How can I automatically switch between integrated graphics and dedicated graphics on Bootcamp?

I have been running Windows 10 on Bootcamp for awhile, but the thermals and the fans have both been irritating while streaming video or web browsing.

With MacOS, there is the option to automatically switch between integrated and dedicated graphics to help combat both of those things, is there any way I can do that with Windows 10 on Bootcamp?

I’m using a MacBook Pro 15″ with a Radeon Pro Vega 20.

2 Answers 2

Unlike most other laptops, MacBook Pros with dGPUs use a graphics muxer to physically switch which GPU is pushing pixels to the display. By contrast, most other laptops simply share a framebuffer which both GPUs push to and the display can read from via some methodology. If you want to read about this more, I recommend you read up on the Linux kernel’s documentation or Arch page on hybrid graphics. The long and short of it though is that the unique hardware architecture of the MacBook Pro means that it can’t just operate like most other laptops.

Under macOS (and Linux), this is handled by the OS and drivers sending the appropriate commands to the hardware and switching when needed. However, although Windows does have graphics switching, it isn’t as well integrated with Macs. To solve this, by default, MBPs with dGPUs boot into Bootcamp with the iGPU disabled—something that, as you’ve discovered, can be problematic.

For reasons, this is a particularly sticky issue with eGPUs. As such, the eGPU community has developed tools to get around this by making your MBP think it’s booting into macOS, thus keeping the iGPU enabled. I strongly recommend you read the entirity of the Boot Camp eGPU Setup Guide thread (even if you’re not going to use an eGPU), but the basics steps are as follows:

1. Use automate-eGPU EFI to set up the custom bootloader (or rEFInd it if you want to use an external drive.)
   1. Download automate-eGPU EFI to a USB drive or internal partition formatted as FAT
   2. Boot to the drive by holding down Option during boot
   3. Install Intel graphics drivers
2. For users of 2016 and 2017 15″ tMBPs (not you!), use 0xbb’s integrated.bat to set the GPU you want attached to the display.
3. Install AMD drivers.

At this point, you should be able to switch between your GPUs!

If you’re feeling brave, I’d also recommend you use AMD drivers from BootCampDrivers rather than the stock AMD ones. Unfortunately, the stock AMD drivers are very poorly optimized for Macs; these drivers are modified to better support Macs. Note that since they’re modified binaries, there’s no source to view, and you’re trusting that the author to write good code. That said, I personally trust them, and the benefits are real.

AMD Switchable Graphics not Working after Upgrading to Windows 10

Hello, so after upgrading to windows 10 I ran into this annoying problem.

switchable graphics doesn’t appear in the context menu or the catalyst control center.

I installed drivers from windows update (not working)

also installed drivers from amd’s official website (no good either)

and the device manager identifies the GPU as AMD 7400M Series

and more over, I’m stuck with the intel GPU and can’t use AMD in almost everything .

HP Pavilion G6 1066se

intel i5 2nd generation processor

AMD Radeon HD 7450m

windows 10 64 bit

what is going wrong ?

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Same problem here.

Sony Vaio VPCSB2J9E (with Stamina/Speed physical switch button)

AMD Radeon HD 6470M (in Windows 10 shown as 7400M)
Intel HD Graphics 3000
BIOS R2087H4

Tested both with Windows Update Drivers and AMD Downladed 15.7.1 drivers

** GRAPHICS ADAPTER(S) **
Catalyst Driver Version: 15.7
Name: Intel(R) HD Graphics 3000
Chipset manufacturer: Intel Corporation
Video RAM: 2210398208
Driver version: 9.17.10.4229
ID: PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_0116&SUBSYS_907B104D&REV_09\3&11583659&1&10
Status: OK
Name: AMD Radeon HD 7400M Series
Chipset manufacturer: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc.
Video RAM: 536870912
Driver version: 15.200.1046.0
ID: PCI\VEN_1002&DEV_6760&SUBSYS_907B104D&REV_00\4&FF5C90C&0&0008
Status: OK
** PROCESSOR, NOTEBOOK AND BIOS INFO **
PC name: VPCSB2J9E
Processor name: Intel(R) Core(TM) i3-2310M CPU @ 2.10GHz
BIOS name: InsydeH2O Version HuronRiver.3.61.05.2051R2087H4
BIOS manufacturer: INSYDE
BIOS version: R2087H4
** OS INFO **
OS: Microsoft Windows 10 Pro
Version: 10.0.10240
Architecture: 64 bits

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what problem do you have?

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Sony Vaio VPCSB2J9E with Stamina/Speed physical switch button

Intel(R) Core(TM) i3-2310M CPU @ 2.10GHz

AMD Radeon HD 6470M (in Windows 10 shown as 7400M)
Intel HD Graphics 3000
BIOS R2087H4, Muxless Fixed Scheme only, can’t be changed

My Laptop has Windows 7 Pro x64 preinstalled. Graphics drivers comes always from Sony support, in an Amd+Intel customized combo. There is no «Switchable graphics» menu in CCC. To switch between Intel and AMD graphics, I have a hardware switch in my keyboard called Stamina/Speed. There is a screen flick when I switch. The Device Manager only shows one device at a time, the AMD or the Intel one, depending of the switch. When in AMD mode, CCC shows config options, when in Intel mode, it does not.

