Fallout 4 seems unable to detect the dedicated AMD Radeon HD 7600M card on my HP Envy m6 laptop, and instead only uses the integrated (and terrible) Intel HD graphics.This is an issue that has plagued all users of this laptop for many games, with some being able to detect the card and others failing entirely.

It seems either Bethesda needs to patch in support for detecting the card, or AMD needs to make a driver update for the card. We all know AMD's track record for Catalyst updates, so I'm hoping Bethesda can provide a solution for those of us with this issue.

'Solutions' that have been tried and tested

• Updating the AMD Drivers - All drivers as of the date of this thread (11/11/2015) are fully updated with the latest Catalyst Beta Drivers. This does not fix the issue.

• Switching to 'High Performance' mode/Assigning Fallout4.exe to 'High Performance' in the switchable graphics settings in the Catalyst Control Center - None of these work. Fallout 4 still can't detect the dedicated card.

• Going into the BIOS and 'turning off' the integrated Intel graphics, and forcing the computer to use the AMD card - As every user of this laptop will tell you, HP were helpful enough to have the BIOS not have this option at all. We are stuck with the laptop itself choosing which applications should use which GPU. There is no way (As far as I'm aware) to FORCE the laptop to use the dedicated card for everything.

If there are any solutions, workarounds, etc, please let me know. If anyone else is having the same issues flag it up on this thread so Bethesda is aware.

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Integrated Graphics are the bane of gaming when you also have a dedicated video card.

Couple things to try:

You already tried the control panel, so now try going into power options and force the laptop to use the 3D card only when plugged in. Not sure exactly how it's worded, it could be very obvious, or it could be something like Use High or Highest Performance or something like that.

Already tried that, it doesn't do anything. My laptop is set on 'High Performance' constantly.

have the absolutely same problem with the same Radeon (but Dell Vostro 3560 laptop). also tried a lot of different possible solutions, but noone works

Update the drivers for the Intel integrated chipset also.

Manually enable 'High Performance' for the Fallout 4 Launcher also.

Take a look here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4oB2oDO-IFk

Intel Drivers also fully updated. Fallout 4 Launcher, AND the .exe are set at high performance. This does not solve the issue.

This essentially highlights the solution that I (and many other people) have tried, that being simply setting the executable at 'High Performance' from the Switchable Graphics properties. This does nothing.

Can we get a member of Bethesda's tech team to chime in here? A solution, or at least a confirmation that this is an issue that's being worked on? Anything?

Unfortunately, its not really Bethesda's issue. The problem is with the switchable graphics software and the device drivers of the discrete and integrated graphics. This is all controlled by the laptop's manufacturer. If the reference drivers and software work on your laptop then maybe you'll an update from either NVidia or AMD, but don't count of it.

Software based switchable graphics should be eliminated, it should be done in the BIOS/UEFI, where you boot into High Performance Mode with the integrated graphics completely disabled or Power saving Mode, with only the integrated available. Certain laptops (Alienware 14 (2013) DO have a BIOS/UEFI flag to disable the integrated but its not standard procedure.

That's fair enough, I suppose. Unfortunately HP are being thoroughly useless about it all, and have not responded to my frequent attempts to bring this up as an issue.

My assumption that at least some of the solution could be offered by Bethesda was based on the evidence that certain games seem to pick up my dedicated AMD card just fine, while others don't.

SOME acknowledgement from Bethesda that this at least is an issue on HPs end and not theirs would be useful. Having just purchased the game, I would like something to satisfy the growing annoyance at spending money on a game that I cannot play as I should be able to.

I have the same problem except I have an MSI GT70 with an intel 4000 and a 670MX. I am running the latest nvidia drivers from nvidia's website and the latest intel drivers from intels website.

When I start the fallout4launcher.exe or fallout4.exe, I should see the power button turn orange. That means that the dedicated GPU has been enabled. This is how the system responds when I start ANY game or application that I have configured in the nvidia control panel to use the dedicated GPU. Except Fallout 4, this is the only application where the computer acts as though it is not even running. Starting the game in this state will load the game to the main menu. But when starting a new campaign, the system will crash to desktop and complain that the intel driver has stopped responding but was recovered. This confirms it was not running on the dedicated GPU.

I tried:

1. Playing with the power options,

2. Disabling the integrated video card

3. Cleaning and re-installing the drivers,

4. Running the exe and launcher in compatibility mode

5. Right clicking the icon and telling it to run on the 670MX

6. I gave the EXE and Launcher admin rights and running the game as an admin user.

Nothing makes the driver recognize that the fallout4launcher.exe or fallout.exe is running. Fallout 3 works perfectly, hell I can setup solitaire to trigger the dedicated GPU. But Fallout 4? Nope

I have even gone so far as to try and mess with the optimus settings through Nvidia Inspector and that was a dead end too.

Would really like someone from Benthesda to chime in regarding what makes their exe files so special.

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Bethesda has no control over how hardware manufacturers set up their machines to handle the switching. It does not help that games show splash screens and other 2D content.

Here are some links, mostly they talk about the Nvidia control panel, but the last link talks about some software that is governing this switch over

http://superuser.com/questions/484962/how-to-force-my-laptop-to-use-the-discrete-gpu

https://knowledge.autodesk.com/support/infraworks-360/troubleshooting/caas/sfdcarticles/sfdcarticles/How-to-force-your-laptop-to-Run-with-Graphics-Processor-vs-the-default-Integrated-Graphics-for-InfraWorks.html

Nvidia

http://forums.autodesk.com/t5/hardware/disabling-nvidia-optimus-amp-perform-clean-install/td-p/4363279

AMD/HP

http://h30434.www3.hp.com/t5/Notebook-Display-and-Video/Disabling-switchable-graphics-or-setting-global-default/td-p/1727181

First two links do not help because they both describe the configuration process both myself and OP have tried with no results. In fact, I specifically mentioned that it seems like the optimus driver completely ignores the control panel settings when both fallout4.exe and fallout4launcher.exe are assigned to the dedicated GPU.

The last two links do not work because my laptop(and not every laptop, including OP's) allows the user to disable optimus OR to choose the primary video card via the bios. In most laptops of our generation that rely on software switching, the integrated video card is a multiplexer and the video stream passes through it at all times even when the dedicated GPU is doing the processing. Most newer laptops have hardware switchable graphics because as you can see, software switching has major limitations. These laptops have a physical switch on the machine that you flip depending on the card you want to use OR permanently enable one or the other via the bios.

This is an issue that needs to be looked into collaboratively by Bethesda and Nvidia. Something is either wrong with the games EXE files or memory allocation that doesnt let the control panel recognize it or there is something wrong with the drivers detection. My guess is that its Bethesdas fault.