According to - Intel® Core, the i7-860 (a “Lynnfield”) does not have integrated graphics. What integrated graphics card came with the PC ?
The absence of the onboard GA would be a boon given the current state of support for same.
You have a point. While it is the same P7H55-M motherboard as voodo has, and while I note a VGA and HDMI connector on the motherboard, I also note the motherboard manual says for a Clarkdale CPU it comes with Integrated GPU enabled. But for the Lynnfield CPU it states Discrete VGA card required.
I noted that " lspci -nnk" yielded no Intel VGA, but I had assumed (possibly mistakenly) because the onboard graphics was disabled in BIOS. Reviewing this now, I see this motherboard has no integrated graphics for the Core i7.
I went back to the Klatt-IT ->Ihr Spezialist im IT Bereich website from where my wife ordered the PC over the Internet. I note the minimal graphic configuration with the Core i7 Lynnfield is with a nVidia 8400GS (256MB RAM) graphic card which adds 28 euros to the basic price. Going instead for the G210 nVidia graphic card added 40 euros instead of 28 euros to the basic price. There was no Intel GMA option possible when the Core i7 CPU was selected.
But if instead on Klatt-IT ->Ihr Spezialist im IT Bereich I were to downgrade the CPU from a Core i7 to a Core i3, and chose the same motherboard, suddently a Intel GMA (on Board) option at NO EXTRA cost (ie a 40 euro savings over the G210, not to mention a massive savings in going from a Core i7 to a Core i3) becomes possible.
So I think you are correct. There is NO integrated Intel GMA available on this board with a Core i7.
That absence, given the Intel GMA ongoing saga, is an absolute benefit. Knowing that which I now know, I would have opted for the NV79 model with the switchable graphics. This, of course, might have spared me from this most educational experience.
lol!
That would be slow to the point of un-usability (do this word even exist?), so obviously something else is going on. Maybe the output is sinc’d to Vblank or the like. The 60 fps (60 Hz) is highly suspicious…
I wouldn’t even waste time thinking about it, as glxgears is a highly suspicious measurement tool, and completely useless for benchmarking 3D. Apparently it seems to be slower with KMS/DRI2 anyway. It’s a very simple graphic, and I don’t think it uses texturing. The rendering time must be so small as to be negligible, so it’s mainly measuring buffer switching/copying time. The 60 FPS has something to do with vsync being on (IIRC).
I did a quick check on the Intel site. i3 and some of the i5 have integrated graphics, i7 do not. ARK | Your source for information on Intel® products.
As far as glxgears gives any indication of performance I’m back to field 1. I will try 11.4 once it is released and see if this makes a difference.
Indeed the core i7 of my wife does not have integrated graphics. I confess in my (rather poor) defence was I allowed myself to be mislead by an ambiguity in the seller’s web page (which lead me to believe there were also integrated graphics with that Core i7) coupled with this Intel web page which for the Core i7 860 suggested there is “something embedded” which I mistook for graphics:
http://thumbnails24.imagebam.com/10879/260fb7108787085.jpg](http://www.imagebam.com/image/260fb7108787085)
and finally the PC had two VGA connectors on the back with both clearly connected to either the motherboard or to the PCI-e nVidia card.
I had assumed (incorrectly with shoddy research on my part) that the motherboard connection was to ‘embedded graphics’ in the Core i7 860 per the quoted Intel page above.
Of course I was wrong.
Further to that, if I had not been so lazy/shoddy, and had clicked a bit further in that site, it would have brought me here which makes it very clearly that there is no Integrated Graphics for that processor: Intel® Core i7-860
For desktop i7, this appears to be true. There is (were?) the i7-6xxM (mobile) i7s, with two “cores” and integrated graphics (reference: Intel Core i7 - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia ). I have not seen a commercial market-built PC/laptop with this model.
A follow up to this thread, I note the Sandy Bridge architecture of Intel graphics is described here in this wiki which includes the Intel Core i3 Integrated graphics.
I was just reading on Phoronix about the Sandy Bridge. Current support for it is a bit shakey. A couple of articles
- [Phoronix] Intel Sandy Bridge Linux Graphics? It’s A Challenge](http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=ODk2OA)
- [Phoronix] The Challenge In Delivering Open-Source GPU Drivers](http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=ODk3MA)
I note Phoronix claim
For the proper Sandy Bridge experience you are left looking for
- the Linux 2.6.37 kernel,
- Mesa 7.10,
- the latest libdrm,
- and the xf86-video-intel 2.14.0
Its not even clear to me that openSUSE-11.4 will have all of that , but it might. I note this openFATE request which suggests it will support this: https://features.opensuse.org/310904
Hence it is starting to look promising that openSUSE-11.4 will have excellent support for this hardware toward the very end, JUST before 11.4 is released (possibly as part of RC1 - speculation on my part).
