappointed that there's no AMD card option...and nothing in the way of a change log on Acer's website.

 

[MegaHtun13]

Errors all over the place!

I ran a few more tests with the update and it's just a mess... I tried very low spec games such as Advent Rising and the original Dawn of War and everything seems to crash on me. Even some internet sites are crashing. Netflix and Youtube are just two of the various examples. When playing games it seems that the system is switching between the two cards dependent on the load at the given moment. Even though it is set to High Power Card for all my games. When it switches to the integrated then back to the discrete card my entire system locks up and it can take anywhere from 10 to 50 minutes for it to work right again. Plus everything seems to lag unless I restart the laptop. I am really disappointed in the new update.

 

[popeye1953]

I agree this new driver is a mess. I also don't trust it since Speccy errors out when trying to detect the graphics. When going back to 8.861 I had a heck of time as just uninstalling the new driver didn't work for me. CCC would not start after going back to 8.861 and also couldn't bring up the configurable graphics panel.
I had to uninstall everything including folders then use CCleaner to remove all ATI registry entries, reboot, then install 8.861. Finally everything worked again.
Thanks for the headache Acer!

 

[Otase]

I agree this new driver is a mess. I also don't trust it since Speccy errors out when trying to detect the graphics. When going back to 8.861 I had a heck of time as just uninstalling the new driver didn't work for me. CCC would not start after going back to 8.861 and also couldn't bring up the configurable graphics panel.
I had to uninstall everything including folders then use CCleaner to remove all ATI registry entries, reboot, then install 8.861. Finally everything worked again.
Thanks for the headache Acer!

Express unninstall should have taken everything except the setings file i think, that is stored somewhere, i got no problems going back to 8.861 trough ATI Express Unninstall.
Also CCleaner only removes registrys that are definitly safe to remove, like unknown or unexistent shortcuts/etc so he basicaly wouldnt clean ATI registrys lol unless you use Revo Unninstaller,
again i dont think he leaves anything trough Express Unninstall.

 

[popeye1953]

Otase, thanks for your interest but I just know what I experienced. Express uninstall didn't work and I still had lots of entries in my registry related to the ATI drivers. After I cleaned the registry, I was able to reinstall 8.861 successfully. I mainly posted my experience in case someone else encountered the same problem. If everything worked well for you using express uninstall then please ignore my post.
I only know I had to fight for over an hour to get back to 8.861. Just my experience is all.

P.S. you can select options in CCleaner to find and remove much more than shortcuts and only safe items. I only mention it because that is the one I used, not promoting it in any way, there are many out there.

 

[popeye1953]

Wow! They have a new BIOS for a card reader LED problem, this has to be a joke.

 

[jadigbones]

acer amd vga driver

I have been looking for a updated driver to work on my acer 7750g, amd radeon hd 6650m gpu switchable graphics laptop. Was so excited to see acer finally released a new driver only to read the comments on this thread about how terribly it performs Wondering first of all if anyone has had performance improvements with new acer vga drivers and secondly, if anyone has tried a modded amd driver for their acer, and if so, how did it work? Also, which installation procedure worked for you? Thanks in advance for any help on this

 

[popeye1953]

jadigbones, I only saw a tenth of a point increase in my Windows experience score on the graphics. It seemed the actual performance was worse in my experience, laggy.
The problem with modded drivers or even the stock drivers on the AMD site is you can't get them to install because of the way the switchable graphics is setup. There is some kind of special code in the 7750g drivers that allow installation of the 6650M drivers even when the Intel HD GPU is the primary video chip and then enables the switchable features.
It would all be mute if we could make the 6650M the primary GPU in the BIOS but it seems that Acer either can't or won't make that happen.

 

[jadigbones]

popeye1953, thanks for quick response. I guess I'll just have to wait for Acer to update again and by then (sometime in 2014) I will have bought a new laptop with a discrete chip. Never again with the switchable graphics. Out of curiosity, does anyone know if the drivers released by Acer (or any other manufacturer for that matter) are the same as the drivers released by Amd? Or does Acer actually change the driver in a significant way? Thanks again

 

[TVeblen]

The correct driver for a system with switchable graphics will have AMD drivers and Intel drivers together in one package. So the laptop manufacturer releases that package for the specific combination of graphic chips.

I have always thought it should be theoretically possible to upgrade each driver independently but have never had the opportunity to try it myself.

 

[CannibalOSX]

Issues

Hey guys I have the same laptop, and I hate this damn switchable graphics situation. I'm starting to have problems with it where it won't switch even for graphics-intense programs, like Saints Row or Skyrim. Used to be fine, 30 fps, now down to 10 or less. It happened out of the blue, then I kind of fixed it somehow, and then it broke again. Anything similar or any solutions? Also, whenever it stops working normally, switching anything in the switchable graphics panel doesn't do anything, it just switches it back like a second after.

 

[popeye1953]

My suggestion would be to uninstall your drivers and make sure you clean out the registry as I said above. Then reinstall using the express option. I found the 8.822.0.0 drivers here:

Acer Support: Downloads & Support Documents - Notebook / TravelMate / TravelMate 7750G

Mine is actually working pretty well now. The 179.5MB file dated 4/18/2011 is the one working well for me.

 

[CannibalOSX]

Alright will try tonight, see how it goes