allocating memory to integrated graphics card [resolved]

Convergence · 2008-09-25 07:55:09

I recently acquired a dell dimensions 2350 with an integrated 82845G/GL[Brookdale-G] GPU. The GPU has no video memory of it's own, but robs it from the main system RAM. From Dell's website:

Between 32 and 64 MB of system memory may be allocated to support graphics, depending on system memory size and other factors.

Since I've maxed out the system memory at 1gig, I'd like to make sure that the GPU is getting the full 64 megs. I thought I could verify this easily by just running htop, and seeing how much memory the system claims to have, thinking that total system ram minus what htop reports would be how much memory is allocated to the GPU. However, htop reports a total of 1010 megabytes. That led me to believe that just 14 megabytes were allocated to the GPU. Is that wrong? Is that missing memory, memory eaten up by the kernel or something?

I tried forcing X to grab more memory by entering "VideoRam 65536" in /etc/X11/xorg.conf under section "device" along with my driver information, but that changed nothing, and the X log file says:

# cat /var/log/Xorg.0.log | grep -i videoram
(WW) intel(0): VideoRam configuration found, which is no longer recommended.
(II) intel(0): Continuing with default 131072kB VideoRam instead of 65536 kB.
(**) intel(0): VideoRam: 131072 KB

That doesn't make sense to me either, since according to Dell, the max allotable video ram would only be 65536.

Thanks in advance.

P.S. The display is fine, and GLX reports that DRI is enabled, but glxgears is ridiculously low, and scrolling in a terminal emulator can be slow sometimes (although scrolling in a web browser is fine). glxgears reports about 835 fps.

Last edited by Convergence (2008-10-01 07:12:40)

Square · 2008-09-25 19:37:19

Since it's integrated, you might find something in the bios. It's worth a look, right?

Last edited by Square (2008-09-25 19:38:23)

Convergence · 2008-09-27 03:07:41

I guess I should have mentioned that I checked that out already. Could find no option to do that. Not a whole lot of options in the bios at all really.

adamc83 · 2008-09-27 06:16:13

It may be that the windows driver only allows allocations between 32-64mb, but the linux driver has a higher limit. If the driver says its allocating 128mb, it probably is. Glxgears is far from a definitive benchmark, but I can tell you that a few untextured gears arent maxing out your available graphics memory. Intel integrated graphics are legendarily slow, and that chipset is 6 years old as well.

Can't say exactly why you get slow terminal scrolling, it should be fine...

Square · 2008-09-27 07:11:07

Most Intel integrated graphics cards can use quite a bit of memory, but they lack in graphics processing power. Those cards used to be bios controlled, but that was removed. Even so, from what I've looked through it seems the driver may be causing the problem (Which there isn't really a fix for). What driver are you using? Also, is it just a nuisance, or a big problem for you?

Convergence · 2008-09-28 05:59:40

Thanks for the responses guys.

Adam: I think that you might be right, that Dell wasn't planning on people using linux drivers, and therefore listed limitations that the windows drivers might enforce. As for the slow scrolling, I alleviated the problem a little by switching to LXterminal, but it's still annoying. You'd think that it would be a lot less processor intensive to scroll text in a terminal, as opposed to graphically enriched hypertext in a browser window. Weird.

Square: I don't really have a problem, (except for scrolling in a text emulator). I just want This old thing to perform as well as possible (partly to show off to the guy that used to own it.) I had a little trouble playing Chromium at first, but one of my tweaks fixed that at some point. What do you mean that it used to be controlled by the bios, but was removed? You mean that at some point the driver developer (i810) decided to override control of videoram from the BIOS?

moljac024 · 2008-09-28 07:56:43

I also have an Intel integrated video card in my laptop. A GMA 950, which also snatches memory from RAM, but can't allocate it in the BIOS. The weird thing is that there is an option for it but it is greyed out.

But, I believe these cards allocate memory dynamically according to need.

Convergence · 2008-10-01 07:12:06

moljac024 wrote:

But, I believe these cards allocate memory dynamically according to need.

Works for me. I probably have as much information as i'll get without actually looking at the driver code myself. Thanks guys.

lucke · 2008-10-01 07:15:25

Try adding options "EXA" and "MigrationHeuristic" "greedy" to xorg.conf. it should improve the performance (at least works on GMA 950).

Convergence · 2008-10-01 20:14:58

Where would I put that? would you post your xorg.conf? Or at least the section that has those lines.

lucke · 2008-10-02 18:39:43

In section "Device":

Option "EXA"
Option "MigrationHeuristic" "greedy"

(I can be mistaken, don't want to power on my laptop right now)

Arch Linux

#1 2008-09-25 07:55:09

allocating memory to integrated graphics card [resolved]

#2 2008-09-25 19:37:19

Re: allocating memory to integrated graphics card [resolved]

#3 2008-09-27 03:07:41

Re: allocating memory to integrated graphics card [resolved]

#4 2008-09-27 06:16:13

Re: allocating memory to integrated graphics card [resolved]

#5 2008-09-27 07:11:07

Re: allocating memory to integrated graphics card [resolved]

#6 2008-09-28 05:59:40

Re: allocating memory to integrated graphics card [resolved]

#7 2008-09-28 07:56:43

Re: allocating memory to integrated graphics card [resolved]

#8 2008-10-01 07:12:06

Re: allocating memory to integrated graphics card [resolved]

#9 2008-10-01 07:15:25

Re: allocating memory to integrated graphics card [resolved]

#10 2008-10-01 20:14:58

Re: allocating memory to integrated graphics card [resolved]

#11 2008-10-02 18:39:43

Re: allocating memory to integrated graphics card [resolved]

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