Precision Mobile Workstations

[beekerc]

I have a M4800 which works great. never new what GPU was in it so i simply used the Intel Graphics driver for several years. I read that with the NVidia and AMD GPUs i can run the laptop screen, HDMI, Display Port and VGA port at the same, which is what i want to do. I determined that there was no GPU by trying to install the NVidia and AMD video drivers from the Dell website, but in both cases, the installer told me it could not find NVidia or AMD hardware. I'm running Windows 7 Ultimate and have the latest BIOS (A25). i went out and got an AMD Fire Pro M5100 GPU specifically for the M4800. while installing it i discovered that there was, in fact, an NVidia card installed. since I couldn't get it to work or be recognized, i went ahead and installed the AMD card. On a fresh installation of Windows 7 Ultimate SP1, i tried installing the AMD M5100 drivers - both from Dell and from AMD. both installers said there was not AMD hardware installed. What the heck??? I even tried installing the drivers with the BIOS Switchable Graphics turned on and off. but when i turned it off, the next time i looked at the BIOS settings, it was turned back on. am i missing something here? why would the driver installer say the GPU was not installed, when it is clearly installed? please help

[hoanzn]

Hi,
I am having the same issue. K2100M NVIDIA cards inside the M4800 are notorious for dying from overheating.
Go through these steps for verification:
1. Flash BIOS A26
2. In the BIOS, disable the switchable card check mark.
3. Reboot
On reboot, the BIOS tries to detect the NVIDIA video card. If that fails, the BIOS restarts the workstation,
resets the switchable card check mark, and proceeds with booting the HD4600 Intel video system. If you enter the BIOS again, you will see that the switchable card check mark has been re-activated. In this case either your main board or your video card (or both) is/are defective.
Kind regards
Thomas

[jaimegu]

I don't know if you found already the solution.

I got myself an M4800 whose previous user replaced the HD and installed Win10Pro not activated.  I have been fighting with it to make everything work.

• I had to revert changes in BIOS (UEFI and Secure Boot).
• The disk was mSata with caddy, so I moved to the right slot
• I bought a Windows 10 Pro retail license (it wasn't possible to get an OEM product key from ACPI tables).

Right now I'm stuck at a similar point as you:  My system runs on the embedded Intel HD4600 graphics adapter.  Probably this is the reason the HDMI is not working (known issue when buying).

No device is detected in the Device Manager, and Nvidia driver installer fails with no compatible graphics hardware found

So I opened the laptop to find that there actually was an Nvidia board there (K2100M I suppose).  I reseated the board and applied more thermal paste and closed again. with no luck.

BIOS is A25.  The switchable graphics is ON.

OTOH, I'm a bit sad with the support in this Dell community,  it's very common to find threads without any answer.