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    How to install two heterogenous video cards in Win7 x64?

    Discussion in 'Windows OS and Software' started by Fel, Feb 25, 2010.

  1. Fel

    Fel Notebook Enthusiast

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    Hi,

    I have a built-in video card quattro 360M from nvidia in my dell notebook. The the notebook is docked on D/dock with installed ATI FireMV PCI. OS: Win7 x64. I have tried with probably all x64 drivers I've found - XP, vista, win7 - for both video cards. I have two 1920x1080 screens connected.

    Outside of dock win7 normal recognizes und uses my nvidia chip - no probs.

    In the dock win7 uses ATI card w/o problems (specially if this card is defined as Primary video in BIOS, but secondary too - just without screens), but nvidia is shown as Intel PM965 or something like this. This device is not working properly ("not enough ressources"), I can't hibernate, the max resolution is 1280x800, the system has 100% CPU load and so on..

    I've tried many combinations of drivers, but nvidia setup either don't see nvidia chip ("no hardware to install") or says you have wrong OS (32-bit :(, not XP, not vista). I've tried also "Windows Update" instead of pre-downloaded drivers, clean install of windows - nothing works.

    I would like get both cards running simultaneously in the dock (with 3 screens :rolleyes: ). If not - at least stable working ATI card in the dock and nvidia outside. With Hot undocking, of course.

    Is there a good troubleshooting guide for the issue?
    Do you have a good tips for installing of video hardware in Win7? Is order of installation important?

    Is there a good tool to remove all nvidia drivers from the system (for clean driver install)?
    How to know which driver model supports a particular driver? I mean XPDM, WDDM 1.0, WDDM 1.1...
    Where are Hardware profiles in win7?

    Thanks in advance
     
    Fel, Feb 25, 2010
    #1
  2. ScuderiaConchiglia

    ScuderiaConchiglia NBR Vaio Team Curmudgeon

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    With the machine in the dock, you might try going into Device Manager and remove the Intel PM965 device and then let Windows find new hardware and see if it recognizes the Nvidia card. By any chance does the laptop actually have an Intel PM965 video chip on the motherboard AND the Nvida as a daughter board? Some laptops from Sony and others have BOTH and let the user switch between them.

    But I would ONLY play with this after you have a good backup image or system restore point.

    Gary
     
    ScuderiaConchiglia, Feb 25, 2010
    #2