nouveau or nvidia prime?

[clever trail]

which is generally better for a laptop with an igpu and a dgpu? I currently have nvidia prime and it has ALOT of problems...

[sturdy harness]

Can you elaborate?

[clever trail]

issues with nvidia prime:

• when using performance mode dgpu fractional scaling does not work and i need it
• also on performance mode some flatpak programs simply cant start up
• worse overall performance than windows
• when using nvidia on demand, it is supposed to run most programs on the igpu and offer offloading to the dgpu, but offloading to the dgpu fails for 99% of programs

[sturdy harness]

Generally, proprietary driver is better.

Don't use fractional scaling, it is experimental an often causes strange issues, if you need to, increase panel \ icons size and text scaling.

For flatpaks, run

sudo flatpak repair

and show the output of

inxi -SGxxx

[clever trail]

System:
  Host: zasus Kernel: 6.8.0-60-generic arch: x86_64 bits: 64 compiler: gcc
    v: 13.3.0 clocksource: tsc
  Desktop: Cinnamon v: 6.4.8 tk: GTK v: 3.24.41 wm: Muffin v: 6.4.1 vt: 7
    dm: LightDM v: 1.30.0 Distro: Linux Mint 22.1 Xia base: Ubuntu 24.04 noble
Graphics:
  Device-1: NVIDIA GA107 [GeForce RTX 2050] vendor: ASUSTeK driver: nvidia
    v: 570.133.07 arch: Turing pcie: speed: 2.5 GT/s lanes: 8 ports:
    active: none empty: DP-1,HDMI-A-1 bus-ID: 01:00.0 chip-ID: 10de:25ad
    class-ID: 0300
  Device-2: AMD Rembrandt [Radeon 680M] vendor: ASUSTeK driver: amdgpu
    v: kernel arch: RDNA-2 pcie: speed: 16 GT/s lanes: 16 ports: active: eDP-1
    empty: DP-2, DP-3, DP-4, DP-5, DP-6, DP-7, DP-8, DP-9, Writeback-1
    bus-ID: 05:00.0 chip-ID: 1002:1681 class-ID: 0300 temp: 45.0 C
  Device-3: Shine-optics USB2.0 HD UVC WebCam driver: uvcvideo type: USB
    rev: 2.0 speed: 480 Mb/s lanes: 1 bus-ID: 1-4:2 chip-ID: 3277:0029
    class-ID: 0e02 serial: 0001

Display: x11 server: X.Org v: 21.1.11 with: Xwayland v: 23.2.6 driver: X:
    loaded: amdgpu,nvidia unloaded: fbdev,modesetting,nouveau,vesa dri: radeonsi
    gpu: amdgpu display-ID: :0 screens: 1
  Screen-1: 0 s-res: 3072x1728 s-dpi: 120 s-size: 650x366mm (25.59x14.41")
    s-diag: 746mm (29.37")
  Monitor-1: eDP-1 mapped: eDP model: Najing CEC Panda 0x004d res: 3072x1728
    hz: 144 dpi: 227 size: 344x194mm (13.54x7.64") diag: 395mm (15.5") modes:
    max: 1920x1080 min: 640x480
  API: EGL v: 1.5 hw: drv: nvidia drv: amd radeonsi platforms: device: 0
    drv: nvidia device: 2 drv: radeonsi device: 3 drv: swrast gbm: drv: nvidia
    surfaceless: drv: nvidia x11: drv: radeonsi inactive: wayland,device-1
  API: OpenGL v: 4.6.0 compat-v: 4.5 vendor: amd mesa
    v: 24.2.8-1ubuntu1~24.04.1 glx-v: 1.4 direct-render: yes renderer: AMD
    Radeon 660M (radeonsi rembrandt LLVM 19.1.1 DRM 3.57 6.8.0-60-generic)
    device-ID: 1002:1681
  API: Vulkan v: 1.3.275 layers: 10 surfaces: xcb,xlib device: 0
    type: integrated-gpu driver: N/A device-ID: 1002:1681 device: 1
    type: discrete-gpu driver: N/A device-ID: 10de:25ad device: 2 type: 

offloading on flatpack still doesnt work after repairing

[clever trail]

nor do other programs offload really

[sturdy harness]

I'd recommend sticking with Nvidia (can be set in nvidia X server settings) and using 100 or 200% scaling.

[clever trail]

but nvidia on demand does not work as intended, or you mean i just switch to performance mode?

[sturdy harness]

I mean use nvidia as default, so yes performance mode

[clever trail]

well, on performance mode programs do run but for some reason the UI is laggy

[sturdy harness]

I don't know what are you trying to do with flatpak exactly, but flatpak apps may require their own set of nvidia drivers, so make sure you have

org.freedesktop.Platform.GL.nvidia-570-133-07
org.freedesktop.Platform.GL32.nvidia-570-133-07

installed

[clever trail]

like mint menu animation, calendar animation

[clever trail]

they do work when on performance mode but they dont work when i select "run with dedicated gpu" when using nvidia on demand

[sturdy harness]

If you've set nvidia as default, you don't need to use "run with dedicated gpu"

[clever trail]

yes but i like using nvidia on demand both igpu and dgpu because it avoids glitches like the ones that come with fractional scaling

and this is the menu animation while using performance mode

pretty laggy for an nvidia gpu

[sturdy harness]

Like I said, fractional scaling is experimental and can cause weird behaviour - test with 100% or 200%

[clever trail]

sorry for the resolution, i forgot to adjust it

[clever trail]

yes 100% removes those visual glitches but it feels annoying having to zoom in everytime i enter a new website or download a new program

[sturdy harness]

You can set default zoom level in most browsers

[clever trail]

I didn't know that. Well I guess i have to improve things myself till nvidia fixes their bad drivers. thank you for your time!