#Gfxcardstatus mid 2010 macbook mac#

If you turned the feature off, then you’ve just made it so your Mac can utilize the high-power discreet graphics card 100% of the time rather than using the power-sipping integrated graphics.Ĭonversely, if you just turned the feature on, then your Mac can now save energy when it doesn’t need the high-power graphics by switching to the low-power graphics source instead, and this will yield improved battery life. The changes are going to take effect immediately after you make your choice. To toggle Automatic Graphics Switching on or off, follow these simple steps:ġ) Launch System Preferences on your Mac and open the Energy Saver preference pane.Ģ) Locate the Automatic graphics switching checkbox at the top of the preferences and add a checkmark to toggle it on, or remove the check mark to toggle it off.

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How to toggle Automatic Graphics Switching on or off On the other hand, if you want to turn it on to conserve power for an on-the-go lifestyle like most people buy notebooks for, then this option should be important to you because you won’t want to waste battery life by using your discreet graphics card to render normal macOS interfaces and view video playback when you don’t need that kind of horsepower to drive that stuff. These users don’t need Automatic Graphics Switching as much as a typical user and can let the computer run off of the discreet graphics card all the time because they’re typically connected to a power source to keep their game playing from killing their computer too quickly.

This is typically the case with gamers who want the best graphical performance. If you’re always tethered to a power source, then you might not care as much about the power efficiency of your MacBook Pro.

#Gfxcardstatus mid 2010 macbook pro#

When it does, your computer not only uses less juice, but it also runs much cooler, and the fans will be quieter as they won’t have to spin so quickly to keep the machine cooler.ĭepending on how you use your MacBook Pro on a daily basis, you may or may not need to utilize the Automatic Graphics Switching setting. When you’re done, it moves back to the integrated graphics source to save power.

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Thanks to powerful software in your Mac, macOS is capable of detecting when your computer needs more graphical horsepower, and it can seamlessly switch over to the discreet graphics card if you’re doing something graphic intensive, such as gaming. Without this feature, your power-hungry discreet graphics card would slide your battery life to a fraction of the time it lasts right now. How Automatic Graphics Switching worksĪutomatic Graphics Switching is a great feature because it helps give your Apple notebook phenomenal battery life. But there are sufficient options to help extend the battery life. Note: You may not see the Video Card heading if you have a MacBook Pro with Apple silicon (M1, M2, and their successors.) Plus, you may not see the Automatic graphics switching option in System Preferences. You might see some variant of Intel integrated graphics, whether it’s the Intel Iris Pro or Intel HD graphics. More than likely, this is going to be the case if you have a lower-end MacBook Pro. If you only see one graphics source in this list, it means you don’t have two graphics processing units. You can tell if you have two GPUs by going to  → About this Mac → System Report → Graphics/Displays on your Mac.Īs you can see from my report, my 2012 15” MacBook Pro with Retina display has both an AMD Radeon M9 graphics card and the Intel Iris Pro integrated graphics: 4) What to do if you don’t see the Automatic graphics switching option on Mac? How to tell if you have dual GPUs