Onboard VideoCard to Dedicated VideoCard switching (vice versa)

Hi, I have a GeForce 8500 GT and OnBoard video card on my motherboard.

Can someone give me an advice on this.

My GF 8500 GT heats up over time and consumes additional power, so sometimes when I dont need it i want to turn it off and use the onboard videocard of my motherboard to save energy and to cool off or give my dedicated video card a rest time.

What is your advice? Because im thinking that if i switch to onboard video card, the GF 8500 might still be running and consuming power.

So basically I just want to switch off the GF-8500 w/o removing it to the motherboard and use the onboard.
Thanks in advance

 

In short you can't.

Drivers have to be loaded for each device separately for one and having both driver sets installed can cause problems, in many cases it's best to remove the 'old' driver and then clean the computer and registry of all traces with a driver cleaner.

At the least you most probably would have to reinstall the driver after switching.

The second problem is when you have a video card connected the motherboard will detect it and automatically disable the onboard video, even if there's an option to enable onboard it will often be ignored once a card's connected.

The third problem is you'd have to keep connecting and disconnecting the monitor lead to each device, they're not designed to do this multiple times a day and they will soon fail.

The good news is the 8500GT consumes VERY little power, at idle it draws 15watts 'a little more that a hard disk' and at peak it draws 35 watts.

Your onboard will consume some power also at idle but in the end you'll be doing all that messing around to try and stop 5-10 watts being used which is the same as a hard drive so it's not worth worrying about.

If you want to use less power and stop the card heating stop doing any graphically intensive tasks or turn the performance down. Any application that looks and feels the same will consume roughly the same amount of power from any video solution.

 

I guess my advice to the OP would be check if they have a cooling fan on their video card and to check to see if it's working.

Maybe more case fans, if feasible, would be needed.

 

Thanks for the advises

So if I'm going to stop using the 8500GT, I will first have to remove the drivers, shutdown the PC and remove the 8500GT

Thanks

 

Greetings, Trollsama.

If you're going to do this two or three times a year, fine. If you're planning to do this on a regular basis, however, I see trouble looming. Software-wise the chances of leaving driver remnants or 'clicking the wrong button' increase each time you uninstall/reinstall, and the OS environment is in constant flux which practically guarantees that one driver installation is slightly different than the next, potentially causing conflicts. On the hardware side pins or connectors could be broken, static electricity issues come into play (especially with cold weather coming), cables could be inadvertently loosened, etc.

Bottom line - constantly changing a computer component for the sake of saving a few watts of power or as an improper defense against heat is, IMO, a recipe for disaster.

 

If your graphics card is overheating, you need to check your cooling. Are the case interior, cards, heatsinks, fans, air vents all free of heat trapping dust? Is your graphics card fan spinning freely? Is your case providing an adequate supply of cool air through the case?

As Puppywunder58 suggested, see if your case supports more, or larger fans to provide more flow through the case.