The «Get Windows 10» does not warn of any incompatible device to upgrade. Once in Windows 10, Windows Update installs AMD and Intel drivers automatically. The Device Manager shows both devices at the same time, but the machine is really using the Intel one. I can’t switch/use AMD in any way. The speed/stamina button does nothing. CCC does not show any config option at all. Changing energy settings in Windows or Intel Graphics settings does nothing (as some people suggests). GPU-Z shows info of both devices, and I can see AMD sensor info trends (temperature/clock) slightly changing.

Tested AMD Catalyst 15.7.1 with same result. Tested Leshcatlabs UnifL 15.7 (Intel+AMD) with same result. Tested Leshcatlabs UnifL 14.4 2.4 (the last one supporting Fixed mode, but not designed for Windows 10) (Intel+AMD) and the AMD device shows a warning in Device Manager about not properly installed (code 43). With recommended install procedure (uninstall previous, amdcleanuputility, reboot, install intel, reboot, install amd, reboot).

I have read a lot of info on Internet about Windows 10, AMD o both (not clear) not supporting Fixed switching, effectively abandoning support of all switchable graphics laptops older than circa 2011, from Sony, Dell, HP and others. Is this a strategy to sell more computers? If the code and the drivers were there, why drop them? Will Microsoft do something to fix this in the future?

W10 and switchable graphics

I have an HP DV6-6170sl, a switchable graphics laptop (AMD Radeon HD 6770M and Intel HD Graphics 3000). Since it came with W7, HP never released new GPU drivers for W8 or W10, but I’m currently running W8.1 with modified drivers found online. I would like to update tu Windows 10, but I’m afraid I won’t be able to switch between the two GPUs anymore. As anyone successfully updated from W8.1 to W10 on a similar situation?

2 Answers 2

You should install latest Intel Graphics Driver first and AMD Catalyst second. After that switchable graphics should work just fine. AMD Laptop Support page contains answers for any other questions you might have about this.

DON’T UPDATE. Nothing works properly: many seconds of black screen before logon screen shows up, sometimes I get just a BSOD, sometimes it works; unable to switch between the two GPUs (I’ve tried different versions of leshcatlabs drivers, some works, some gives serious problems); desktop and start menu were missing; network takes some minutes before starts working and even then Wi-Fi is unmanageable. I made a system image before updating, and I had many problems restoring (the only working method was to use a Windows 8 DVD to restore the image). After restoring I tried to uninstall as many software as possible that may be causing problems during update. I re-updated from W8 to W10 and I still had many problems, even if someone was gone. Then I tried to restore again the W8 system image and the tool says I can’t restore cause the image is located on a drive that needs to be formatted. I moved the image to another PC and tried to restore via network: same error message. I’ll try to mount the laptop SSD into PC, format and restore with PC’s OS, HOPING it will work!!

Drivers & Software

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I’ve got a problem with my laptop HP G62-a16SL with Windows 7 x64. Playing with flash/java games, like the ones on Facebook, I’ve got the CPU load very high (80-100%) like it doesn’t work the hardware acceleration.

This pc has a ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5470, so I tried uninstalling its driver using this tool

and reinstalling the driver

After the installation is completed, I reboot and when I go in the switchable card’s page of the Catalyst, there aren’t the buttons to switch GPU from the Intel one to ATI. Then I try to disable the Intel’s GPU from the Control Panel to force my pc to use the other GPU but it looks like the drivers are missing. It changes the resolution and when I reboot appears the message «Driver missing or not working». I don’t know what to do.

I’ve also tried using the autodetecting tool in case I was installing wrong drivers but still doesn’t work.

In any case, the GPU is detected because I can seen it from the Contro Panel.

And yes, I already tried to reinstall the original drivers using the Recovery Tool.

Message was edited by: Matt B

We have updated the title of this discussion with relevant details to better describe your issue.

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I’ve been trying to find solution to this for weeks now and I can’t seem to find anything reliable.

I have notebook HP ProBook 4530s with switchable gpu, originally with Windows 7, everything worked just fine. The main feature I want to mention was that I could manually switch between Intel and AMD gpus. I could just press button Low performance and it would use Intel gpu regardless of running application. Same for High performance , just press of a button and it’s always using AMD gpu regardless of running applications. That was awesome so whenever I wanted to play some game, I could just manually determine which gpu will be used.

Here is the issue I have now. I decided to upgrade to Windows 10 (man, that was hell to install it), and of course Windows 10 decided what’s best for me and installed newest drivers for my AMD system. Which is fine and all, but the manual switching option between Intel and AMD gpus is nowhere to be found in CCC (version 2015.1104.1643.30033). I simply can’t determine which gpu I want to use at the moment.

I know there’s the dynamic option based on running applications, but it’s not really reliable. Sometimes the AMD gpu will be used, sometimes not, even if the application has assigned High performance option.

Is out there a driver that still supports the manual switchable gpu for Windows 10?

I’m looking for something like this (screen from HP support)

HP Probook 4530s

Intel Core i5-2430M @ 2.40 GHz

AMD Radeon HD 7400M

If anyone could help me with this, it would be awesome