Nvidia Driver Issue

[BinaryApe]

Hey everyone, I'm trying out the latest build of Jaunty. I have read a bit about how the Nvidia drivers from the official repo will cause Xserver/xorg to be removed (found that out the hard way 3 times lol).

I then started to read into the situation and found this thread: http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1013849

I followed the instructions and it did let me install the latest nvidia drivers (without removing xorg/xserver). Now I don't know how to actually "Use" the nvidia drivers.

I'm still stuck using the basic vesa graphics driver. When I do the nvidia-xconfig option it gives me a new xorg.conf file but when I boot up I get a black Screen with a Gray E flashing in the upper left hand corner.

I'm kind of stuck here and reading some of the threads in the forums hasn't helped. I'm wondering is there something I over looked or did wrong. Cause the drivers also show up in Restricted Hardware (but I'm afraid if I activate it will remove xserver again).

Anyone have any ideas?

[ronacc]

activating the restricted driver will not remove your xserver ( or it shouldn't ) , what gpu do you have ?

[MacUntu]

If X got uninstalled, do:

# apt-get install ubuntu-desktop

If you have dkms installed do:

# dkms uninstall -m nvidia -v 180.22
# dkms remvoe -m nvidia -v 180.22 --all

[tab after "-v" to get the right version]

Get the latest beta driver and install

# sh NVIDIA-blabla.run

[autocrosser]

activating the restricted driver will not remove your xserver ( or it shouldn't ) , what gpu do you have ?

Yes---We need to know what card you have....

[BinaryApe]

Silly me, forgot the most important part.

My GFX Card is a Nvidia Geforce 7950GX2.

[BinaryApe]

using the restricted driver causes xorg to be removed.

Here is my xorg.conf file when using nvidia-xconfig (which gives me a black screen on boot up with a gray box in the upper left with a flashing E looking symbol):

# nvidia-xconfig: X configuration file generated by nvidia-xconfig
# nvidia-xconfig: version 1.0 (buildmeister@builder63) Tue Jan 6 10:03:02 PST 2009

Section "ServerLayout"
Identifier "Layout0"
Screen 0 "Screen0"
InputDevice "Keyboard0" "CoreKeyboard"
InputDevice "Mouse0" "CorePointer"
EndSection

Section "Files"
EndSection

Section "Module"
Load "dbe"
Load "extmod"
Load "type1"
Load "freetype"
Load "glx"
EndSection

Section "InputDevice"
# generated from default
Identifier "Mouse0"
Driver "mouse"
Option "Protocol" "auto"
Option "Device" "/dev/psaux"
Option "Emulate3Buttons" "no"
Option "ZAxisMapping" "4 5"
EndSection

Section "InputDevice"
# generated from default
Identifier "Keyboard0"
Driver "kbd"
EndSection

Section "Monitor"
Identifier "Monitor0"
VendorName "Unknown"
ModelName "Unknown"
HorizSync 28.0 - 33.0
VertRefresh 43.0 - 72.0
Option "DPMS"
EndSection

Section "Device"
Identifier "Device0"
Driver "nvidia"
VendorName "NVIDIA Corporation"
EndSection

Section "Screen"
Identifier "Screen0"
Device "Device0"
Monitor "Monitor0"
DefaultDepth 24
SubSection "Display"
Depth 24
EndSubSection
EndSection

[gmclachl]

If you are using 180.22 you need to add the ignoreabi option into your xorg.conf

Section "ServerFlags"
Option "IgnoreABI" "true"
EndSection

[ronacc]

what driver are you using and how is it being installed ? are you hand installing from nvidia or using "hardware drivers" to install it ? also what version# xorg do You have ? The driver from the PPA in the thread you referenced should be 180.27 and that should work fine with your card ,I'm using it right now on my 7600gs . the 180.27 driver does not need "ignore abi" before .27 they do .

[MaX]

I had the same problem, If you installl 180.?? from the PPA and then go into X and use the restricted drivers program (jockey?) to aktivate the nvidia drivers, you'll end up with a non-working X, when you look around you'll see that X is GONE!
So installing xorg-core and nvidia-glx-180 again will make it work and then run nvidia-xconfig to have Nvidia make it's own xorg.conf does the trick and you're now in a working environment

[plun]

This is all what is needed within xorg.conf

# xorg.conf (X.Org X Window System server configuration file)

Section "Device"
Identifier "Configured Video Device"
Driver "nvidia"
EndSection

Section "Monitor"
Identifier "Configured Monitor"
EndSection

Section "Screen"
Identifier "Default Screen"
Monitor "Configured Monitor"
Device "Configured Video Device"
EndSection

[BinaryApe]

what driver are you using and how is it being installed ? are you hand installing from nvidia or using "hardware drivers" to install it ? also what version# xorg do You have ? The driver from the PPA in the thread you referenced should be 180.27 and that should work fine with your card ,I'm using it right now on my 7600gs . the 180.27 driver does not need "ignore abi" before .27 they do .

1. The driver is the one through the ppa which is the 180.27.
2. I am installing it by the instructions I got from the thread which is using the apt-get line. It auto installs from the ppa so I guess that is a manual install then.
3. I'm not at home to check but I am using the one with alpha three release. (I assume that is the latest version.

Plun, I think I tried doing that and it gave me a black screen with no screen When ubuntu boots up ( while using that xorg.conf) I'm not 100% sure so I will try that when I get home to see if that resolves my issue.

Max, I have xorg core and the 180 installed. When I use the nvidia-xconfig to make the new xorg.conf file it let's me boot and I get a black screen with a flashing gray box in the upper left hand corner. Not sure if that means anything as I think I have gotten the problem when I got intrepid ibex but I cannot remember what I did to fix it. it has been like 6 months since I have installed linux ( went back to Xp after my 1.5 years of ubuntu, but I couldn't stand it any more so I am back.) any tips on that might help.

[ronacc]

if you are using the PPA driver , you should not activate it with hardware drivers , that would cause the one from the normal repos to be used and that is broken right now . try reinstalling the driver from the PPA . A manual install would be to download the driver directly from nvidia and then installing it from terminal without GDM or X running .

[BinaryApe]

I have tried the reinstall before but I will try again. I am doing the install from the ppa then and not a manual install. Hopefully it is just some setting I need to tweak in the conf file.

[BinaryApe]

I figured out what was wrong with my setup. It seems I removed the 177 drivers but I didn't remove the 96 drivers that come with Jaunty. So I did a

sudo apt-get remove --purge Nvidia*

To remove all nvidia drivers and files. Then re-installed the PPA ones. I was just removing the 177 drivers and 180 drivers by hand. Upon doing that My xorg.conf works and I can now use 3d graphics. WOooooo! Thanks everyone for the help in looking into this.