[ltp] T510 Gotchas

[Laurent]

Hi,

the bitter truth is: the xorg (3D) stack is totally fubar. It is not
possible to use nonbasic OpenGL ops or the plugin structure w/o
cheating (detecting the version of the stack, libs and drivers
at runtime and adopting to it). Nvidia cannot realistically support
a moving, dirty, ever changing target for a whole range of GPUs.
All while taking fire for not giving out for free all IP they ever
created or bought in the last 10 years.

So they replaced most of the Xorg stack.

I think they are right.

Reinstalling Xorg, all mesa and openGl-related libs fixes the
problem. The list of packages to reinstall is also different for
nearly every distri and changes from release to release, sometimes
even from DM to DM. Fun.

About the T510 and optimus: do not expect it to work like in windows.
You will have to close all programs and and log out at each switch.
Be ware of problems like the both cards active bug after suspends
(check the thermal sensors often). Most linux users i know do not use
that feature at all. I run mine on intel only, with the real GPU
disabled in the BIOS. YMMV if you use bleeding edge code.

cu

On Mon, 31 Jan 2011 22:12:38 +0100, John Jason Jordan <johnxj@comcast.net>  
wrote:

> On Mon, 31 Jan 2011 14:35:22 -0600
> "Jeffrey L. Taylor" <jeff@abluz.dyndns.org> dijo:
>
>> I'm about to buy a T510 w/ the switchable graphics (Opitmus).  Any
>> hardware I should avoid (e.g., WiFi adapters, fingerprint reader,
>> Bluetooth)?  Any Linux distros to stay away from?  Any that make
>> switching between the Intel integrated graphics and Nvidia discrete
>> graphics easy?
>
> I've never used Linux on any computer with Intel graphics, but I have
> some experience with the nVidia drivers.
>
> My laptop has the nVidia Quadro NVS 140M and when I installed Fedora it
> automatically installed the nouveau driver. I used that driver for a
> year without a single problem, until one day I needed to connect to a
> projector in a classroom. In the process of trying the get the
> projector to use the highest resolution it was capable of I installed
> the proprietary nVidia driver.
>
> The nVidia driver did not solve the problem with the projector, so I
> went back to the nouveau driver. What a PITA! Installing the nVidia
> driver automatically blacklists nouveau. Worse, even after removing the
> blacklists and deleting the xorg.conf file that the nVidia driver
> created, I found several apps that would no longer launch. The apps
> were a disparate lot, like ksysguard, FontMatrix, Avidemux, among
> others. Each gave the same error message - unable to load an nVidia
> library. I tried for days to resolve the issue, and finally had to
> reinstall the nVidia driver in order to get all my apps working again.
> And even after doing so 3D screensavers that used to work fine with the
> nouveau driver no longer work. I still use the nouveau driver, but I
> have to leave the nVidia driver installed.
>
> As far as I am concerned the nVidia proprietary driver today should be
> considered a one-way street. If you want to go back you'll need divine
> intervention or witchcraft.
>
> It used to be simple: There was always an xorg.conf file and all you
> had to do was change the driver line from "nv" to "nvidia" or back and
> restart X.


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