I use openSuse 11.3 on my laptop and sometimes the display freezes, so that pressing any key is of no avail. I’ve read there was a bug fixed by exporting LIBGL_ALWAYS_INDIRECT to 1 (this being the shortest solution!) - I’ve done that, and now it doesn’t freeze as often (but still…). I was wondering if it may not be due to the display driver configuration, and I was thinking of asking you on this matter.
Here’s the output of lspci -vk
00:02.0 VGA compatible controller: Intel Corporation Mobile GM965/GL960 Integrated Graphics Controller (rev 03) (prog-if 00 [VGA controller])
Subsystem: Hewlett-Packard Company Presario C700
Flags: bus master, fast devsel, latency 0, IRQ 26
Memory at 91000000 (64-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=1]
Memory at 80000000 (64-bit, prefetchable) [size=256]
I/O ports at 30d0 [size=8]
Expansion ROM at <unassigned> [disabled]
Capabilities: [90] MSI: Enable+ Count=1/1 Maskable- 64bit-
Capabilities: [d0] Power Management version 3
Kernel driver in use: i915
and here’s the result of benchmarking with glxgears[/size][/size]
*** WARNING: Direct Rendering is NOT enabled
*** NOTE: Don’t use glxgears as a benchmark.
OpenGL implementations are not optimized for frame rates >> 60fps,
thus these numbers are meaningless when compared between vendors.
343 frames in 5.3 seconds = 65.002 FPS
320 frames in 5.1 seconds = 62.179 FPS
320 frames in 5.1 seconds = 62.186 FPS
320 frames in 5.1 seconds = 62.179 FPS
320 frames in 5.4 seconds = 59.050 FPS
220 frames in 5.3 seconds = 41.836 FPS
320 frames in 5.3 seconds = 60.667 FPS
260 frames in 5.1 seconds = 50.983 FPS
300 frames in 5.3 seconds = 56.540 FPS
and of cat /var/log/Xorg.0.log | grep ‘(‘II’)’’ 'intel
23.509] (II) intel: Driver for Intel Integrated Graphics Chipsets: i810,
23.569] (II) intel(0): Creating default Display subsection in Screen section
23.569] (II) intel(0): Integrated Graphics Chipset: Intel(R) 965GM
23.585] (II) intel(0): Output VGA1 using monitor section Default Monitor
23.711] (II) intel(0): Output LVDS1 has no monitor section
23.711] (II) intel(0): found backlight control interface /sys/class/backlight/acpi_video0
24.089] (II) intel(0): Output TV1 has no monitor section
24.105] (II) intel(0): EDID for output VGA1
24.210] (II) intel(0): EDID for output LVDS1
24.210] (II) intel(0): Manufacturer: LPL Model: db00 Serial#: 0
24.210] (II) intel(0): Year: 2006 Week: 0
24.210] (II) intel(0): EDID Version: 1.3
24.210] (II) intel(0): Digital Display Input
24.210] (II) intel(0): Max Image Size [cm]: horiz.: 33 vert.: 21
24.210] (II) intel(0): Gamma: 2.20
24.210] (II) intel(0): No DPMS capabilities specified
24.210] (II) intel(0): Supported color encodings: RGB 4:4:4 YCrCb 4:4:4
24.210] (II) intel(0): First detailed timing is preferred mode
24.210] (II) intel(0): redX: 0.600 redY: 0.351 greenX: 0.324 greenY: 0.554
24.211] (II) intel(0): blueX: 0.153 blueY: 0.145 whiteX: 0.312 whiteY: 0.328
24.211] (II) intel(0): Manufacturer’s mask: 0
24.211] (II) intel(0): Supported detailed timing:
24.211] (II) intel(0): clock: 71.0 MHz Image Size: 331 x 207 mm
24.211] (II) intel(0): h_active: 1280 h_sync: 1328 h_sync_end 1360 h_blank_end 1440 h_border: 0
24.211] (II) intel(0): v_active: 800 v_sync: 803 v_sync_end 809 v_blanking: 823 v_border: 0
What should I make of that?[/size]
Other than noting your laptop is a Hewlett-Packard Company Presario C700 using the Intel graphic driver (i915 kernel module) it means nothing to me. I don’t find those retrievals useful, but presumeably you read some where that those retrievals are of use ? What was it supposed to mean ?
I checked out this page:
kde - What does LIBGL_ALWAYS_INDIRECT=1 actually do? - Unix and Linux - Stack Exchange
after reading one of the suggestions made by a member of this forum. As I said, the display doesn’t freeze as often. I don’t know whether I should update my driver or not, and if it’s worth updating it for one freeze a week 
Ok. I’ve upgraded my openSUSE 11.3 to 11.4 and now everything is FINE! No freezes, no anything. At last…