Okay, figured out the monitor issue. It was a combination of the following:
https://discovery.endeavouros.com/nvidia/optimus-manager-for-nvidia/2021/03/
Follow the install instructions for the drivers, optimus manager and the GUI. Then go into said GUI manager and select Optimus from the set of icons on the left and chose NVIDIA under startup mode. Hit OK, then restart the system.
The lid thing was a little trickier, but I found the following:
There’s a config file that needs to be changed and updated. Open using nano or some other text editor, make the changes in the post and viola, it works.