Hi,
i installed the current opensuse tumbleweed snapshot on my new Dell XPS 15 9560 notebook. And i noticed that GNOME is very slow and not very responsive. I also did not have installed any special driver so i am guessing this is maybe related to the intel graphics? But this was never a problem on other notebooks i have installed tumbleweed and used gnome with intel graphics
It seems this problem is related to having “nomodeset” as kernel boot parameter, when using “nouveau.modeset=0” instead, the system is still working/booting and gnome is running fine.
nomodeset should only be used when debugging the machine as it disables all user mode kernel modules
nouveau.modeset=0 is only valid on nvidia hardware imo on nvidia you’re better off using the propitiatory drivers seeing how nvidia builds them for opensuse
http://http.download.nvidia.com/opensuse/
if that’s an optimus laptop (it has both an intel integrated and an nvidia pci card) you should consider installing nvidia bumblebee
https://en.opensuse.org/SDB:NVIDIA_Bumblebee
what’s the output of
sudo lspci | grep VGA
it only lists the intel 591b device. But the notebook indeed has an nvidia chip also. Installing the nvidia drivers using the official repository works but of course the device is not used, when using bumblebee the system hangs during boot, thats why i would rather not using bumblebee on this system, even if it would be nice to have it.
it is possible that notebook is not optimus in which case it would still have both graphic devices but only use the one specified in bios in which case lspci might not detect the nvidia chip
if this is the case you have two options keep noveau disabled and continue using the intel device or go in bios set the pci-express as the preferred video device and install the nvidia drivers (not bumblebee)
but as that is a newer laptop if it has an pci-e graphic card it should be optimus
according to dell there are some devices which are intel only
http://www.dell.com/en-us/shop/dell-laptops/xps-15/spd/xps-15-9560-laptop
what happens if you don’t use nouveau.modeset=0 because if lspci does not detect an nvidia card the nvidia drivers should not be loaded
if i remove the nouveau.modeset=0 parameter the notebook just hangs during boot at some time.
if i run:
/sbin/lspci -nnk | egrep -A3 "VGA|3D"
i get this output:
00:02.0 VGA compatible controller [0300]: Intel Corporation Device [8086:591b] (rev 04)
Subsystem: Dell Device [1028:07be]
Kernel driver in use: i915
Kernel modules: i915
--
01:00.0 3D controller [0302]: NVIDIA Corporation GP107M [GeForce GTX 1050 Mobile] [10de:1c8d] (rev a1)
Subsystem: Dell Device [1028:07be]
Kernel modules: nouveau
02:00.0 Network controller [0280]: Qualcomm Atheros QCA6174 802.11ac Wireless Network Adapter [168c:003e] (rev 32)
So, that proves that it’s a dual graphics machine. Check the BIOS whether one is disabled by default.
i checked the bios, it is not possible to disable one of the devices.
Hybrid graphics (Optimus) are a pain. Have you tried bumblebee???
keeping
nouveau.modeset=0
disables the nouveau driver which in turn I assume disable’s the nvidia chip
having a GeForce GTX 1050 and not using it imo is a crime against computing (a bad joke)
you really should try bumblebee as nouveau is known to have issues with plasma 5 and possibly gnome (I don’t use gnome)
the newer bumblebee install method is much simpler and uses the propitiatory drivers from nvidia it should be simpler
if you have issues with bumblebee report them here or open a new thread there are people that have gotten it working
As my system is running fine now (using intel graphics) i will wait some time unitl i really need the nivida graphics. It would be nice to disable the nvidia device thought, to prevent it from draining the battery… but i will check that topic later.
My last try to install bumblebee on this notebook resulted in a total lockup of my system, but i will try it again as soon as i feel like doing it 
I also tried to just add the official nvidia repository and installed the nvidia driver from there but of course that does not made the nvidia graphics available… but it there anything i can gain from doing so or is bumblebee the only way?