how do I find out what kind of graphics card I have?
 

OK, so I'm really new at this. And I just figured out how to download google earth. But then when I went to open it, it sadi that my graphics card was insufficient to run the graphics. Soooooo

1. What the heck IS a graphics card? Is it a piece of hardware or software?
2. How do I find out what kind I have?
3. How do I update it?

Thanks! I don't know what I'd do without ya!

In Terminal:

You will then get output similar to this:

jim@hp ~ $ lspci -vnn | grep VGA -A 12
00:01.0 VGA compatible controller [0300]: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD/ATI] Wrestler [Radeon HD 7310] [1002:9809] (prog-if 00 [VGA controller])
Subsystem: Hewlett-Packard Company Device [103c:188b]
Flags: bus master, fast devsel, latency 0, IRQ 44
Memory at e0000000 (32-bit, prefetchable) [size=256M]
I/O ports at 3000 [size=256]
Memory at f0400000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=256K]
Expansion ROM at <unassigned> [disabled]
Capabilities: <access denied>
Kernel driver in use: radeon


jim@hp ~ $ sudo lshw -numeric -C display
[sudo] password for jim:
*-display
description: VGA compatible controller
product: Wrestler [Radeon HD 7310] [1002:9809]
vendor: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD/ATI] [1002]
physical id: 1
bus info: pci@0000:00:01.0
version: 00
width: 32 bits
clock: 33MHz
capabilities: pm pciexpress msi vga_controller bus_master cap_list rom
configuration: driver=radeon latency=0
resources: irq:44 memory:e0000000-efffffff ioport:3000(size=256) memory:f0400000-f043ffff

00:01.1 Audio device [0403]: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD/ATI] Wrestler HDMI Audio [1002:1314]
Subsystem: Hewlett-Packard Company Device [103c:188b]
Flags: bus master, fast devsel, latency 0, IRQ 45

You may find this Ubuntu link on Google Earth of use:
https://help.ubuntu.com/community/GoogleEarth

1) Graphics card is a piece of hardware.

2) You find that by previuos post and also by reading your hardware manual. Or you see in the motherboard what's installed.

3) You can upgrade by installing new one in motherboard replacing old one. Read a good pc upgrade manual. Or use a computer service. In case of laptops this may or may not be possible.

In a nutshell the graphics card is a piece of hardware either built into the motherboard or as an add in card that creates what you see on your display.

As stated with desktops you can usually add a card but laptops typically not possible.

Here are the requirements to run google earth.
https://support.google.com/earth/answer/20701?hl=en

Ok, it says I have an i915

This is what I got in full:

john@family-guest:~$ lspci -vnn | grep VGA -A 12
00:02.0 VGA compatible controller [0300]: Intel Corporation 82G33/G31 Express Integrated Graphics Controller [8086:29c2] (rev 02) (prog-if 00 [VGA controller])
Subsystem: Dell Device [1028:0238]
Flags: bus master, fast devsel, latency 0, IRQ 42
Memory at fdf00000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=512K]
I/O ports at ff00 [size=8]
Memory at d0000000 (32-bit, prefetchable) [size=256M]
Memory at fdb00000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=1M]
Expansion ROM at <unassigned> [disabled]
Capabilities: <access denied>
Kernel driver in use: i915

00:19.0 Ethernet controller [0200]: Intel Corporation 82562V-2 10/100 Network Connection [8086:10c0] (rev 02)
Subsystem: Dell Device [1028:0238]
john@family-guest:~$ sudo lshw -numeric -C display
[sudo] password for john:
*-display
description: VGA compatible controller
product: 82G33/G31 Express Integrated Graphics Controller [8086:29C2]
vendor: Intel Corporation [8086]
physical id: 2
bus info: pci@0000:00:02.0
version: 02
width: 32 bits
clock: 33MHz
capabilities: msi pm vga_controller bus_master cap_list rom
configuration: driver=i915 latency=0
resources: irq:42 memory:fdf00000-fdf7ffff ioport:ff00(size=8) memory:d0000000-dfffffff memory:fdb00000-fdbfffff
john@family-guest:~$

Anybody wanna tell me how to upgrade so I can run google earth?

"i915" is the driver rather than the card -- I have an Intel HD4600 that also uses the i915 driver.

You have an "82G33" or "G31" integrated graphics card -- this means the graphics chip is integrated into the motherboard.

If you have any spare PCI slots you could buy a dedicated graphics card but they're a bit of a pain to set up in GNU/Linux (depending on your distribution).

What version of Google Earth are you trying to run? It could be related to a bug that was fixed in 7.0.3

https://support.google.com/earth/answer/40901?hl=en

I really doubt that your graphics are insufficient for google earth. So if you have interpreted the error message, it would be better to quote it exactly. It might not mean what you think.

But I haven't tried google earth in years and when I did try it, the Linux support (including generating meaningful error messages when something goes wrong) was pretty lame compared to Windows.

So I probably won't know what to fix even if I see the exact error message. Probably you need to install some software package from your distribution. But I'm not sure of that and have no guess at which package.

You really have a google earth question, not a graphics card question. If "google earth" were in the title of your post, it would be more likely to get seen by someone who knows the answer. Try editing your original post title.

On many systems it is an actual hardware card. Based on your lspci output, I'm pretty sure your graphics are part of your CPU (so hardware, but not seperate hardware). That may make something like google earth run slower than it would with a real graphics card, but should not be a reason for it to not run at all.