blade-egpu-switcher

Scripts that deal with docking and un-docking an eGPU from the Razer Blade laptop.

Tested on Elementary OS Loki using a Razer Blade 2017, a Razer Core X Chroma w/ an RTX 2070 Super, and Nvidia/Nvidia Prime driver version 430

Requirements

• An Nvidia Graphics card
• An Nvidia optimus laptop
• X display driver
• Nvidia and Nvidia prime drivers >= 430

Installation

• Open terminal and type lspci | grep -i "vga". Make note of the intel and eGPU's Bus ID's. (the id to the very left. ie. 07:00.0 ). You'll need these to configure the xorg file below.

• Open the xorg.conf.egpu file inside the project directory

  • 1. set the Intel Bus ID:

  • Section "Device"
        Identifier "intel"
        Driver "modesetting"
        BusID "PCI:0@0:2:0" #enter your intel diplay adapter's Bus ID here
        Option "AccelMethod" "None"
    EndSection
    

    • Be sure to maintain the same Bus ID formatting (i.e. Bus ID 00:02.0 would be PCI:0@0:2:0)
  • 2. set the Nvidia eGPU Bus ID:

    • Section "Device"
          Identifier "nvidia"
          Driver "nvidia"
          BusID "PCI:7@0:0:0" #enter your egpu's Bus ID here
          Option "ConstrainCursor" "off"
          Option "AllowEmptyInitialConfiguration"
          Option "AllowExternalGpus"
      EndSection
      

      • The key here is the Option "AllowExternalGpus" option. Without this, the eGPU will not be recognized.
  • 3. Save the file.

• Copy the xorg.conf.epu file into your X11 folder. In my case, my X11 folder lives at /etc/X11

  • sudo ./cp xorg.conf.egpu /etc/X11/xorg.conf.egpu

• Copy the dock-egpu and undock-egpu scripts into your bin folder. (/usr/bin/ in my case.)

• sudo cp ./dock-egpu /usr/bin/dock-egpu; cp ./undock-egpu /usr/bin/undock-egpu

Usage

If you already have an xorg.conf file, be sure to create a backup before running the scripts below!!

• Docking the egpu
  • run dock-egpu
• Un-docking the egpu
  • run undock-egpu

Uninstall

1. sudo rm /usr/bin/dock-egpu; rm /usr/bin/undock-egpu
2. sudo rm /etc/X11/xorg.conf.egpu
3. Restore xorg.conf from backup, if applicable.