Is there a definitive, crystal clear, step by step How to NVidia proprietary driver?

[bogan]

Hi!, Geezanansa, Thanks for the feedback, I have edited Post #19 to clarify the points you raised.

There is always the problem of trying to include all the points of one's own knowledge and experience, and foresee what others might encounter, whilst not creating vast tracts, or risking being seen as condescending to those who class themselves as 'noobies'.

A 'Text Terminal' is a 'TTY' or a 'Text Console', or 'Shell' but one in which the Gui Screen is not used. Once again the curse of different terms being used for the same thing, and the same name being used for different things.

You are correct that I had missed the case of a reader who had no access to a GUI Screen, and would need to use another text editor, not 'gedit'; such as 'nano' or 'vim'. As I have never used either of those, perhaps someone who has will correct me if they do not both work without a GUI.

I was aware of the passage you quote from Nvidia, and I have added the 'option nouveau modeset=0' line to the blacklist entry. Though in past experience it has never been needed, and was not included in the blacklist file that nvidia-installer itself created, nor is it included in the blacklist files created by nvidia-current.

Please do not hesitate to Post any further points of doubt or confusion, omission or error, that you find.

Chao!, bogan.

[bogan]

Hi!, again Geezanansa,

You Posted:

Did not try tty from within desktop session.(x server could still be running even if lightdm stoppped).

Whilst there have been Posts reporting 'sudo service lightdm stop' and other alternative lightdm commands, failing to stop the Xorg server - and I one time experienced this myself - that was not normal, and is an assumed bug occaisionally occurring in lightdm.

When it happened to me, I rebooted and then lightdm worked as it should.

Chao!, bogan.

[Geezanansa]

Big Thank you bogan

With regard your last post; would installed apps or anything else installed that gets started up at boot have an effect on this?


What is difference between nouveau modeset 0 and options nouveau modeset 0?

[bogan]

Hi!, again, Whoops!! My typo - corrected.

Edit: Regarding your first question in Post #23 I would think not, but it might if it interacted with Compiz or unity greeter. I have had a lot of Apport errors with both lightdm and the greeter so anything is possible.

Chao!, bogan.

[Geezanansa]

With regard to etc/modprobe.d/blacklist.conf how about highlighting concern if anything else is in that file. Renaming to anything you think would be suitable i.e. disable-nouveau.conf is suggested. You do explain that that if white page comes up then gedit just made a fresh file for you which would confirm whatever the file name is it is good for purpose.

The point i raise is mentioned at Chapter 8.1. Interaction with the Nouveau Driver here http://uk.download.nvidia.com/XFree8...s.html#nouveau

Chao the now!

[bogan]

HI1,Geezanansa,

My current blacklist.conf file contains 19 items, including the nouveau and 4 legacy nvidia items, none of them [apart from the later, appear to me to have anything to do with video or xorg matters, and it has not produced any side effects Iam aware of; so I tended to discount nvidia's warning as a bit over-zealous.

On the other hand, having the nouveau blacklist in its own file would make it easier to revert to the nouveau driver, later on, if that were desired.

I am also wary of making things over-complex and intimidating. I'll think it over.

After-all, under most circumstances the only part you need to use, - after the first time - is:

To Install the nvidia driver it is necessary to reboot to a 'TTY' [Text Terminal or Text Consol], or shut down the Xsession from a GUI screen, as the nvidia driver must be installed when the Xserver and GUI screen are inactive. Then CD to the folder where you have downloaded the .run file, make it executable and run it with 'sh'.

Chao!, bogan.

[Geezanansa]

After-all, under most circumstances the only part you need to use, - after the first time - is: Quote:
To Install the nvidia driver it is necessary to reboot to a 'TTY' [Text Terminal or Text Consol], or shut down the Xsession from a GUI screen, as the nvidia driver must be installed when the Xserver and GUI screen are inactive. Then CD to the folder where you have downloaded the .run file, make it executable and run it with 'sh'.

Yep it is that simple.
It is simple . Nice one bogan you just made something very intimidating appear very useful.

[Geezanansa]

bogans posts at #18 and #19 in this thread and in http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1743535&highlight=resolution+blan k+screen
are what has worked for me. The troubleshooter at the start of the other thread is brilliant. Simple and effective. Thx op.
Now running the .run drivers and using the above resources to sort out another machine that is using vesa drivers and running 12.04 32bit Desktop 3.2.0-32 -generic-pae.

[bogan]

Hi!, Geezanansa,

As a matter of interest, I checked out the /etc/modprobe.d folder in the installation in which I run the nvidia-current-updates driver from the x-swat ppa.

There are two files of identical date & creation time, both created by nvidia-current, one is called:"nvidia-graphics-drivers.conf" and contains:

# This file was installed by nvidia-current-updates
# Do not edit this file manually

blacklist nouveau
blacklist lbm-nouveau
blacklist nvidia-173
blacklist nvidia-96
blacklist nvidia-current
blacklist nvidia-173-updates
blacklist nvidia-96-updates
alias nvidia nvidia_current_updates
alias nouveau off
alias lbm-nouveau off

The other called: "nvidia-current-updates_hybrid.conf " is the same, but omits the legacy nvidia blacklists.

I have modified the list in Post #19 to include the extra nouveau entries, but not the nvidia alias entry, as I do not know what effect that would have with an nvidia.com downloaded driver.

Note that neither includes the "options nouveau modeset=0" entry, though, in another installation, the file created by a recent version of nvidia-installer, does include it.

Actually this info makes the creation of further blacklists redundant.

I have also made a few other changes to clarify things a bit - I hope.

Your comments - or those from anyone else reading this - welcomed.

Chao!, bogan.

[Geezanansa]

nice timing!