gma booster promises 2.4x the power for netbook graphics chips

By , Published June 10, 2010

It will come as no revelation that the number one reason netbooks' suck is due to their meek integrated innards – such as the prevalent use of Intel’s integrated graphics chips. Sure, they need to be underpowered to give good battery performance etc but what about the times when you need to squeeze just that little bit more juice from your Intel fruit? That's where GMA booster comes in.

GMA Booster promises up to €œan astonishing 2.4x of extra processing power for Your computer’s integrated graphics engine€. A heady claim€¦ does it live up to it?image

Download

The best way to find out whether you can get 2.4x the current power of your integrated chip with GMA Booster is to install it and find out! GMA Booster is a standalone application that runs 'without risking your hardware or anything else' so nothing ventured€¦

GMA Booster requires an up-to-date kernel (which you probably already have) and the Intel® 2008Q4 graphics package (available here). It only works with the chip models listed in the picture above.

image

Once downloaded proceed to run the application via the terminal as root, following the instructions printed on screen.

Thanks to Fox Master

Article originally appeared on omgubuntu.co.uk

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  • https://launchpad.net/~chmiela-st StanisÅ‚aw Chmiela (Aragwain)

    It works, or it’s placebo. ;)

    I’ve got HP Mini 2140, set graphics to 400 MHz and Compiz works smoother than before.

    • Michaelc37

      can it play videos smoothly from http://www.nba.com/videos

    • http://twitter.com/GrimeyWelsh Scott Welsh

      I have a 2140 as well. Are you running Lucid? Does your system go to sleep/blank page when you shut the lid? It’s teh only issue I have had. It may be due to the fact that I installed it pre-release and updated. Some of teh theme stuff is still a little off too. Also how is the battery life after running this app?

  • fanfan

    its trial software according to the download page

  • Guest

    There are only downloads for GMA 900 and 950, the rest are going to be supported in the future releases.

  • http://www.twitter.com/wilsonliam Wilsonliam

    lspci lists me as having:

    00:00.0 Host bridge: Intel Corporation Mobile 945GME Express Memory Controller Hub (rev 03)
    00:02.0 VGA compatible controller: Intel Corporation Mobile 945GME Express Integrated Graphics Controller (rev 03)
    00:02.1 Display controller: Intel Corporation Mobile 945GM/GMS/GME, 943/940GML Express Integrated Graphics Controller (rev 03)

    I guess this is a 945GMA, which isn’t listed above, but the website states “GMA 950 (mobile Intel® 945 family)” Does this mean it works with my GFX card?

    • Julio

      If you go to the page for GMA950 you will see that the 945GM chipset IS supported. I have the same chipset on my Dell Mini 9

      “Supported chipsets: Intel® 945GM/GME/GMS/GSE and 943/940GML/GU Express featuring GMA 95″

    • AJ

      the 950 is actually physically identical to the 500, it is just clocked to a lower speed =]

  • Abgorn

    Why is GMA x3100 grayed out?

    • Anonymous

      From the FAQ:
      GMABooster for GMA X3100, GMA X4500, GMA 500, GMA 900 is planned. An issue is, 1-2 devices based on each of the chipset families are needed for development and testing… And it’s really difficult (not to say impossible) to develop such programs without the real devices on developer’s desk. If someone would donate suitable laptop(s), this would speed up the development process significantly. Please click here to read the detailed message from author of GMABooster.

  • Anonymous

    Meh. No 900 for Linux. :/

  • Anonymous

    anyone can benchmark their system, phoronix has a benchmark

    whats the difference between this and pumping up the cpu frequency applet?

    • Jopakowa

      This software changes the frequency of the GPU (the graphical chipset), not the CPU.

  • http://intangiblestyle.com/ Matthew

    Looks like the speedup is achieved by overclocking the chipset. Even if it doesn’t cause overheating, it’s probably going to drastically reduce battery life.

  • Roger Dean

    Looks interesting – might extend the life of my Thinkpad X60s. But installing the intel linux graphics files is a bit beyond me – could someone please give a step-by-step, tell me exactly which of those downloads I need, how to install them etc? Many thanks…

  • Romanovzky

    One (that may be a) stupid question, I’ve my eepc1000h installed with UNE with every driver being the default one, do I need to get the Intel® 2008Q4 or is it compatible as it is right now?

  • Jopakowa

    According to a french blog about netbooks (http://www.blogeee.net/2009/03/gmabooster-booster-son-chipset-video-gma-pas-beaucoup-dinteret/), this little software isn’t very efficient, maybe because the old Intel Atom is a limiting factor… But they were using Windows, maybe it works better on Linux (meh)…

  • Anonymous

    intel gfx cards in general suck so much that i’m not sure a 2.4x increase will make much difference….lol
    and i’ll wait to see how this so called 2.4x increase translates into real-world, real-usage improvement before i get too excited….it could all just be benchmarking figures and not greatly noticeable from an end-user perspective

  • Anonymous

    Hey, my friend has a netbook with that in it! Sweet. Why don’t they build this into the kernel, though?? Weird.

    My parents have an old 82865G- wish they had something for that, other than using an old kernel. Somehow the new graphics modules they use seem to make graphics on 5 year old chip sets really crappy instead of better. I thought open source was about improving over time, not degrading. I really hope they come back to them some day, since that computer really isn’t THAT old.

  • http://www.manhattanos.com/ Kevin McDole

    The funny thing is the download says last updated June 25th, 2009

  • Renan Decarlo

    how do I install the Intel® 2008Q4 graphics package?

  • http://viettelonline.com/ LienDTK

    Oh nice, thanks for your information!

  • http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100002602782035 Tamer Ursavas

    ive 3500