Laptop may not be using nVidia GPU, uses Intel instead?

[heatman323]

So I came across a couple of threads about people having the same laptop as mine and saying theyre able to at least play Final Fantasy XIV A Realm Reborn on medium settings(not sure, think it was high) on 30 fps. I use medium too(no low settings unfortunately, tried lowering all the subsets and fps was same as medium/standard settings). They had the same problem as mine at first about the very low fps in crowded areas(<10fps) and 20ish fps on non crowded places or areas that arent too graphically intricate. But then they say it was the settings/setup that was causing the problems, about our laptop using the Intel gpu instead of the nVidia GTX 660m one. I remember it was sort of 2-3 threads I saw that had these problems, but some of the answers werent too direct or were pretty vague like this oneCan't get above 8 FPS on a Lenovo y580 | FFXIV ARR Forum - Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn.
He said he "put the whole computer to use the Nvidia card exclusively... and now it runs between 30 and 60 FPS" though I dont know how and didnt quite understand how to do it based on his answer, but I guess thats on me not being a techie guy "Swapping between Auto Select and Nvidia exclusively is as easy as right clicking on my desktop". I tried to check where when I right click but the only related ones I see are Graphics Properties which is wholly related to Intel, and couldnt find anything about switching entirely to nVidia and Graphics Options was more of a notifications and keybind thing. If anyone could clarify how all of these works or how to finally get these games to run decently, it would be greatly appreciated.

 

[diplo]

You could look in your BIOS for a setting that lets you pick what graphics to use. Look at startup for what key to press to get in to your BIOS, it varies by manufacturer.

 

[heatman323]

The only other option in the BIOS was UMA graphics though, didn't know if that was what I wanted so googled it and seems another guy with the same prob as mine also tried switching to UMA but it didn't solve it. Tried it too but it was still the same

 

[diplo]

Do you have a control panel for your NVIDIA graphics? If not make sure you have the proper drivers installed for your NVIDIA card, these drivers may govern how your laptop handles switchable graphics.

 

[RoasterMen]

Always enable High-Performance mode, your laptop switches to Intel UMA because of the battery saving mode

 

[heatman323]

Yep I'm always on Dynamic Graphics, and a good guy just gave me a link to the Lenovo Windows 8 drivers, here's hoping control panel opens after I update it

 

[paulstelian97]

It's possible you have a configuration such as mine, where the discrete graphics collaborates with the Intel one and you control which GPU is used per-app. Though it should be able to detect that that game is a game amd NVidia would activate automatically.