ATI Mobility Radeon 4670 & Intel Confliction

I've just installed Windows 7 Pro 32-bit on my Acer 8935G notebook. Along with my ATI 4670 I have an onboard Intel 4 Series Express Chipset Family display adapter.

*My problem is that I cannot seem to have my notebook utilize my ATI adapter rather than the built-in (and inferior) Intel adapter, it seems to want to use the Intel by default.

In device manager, both display adapters are reported to be working fine and without error. I have also already downloaded and successfully installed the latest ATI Catalyst display driver for Windows 7 32bit.

What can I do so solve this? What am I missing?

Thanks in advance.

JV3 said:

I've just installed Windows 7 Pro 32-bit on my Acer 8935G notebook. Along with my ATI 4670 I have an onboard Intel 4 Series Express Chipset Family display adapter.

*My problem is that I cannot seem to have my notebook utilize my ATI adapter rather than the built-in (and inferior) Intel adapter, it seems to want to use the Intel by default.

In device manager, both display adapters are reported to be working fine and without error. I have also already downloaded and successfully installed the latest ATI Catalyst display driver for Windows 7 32bit.

What can I do so solve this? What am I missing?

Thanks in advance.

go to device manager and the offending device. right click and disable it. no problem


EDIT Just realize that if your ati doesn't work the integrated one will still be disabled

go to device manager and the offending device. right click and disable it. no problem

I did this but my screen simply went blank and I had to manually shut down my machine. I have checked my device manager again and the Intel chip is once again enabled... What's going on here?

Again, both adapters report to be working properly and (to my knowlege) I have successully installed the latest catalyst drivers for the ATI mobility radeon 4000 series (ATI Catalystâ„¢ Mobility Display Driver)

JV3 said:

go to device manager and the offending device. right click and disable it. no problem

I did this but my screen simply went blank and I had to manually shut down my machine. I have checked my device manager again and the Intel chip is once again enabled... What's going on here?

Again, both adapters report to be working properly and (to my knowlege) I have successully installed the latest catalyst drivers for the ATI mobility radeon 4000 series (ATI Catalystâ„¢ Mobility Display Driver)

If your screen went blank when disabling it you were running it at the time. because the screen went black you couldn't ok it. did you try disabling it by properties>right click? you can also try right click>properties>driver>disable.

As far as I know you cant have 2 drivers working on the same display. you sure the ATI is good?

I've tried both methods with the same effect. I've also tried uninstalling both adapters then restarting my computer and loading everything back but it didn't make a difference.

I came across this before posting, I felt it was relevent to some extent but not entirely. Driver issue in windows 7 (ATI Radeon Mobility 4670)

Are there other known issues?

It may be that Acer has yet to provide Windows 7 support for my particular notebook model (Acer Aspire 8935G). I gather from what I have read online that support is to be expected later this month. Perhaps I should call them in the mean time.

It's been nice talking to myself :P

Hi JV3,

the acer notebook has a hybrid videocard usage wich, using the standard installation, can switch between them on the fly.

The problem is that these notebooks have a BIOS problem ( for wich i know acer has an update) that can be fixed by installing the update.

Also:
The notebook has 2 powerswitches. the normal one in the top left corner. Wich, when pressed, starts the notebook with the intel adapter.

And a 2nd one. on the right side of the keyboard just left of the "hold" button. Starting you notebook with this button will make use of the ATI card.

This is tested on my 8935G with an XP installation. And i am still waiting for the acer software that was promised to me...

Just one more thing i want to ask you. When you started the notebook with the "media" key (the one left of hold) do you have problems or "lag" when you try to resize explorer windows???

I hope this helps.

Rik
Netherlands.

rikdol said:

Hi JV3,

the acer notebook has a hybrid videocard usage wich, using the standard installation, can switch between them on the fly.

The problem is that these notebooks have a BIOS problem ( for wich i know acer has an update) that can be fixed by installing the update.

Also:
The notebook has 2 powerswitches. the normal one in the top left corner. Wich, when pressed, starts the notebook with the intel adapter.

And a 2nd one. on the right side of the keyboard just left of the "hold" button. Starting you notebook with this button will make use of the ATI card.

This is tested on my 8935G with an XP installation. And i am still waiting for the acer software that was promised to me...

Just one more thing i want to ask you. When you started the notebook with the "media" key (the one left of hold) do you have problems or "lag" when you try to resize explorer windows???

I hope this helps.

Rik
Netherlands.

Ok, I will look into this. Personally, I didn't know of the dual boot capabilities/never bothered to investigate. I'm assuming I can find the download for the ACER bios on acer.com?

JV3 said:

rikdol said:

Hi JV3,

the acer notebook has a hybrid videocard usage wich, using the standard installation, can switch between them on the fly.

The problem is that these notebooks have a BIOS problem ( for wich i know acer has an update) that can be fixed by installing the update.

Also:
The notebook has 2 powerswitches. the normal one in the top left corner. Wich, when pressed, starts the notebook with the intel adapter.

And a 2nd one. on the right side of the keyboard just left of the "hold" button. Starting you notebook with this button will make use of the ATI card.

This is tested on my 8935G with an XP installation. And i am still waiting for the acer software that was promised to me...

Just one more thing i want to ask you. When you started the notebook with the "media" key (the one left of hold) do you have problems or "lag" when you try to resize explorer windows???

I hope this helps.

Rik
Netherlands.

Ok, I will look into this. Personally, I didn't know of the dual boot capabilities/never bothered to investigate. I'm assuming I can find the download for the ACER bios on acer.com?

I've updated the Bios with ACER's latest release (October 12th I think) and shut down my computer and booted it using the media button (left of Hold button) and then let windows install the necessary media drivers that hadn't been loaded yet. I rebooted using the media key and it seems that everything is working properly i.e. my ATI card IS being used (REJOICE). Also, no signs of window lag.

However, is there any way to have the ATI loaded as the default display adapter so I don't have to keep booting using the media button?