2010 MBPro Battery Life & Graphics Switching

Soldato
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I thought some of you may be interested in these posts:

About battery life and the graphic switching
Macbook Pro 2010 Poor Battery Life

Few Common Questions on the 2010 MBP
http://www.markc.me.uk/MarkC/Blog/Entries/2010/4/20_Early_2010_Macbook_Pro_i7.html

The battery one is doing my head in. You cannot currently specify the low power chip. The choices are:

1. Intel HD Lower power graphics
2. Auto-switching.
3. Hi-power NVIDIA GeForce

Currently you can do 2 & 3, but you cannot do 1..... which is unfortunate!
 
Caporegime
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Hmm thats a worry - I presume you can switch it back after it all boots to the Intel one and if you use any apps that need the nVidia theyll use the switching properly?

Wondering if its just a boot issue...

Though being able to tell and save which programs should use which GFX chip in what circumstances (i.e. on battery) would be preferred if they can get it sorted to work automatically...

ps3ud0 :cool:
 
Soldato
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It switches automatically back to the Intel once you stop using the app that forces the switch to NVIDIA.

A choice of which to use would be nice I think.
 
Soldato
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I thought some of you may be interested in these posts:

About battery life and the graphic switching
Macbook Pro 2010 Poor Battery Life
Interesting stuff :)

At the risk of crossposting... http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showpost.php?p=16411791&postcount=463
I've just been reading http://www.engadget.com/2010/04/21/macbook-pros-with-nvidia-geforce-gt-330m-silicon-making-question/ and the edited highlights are that some applications have issues with switching between the integrated Intel HD graphics and the proper GeForce GT 330M (applications only using the rubbish Intel when they could do with the proper Nvidia, applications that don't need the Nvidia using it anyways, applications forgetting to turn off the Nvida when they're done etc.)

I assume that this is an OS X bug, and that Apple will soon release a update to fix it.

But it got me thinking....

What about your Windows Bootcamp partition? Or your Windows/Linux VMs?

Anyone that’s got one yet and put Windows on it want to comment? As, in theory, it should use the integrated Intel usually and then go to the Nvida when you open up a game or something and then turn it off afterwards. But if OS X can’t do it right I’m doubtful as to whether Windows can do it.... and I can just imagine someone putting a Windows Bootcamp partition on to play their games and then find they can only use the rubbish integrated Intel graphics!
 
Caporegime
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Westyfield2 - saw your post in the main thread but thought this concern warranted a new thread while its still being discussed. Your thoughts on the Windows bootcamp are interesting - might delay my purchase...

ps3ud0 :cool:
 
Soldato
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Shirley its a software issue with OSX, I'll put a pound on that Apple is already testing a solution....I also bet under bootcamp Windows manages it better because the drivers have been out for a lot longer with regards of auto-switching?
 
Soldato
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It estimates 4-5 hours in Win7 x64 via Bootcamp for me. To be fair I only use B/c for a couple of work specific apps that are quite intense so it could be you'd get longer.
 
Associate
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It needs some tweaking, but I've found the battery life to be brilliant, best out of all the laptops I've owned.

Mind you, this is the first Macbook I've owned.. so that is probably why i'm so wow'd by the battery life.
 
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