Questions about DisplayLink devices

[marcelsutton]

I have questions about DisplayLink devices. What resources, exactly, are used to drive the display? Can I take control of them somehow?

Looking for a definitive answer here: what resources are used by a DisplayLink driver program? CPU? GPU? Both? How intensive? Every search I do on this leads me to very generic answers which leave me with more questions.

What MS Windows processes/services are active while a DisplayLink display is active?

Is there some way to take control of the driver program, so it gets routed to my CPU's currently dormant integrated graphics? It would be awesome to free up more overhead for my dedicated GPU if this is possible.

[AlbanRampon]

Hello,

The details vary over time, as the algo is tweaked release after release based on new use cases discovered and optimizations. We don't give away our always evolving recipe.
It is impossible to publish a number because it is a multi-dimension adaptive algorithm.
We adapt based on content, link bandwidth and computing bandwidth available on a frame by frame basis, with the ability to switch between GPU and CPU based on their utilization level to get the best UX. So, counter-intuitively, we use less computing if all computing is already busy (as it would severely degrade the UX), and use more if it's all idling doing nothing...

It already uses your dormant integrated graphics (iGPU) instead of discrete graphics (dGPU) because generally speaking, people who buy a discrete GPU already load it with CAD and other compute intensive applications. But we could also leverage the dGPU.

Some competitors have added switches to give the illusion of control, but we believe the user should not need to be a graphics guru to use a product... It is our job to make it work behind the curtain.

One last note to avoid confusion, the DL encoding process is different than rendering the content displayed on a DL-driven monitor. As an example in your dual graphics setup, if you have a CAD application displayed on a DisplayLink driven monitor, the application will be rendered (calculated) using the GPU of your choosing (probably the dGPU), and then when the result is calculated, the result will be encoded by the iGPU. So you can use AutoCAD on a docking station with DisplayLink technology still leveraging your dGPU power!

Hopefully this demystifies a few points for you.

Regards,
Alban