How to turn off ATI Radeon HD 7730M (on Dell inspiron 7520)?

I'm new to Linux, and I've just installed Ubuntu on my Dell inspiron 15R Special Edition.

The ATI Radeon HD 7730M is running by default, instead of the on-board intel HD Graphics 4000. I searched as much as possible on the internet and found no solution so far. I believe someone would help me here.

The ATI driver available at Ubuntu Additional Drivers don't install correctly. To fix this issue, install the latest stable version from the ATI suporte site and you'll get the AMD Catalyst Control Center, a GUI with an option to Switchable Graphics.

To install it, follow the instructions below.

1) First, check the software sources, then paste this command into the terminal to install the dependencies:

sudo apt-get install build-essential cdbs dh-make dkms execstack dh-modaliases fakeroot

1-A) ONLY IF you have a 64 bit system, do this EXTRA step:

sudo apt-get install ia32-libs-multiarch:i386 lib32gcc1 libc6-i386 ; cd /usr ; sudo ln -svT lib /usr/lib64

2) Paste these commands into the terminal to create a new folder and download the latest catalyst driver:

 mkdir ~/amd-catalyst-driver; cd ~/amd-catalyst-driver/
 wget -c wget -c http://www2.ati.com/drivers/linux/amd-driver-installer-catalyst-12.10-x86.x86_64.zip
 unzip amd-driver-installer-catalyst-12.10-x86.x86_64.zip

3-A) IF you have Intel HD graphics AND discrete ATI GPU, then do this, click NEXT > NEXT > etc (and reboot):

 sudo sh amd-driver-installer-catalyst-12.10-x86.x86_64.run

3-B) ONLY IF you have just the ATI Graphics card, then try to do this instead, but it could take a while:

 sudo sh amd-driver-installer-catalyst-12.10-x86.x86_64.run --buildpkg Ubuntu/precise
 sudo dpkg -i fglrx*.deb

4-A) Overwrite the /etc/X11/xorg.conf file(anyway):

 sudo amdconfig --initial -f

4-B) Force the use of the new xorg.conf file:

 sudo amdconfig --input=/etc/X11/xorg.conf --tls=1

6) Reboot the computer and you're done:

 sudo reboot

7) To verify your installation, in terminal type:

 fglrxinfo ; fgl_glxgears

8) To switch between the GPUs, run one of the following commands and re-start X to take effect

8-A) Activate discrete GPU (High-Performance mode), must re-start X to take effect

 sudo aticonfig --px-dgpu
 fglrxinfo ; fgl_glxgears

8-B) Activate integrated GPU (Power-Saving mode), must re-start X to take effect

 sudo aticonfig --px-igpu
 fglrxinfo ; fgl_glxgears

SOURCES:

http://blog.wapnet.nl/2012/07/ubuntu-12-04-install-ati-videodrivers/ http://wiki.cchtml.com/index.php/Hardware http://support.amd.com/br/gpudownload/linux/Pages/radeon_linux.aspx http://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.php?f=191&t=112234 http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1930450

I have the same computer. Unless I'm totally blind, the BIOS does not have a mux switch. As far as I can tell the best way to switch off the card is to use vgaswitcheroo:

# echo "OFF" > /sys/kernel/debug/vgaswitcheroo/switch

If you don't ever use the card (like me), you could run this command in a startup script.