Is it possible to use iGPU for display output and use NVIDIA GPU for 3D rendering on a desktop PC just like a gaming laptop? Update: I made it work.

[imluvian]

Hello everyone, I have a desktop workstation that I also use as my gaming machine.

It's running some 7x24 services so it is always powered on. Since dedicated GPU consumes more power than the iGPU, I'm just wondering if there is any way I can configure it to work like gaming laptops with both iGPU and NV GPU enabled: display output comes from the iGPU and the NV GPU goes to hibernate mode during idle or low graphics workload, and in games the iGPU hands over the 3D rendering tasks to NV GPU.

I saw someone doing it in a random video but I couldn't figure out how by myself. I managed to enable both iGPU and NV GPU, and installed laptop version of NV driver as well, but the driver does not behave like it does on my laptop where there is settings for GPU switch. I'm running 7700k + asrock extreme4 Z170 motherboard and GTX 1070.

May anyone give me some help on this? Thanks a lot.

 

 Update: An Eureka moment kicked in! I just remembered that Linus did a video about enable freesync on NV GPUs, which you can find here: 

Using the same approach I was able to use iGPU for display output. When you need to render some game using the dedicated GPU, you can go to graphics settings built in windows 10 and change the game to high performance mode. It's a little bit annoying that you have to set it manually for every new game, but for me it's worth it and also it's a lot of fun!

[JoostinOnline]

There's not, but with modern GPU architecture you'll use very little power anyway.

[PineyCreek]

In general on a desktop if a discrete GPU is present the iGPU is disabled from what I've seen.  There's a couple programs that still use the iGPU for some extra processing (Adobe products?) but yeah...you should consider for most scenarios that the iGPU isn't available.

[imluvian]

1 minute ago, JoostinOnline said:

There's not, but with modern GPU architecture you'll use very little power anyway.

What a shame...

There is also another benefit if I can make this work: I use my GPU for CUDA workloads as well. When CUDA tasks are running, the windows desktop environment becomes very laggy. However on my laptop the windows desktop is unaffected since it is running on iGPU.

[imluvian]

2 minutes ago, PineyCreek said:

In general on a desktop if a discrete GPU is present the iGPU is disabled from what I've seen.  There's a couple programs that still use the iGPU for some extra processing (Adobe products?) but yeah...you should consider for most scenarios that the iGPU isn't available.

There is usually a switch in the BIOS setting on decent motherboards. I'm pretty sure there is one in most MSI/Asrock/ASUS Z series motherboards manufactured within past 3 years.

[LIGISTX]

Every mobo I have had since the GPU was put on die, there was a toggle to turn it on or off in BIOS.

[imluvian]

9 minutes ago, Strike105X said:

Edit (this was only relating power management):What your trying to do is just a hassle and counter productive, modern GPU's have good energy management and efficiency, they adjust their clocks and power consumption based on the workload you provide, so there's no point. The card isn't running full power all the time... hell even fans stop spinning when its not used up to a certain stage.

 

You could hook a monitor to the IGPU then, the desktop enviroment at the very least on that monitor will be rendered on the IGPU, the problem is however the apps, most apps will still rely on the main GPU for processing. 

Thanks for your input.

I'll admit I'm doing it mainly for fun and for a smooth desktop experience when my GPU is chocked up with machine learning tasks.

Seems to me it's just a software thing since laptop and desktop pc nowadays are basically same hardware but just in different form factors. Such a shame that Mr. Jensen Huang decides you just cannot have that on desktop as well

[Constantin]

NO

[JoostinOnline]

31 minutes ago, imluvian said:

What a shame...

There is also another benefit if I can make this work: I use my GPU for CUDA workloads as well. When CUDA tasks are running, the windows desktop environment becomes very laggy. However on my laptop the windows desktop is unaffected since it is running on iGPU.

Well that may be do-able. By turning on the iGPU in the BIOS and connecting your monitor to your motherboard video (as opposed to the graphics card) then Windows may default to using the iGPU. You'll have to swap it out for gaming of course.

 

It's definitely not possibly to swap them on the fly to conserve power though.

[imluvian]

Hi everyone, I managed to make it work and put the update in the op.

[ZubayrLTT]

I tried to do this exact thing with my setup, I'm currently using a monitor that only supports vga outputs, but my discrete gpu does not have any of those ports, by looking at the video I switched on "igpu multi monitor display" and changed my primary gpu to my intel processor (i5 3570 if anyone is wondering). After I did this I went into my graphics settings in Windows and tried to set some applications to my high performance one which should be discrete, but in the settings it just displays my iGPU in all of them. Dyou have a solution for this. (some extra info) My little brother tried to play fortnite on my PC and for some odd reason it decided to use my discrete and not my integrated one (even though I did not do anything in settings)   

[Coldblackice]

On 1/6/2021 at 8:21 AM, ZubayrLTT said:

I tried to do this exact thing with my setup, I'm currently using a monitor that only supports vga outputs, but my discrete gpu does not have any of those ports, by looking at the video I switched on "igpu multi monitor display" and changed my primary gpu to my intel processor (i5 3570 if anyone is wondering). After I did this I went into my graphics settings in Windows and tried to set some applications to my high performance one which should be discrete, but in the settings it just displays my iGPU in all of them. Dyou have a solution for this. (some extra info) My little brother tried to play fortnite on my PC and for some odd reason it decided to use my discrete and not my integrated one (even though I did not do anything in settings)

 

   

 

 

On 12/29/2018 at 1:43 AM, imluvian said:

Hi everyone, I managed to make it work and put the update in the op.

 

 

Is this (still) working for you guys? I'm setting these programs in the "Graphics" Windows 10 settings but I'm not sure if it's actually working. Is there a way to see if the iGPU is actually being loaded?

 

I don't have any monitor connected to the iGPU port (which is merely an HDMI port built into the motherboard) because I get my audio from my discrete NVIDIA GPU via HDMI out and into a home theater receiver. Not sure if that could be the issue or not.