[SOLVED] Turning off Nvidia GPU on Asus N53SV laptop. Nvidia Optimus. Installed Bumblebee

Linux eats eats my laptop's battery for breakfast.

Laptop: Asus N53SV with 2x 8GB DDR3 and 2 memory slots free. With the standard 750GB 7200RPM hard drive and DVDRW.
Distro: Mint 15 x64 with Mate 1.6
Kernel: 3.8.0-19 kernel

On a fresh boot powertop reports 44W used. It settles down after a few seconds to 23W.

I used this kernel module to turn off my GPU with the command: \_SB.PCI0.PEG0.GFX0.DOFF

Powertop reports power consumption drops to 11.3W.
All seems well. But when I try shut down the system crashes (Mate GUI freezes and the hard drive light stops blinking)

I tried repeating the test, turning the GPU back on using the command \_SB.PCI0.PEG0.GFX0.DOFF, but power consumption only rises to 18W meaning the GPU is not restored to its original (power hungry) state. Shutting down STILL crashes.

I verified that if I boot up, run powertop, wait for system to settle and then shut down, there are no problems.

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The next idea I had is to shut down in a terminal or see if there is some error message, whats the best way to do that?

Beyond that I'm out of ideas. What do you suggest?

All seems well. But when I try shut down the system crashes (Mate GUI freezes and the hard drive light stops blinking)

any indication of the error? You really need some error here, or some piece of code that has crashed. Otherwise, how are you going to find it?

Asus N53SV with an nVidia GPU? If so, its an 'optimus' setup and I'd suggest trying Bumblebee, not vga-switcharoo.

http://bumblebee-project.org/

business_kid:
I was hoping someone could suggest what log files I should check or what method to use to shut down, where I'd be able to see an error.

cascade9:
Ok, I thought bumblebee was for using the Nvidia graphics. I don't want to use the Nvidia graphics at all. (at this stage) so I thought the ACPI stuff was the way to go.

Bumblebee is a software implementation comprising of two parts: Render programs off-screen on the dedicated video card and display it on the screen using the integrated video card. This bridge is provided by VirtualGL or primus (read further) and connects to a X server started for the discrete video card. Disable the dedicated video card when it is not in use (see the Power management section)

Power management The goal of power management feature is to turn off the NVIDIA card when it is not used by bumblebee any more. If bbswitch is installed, it will be detected automatically when the Bumblebee daemon starts. No additional configuration is necessary. Default power state of NVIDIA card using bbswitch The default behavior of bbswitch is to leave the card power state unchanged. bumblebeed does disable the card when started, so the following is only necessary if you use bbswitch without bumblebeed.

https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/bumblebee

Okay here is whats crashing. plymouthd and Xorg
http://i.imgur.com/V5C6K34.jpg

Cool, thanks will give bumblebee a try

I was a little hasty when I went through the installation.
I didn't read the whole page and see that there is an option to JUST get the power management.
https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Bumblebee#Installation

For better or worse I'm getting the whole bumblebee open source nVidia story. (500MB of archives)
Perhaps I'll find a use for my GPU.

Thanks cascade9!

I installed the full bumblebee package.
Rebooted. Had to re-configure my resolutions.
Then I ran powertop and saw my GPU is automatically switched off. My laptop was idling at 13.5W

Awesome!
Then I shut down and it didn't crash!

weeeeeee!