vga_switcheroo sony-vaio-z-series

[Giacomo Bagnoli]

Linux ubik 2.6.34-rc3-git #14 SMP PREEMPT Thu Apr 8 09:37:43 CEST 2010 x86_64 Intel(R) Core(TM) i5 CPU M 520 @ 2.40GHz GenuineIntel GNU/Linux

$ sudo dmidecode -s system-product-name
VPCZ11X9E
$ sudo dmidecode -s system-version
J0044RC7

This laptop has the "dynamic hybrid graphic system" which is supposed to switch (on windows) the used graphic card based on load.
It has a button to choose between "Speed" (nvidia) "Stamina" (intel) and "Auto".
I'm running the latest kernel git code, plus branches drm-next, acpi/test and nouveau/master merged in (but the same happen with vanilla 2.6.24-rc3 and 2.6.33).
If I enable i915.modeset=1 at startup, I get a black screen (no ping response) soon after grub. Disabling it makes the boot process to succeed but I need to start X with vesa drivers. Nouveau fails saying that no bios is found for the device. Latest Nvidia binary beta drivers fails with "no device found".
At last, with no nvidia binaries installed, with nouveau enabled in staging, intel, booting with i915.modeset=0 I get no switcheroo files in /sys/kernel/debug where debugfs is mounted.
I happened one time that the pc booted with the "speed" light turned on for no known reason (but nouveau seemed to find the device bios, I can attach related dmesg for that boot too if needed). In that particular boot I got no console (blank screen) and X failed to start (stuck in black screen too) - X was not configured with nouveau but with vesa- ..

[Jeremy Foshee (jeremyfoshee)]

Hi Giacomo,

This bug was reported a while ago and there hasn't been any activity in it recently. We were wondering if this is still an issue? Can you try with the latest development release of Ubuntu? ISO CD images are available from http://cdimage.ubuntu.com/releases/ .

If it remains an issue, could you run the following command from a Terminal (Applications->Accessories->Terminal). It will automatically gather and attach updated debug information to this report.

apport-collect -p linux 558395

Also, if you could test the latest upstream kernel available that would be great. It will allow additional upstream developers to examine the issue. Refer to https://wiki.ubuntu.com/KernelMainlineBuilds . Once you've tested the upstream kernel, please remove the 'needs-upstream-testing' tag. This can be done by clicking on the yellow pencil icon next to the tag located at the bottom of the bug description and deleting the 'needs-upstream-testing' text. Please let us know your results.

Thanks in advance.

    [This is an automated message. Apologies if it has reached you inappropriately; please just reply to this message indicating so.]

[Vincenzo Di Massa (hawk-it)]

Hi I have exactly the same laptop and managed to both cards work. But what I manage to do is just a super hack workaround, the problem is not solved.

I downgraded grub2 to grub in order to make the intel card work: when using grub you don't need to use the nomodeset option. This basically makes the laptop usable as long as you are ok using the intel card.

In order to enable the nvidia card (G330M) you must:
1) set the selector to "speed"
2) boot the old kernel vmlinuz-2.6.31-20-generic (don't ask me why, but this step is required)
3) boot a newer kernel with the nvidia binary drivers

After step 2) the green light of the selector will be lightnened.

Another couple (possibily urelated, but who knows) problems with this laptop are:
1) touchpad does not work ( setting the i8042.nopnp kernel-boot parameter fixes it *most of the times*)
2) after a suspend to ram the laptop freezes while waking up (blank screen, no ping, no keyboard leds responding)

Of course it is just a little bit more than annoying :-)

[Adam Hill (sidepipe)]

I have the same problem ( on a VPC Z12 ) but unlike others I can find no way to get the Intel card working - though this may be because I have kept the fake raid 0 set up and am dual booting with Windows 7, and so booting without using grub 2 seems impossible. However, I have tried booting the live DVD in "rescue mode," and then inserting the i915 module from a root shell in the raid 0 device, and this too results in a black screen... which is even more odd because booting the live DVD normally results in working graphics with the i915 and Intel drivers being used. So, there is something different happening when the live DVD starts the modules/X-server which is not necessarily down to the boot loader.

I also found the modified sony-laptop driver, sony-laptop-zseries-0.9np7, and by changing the first line in the "sony_ovga_dsm" function to 'static char *path = "\\_SB.PCI0.GFX0._DSM";', I can get the stamina/speed lights to light as appropriate when I echo to /sys/devices/platform/sony-laptop/speed* ( can't remember the exact name! ) and power consumption drops when switching to stamina mode, BUT the blank screen still happens.

If I boot normally and then load the i915 module with "modeset=0", the blank screen does not happen, but when I start the X server I get a kernel panic.

Looking for any clues as to where to go next with this - I can use the machine with the NVidia card/drivers but ideally I'd like to use the Intel card and disable the NVidia one ( without modifying the BIOS that is! )

[Jeremy Foshee (jeremyfoshee)]

This bug report was marked as Incomplete and has not had any updated comments for quite some time. As a result this bug is being closed. Please reopen if this is still an issue in the current Ubuntu release http://www.ubuntu.com/getubuntu/download . Also, please be sure to provide any requested information that may have been missing. To reopen the bug, click on the current status under the Status column and change the status back to "New". Thanks.

[This is an automated message. Apologies if it has reached you inappropriately; please just reply to this message indicating so.]