Best Distro and Nvidia Match
 

Is there such a thing as a good disto and nvidia match? I want a distro that I can just install using my nvidia card. I don't want to spend hours fooling around with getting the disto and nvidia to work properly.

I already know that ubuntu and nvidia isn't a good match because when I installed the GE Force 5200 card ubuntu gave a fatal error. When I went back to my onboard graphics ubuntu worked fine.

And yes the onboard was diabled so there wouldn't be any conflict between the onboard and nvidia card.

I might also add this is a dual boot system.

Any suggestions would be much appreciated.

Not sure what you mean by fatal error.. Quite a few people have nVidia cards working with Ubuntu or Debian. personally I think nVidia cards are a snap to setup on Debian based distros.. usually takes me about a minute and a half to install the driver and manually edit the config file.. (I'm not big on wizards)

At what point do you get the error ? and what is the exact error..
I would bet the problem could be fixed in a short amount of time.

I get the error when it is trying to run the video drivers at startup. It displays a few of the addresses for the video and then crashes with a fatal error message.

For installing graphics card drivers you'll need your kernel source code pretty surely. Did you try installing the driver using some nVidia-provided installer (.sh or .bin or something), or using apt/Synaptic/some other front-end for apt or what? I've used the nVidia command-line driver installer utilies (a .bin file which checks the kernel version, installs a driver or if none is found, downloads sources and compiles one -- at least used to) and they've worked 250% better than those pieces of crap ATI calls "installers"..maybe the installion didn't work out as expected, or you didn't edit your X's configuration file the right way or something. Please tell more details so this can be worked out.

Post the output of the following command
cat /var/log/Xorg.0.log | grep EE

Then at least we can see the errors you are getting.


For Debian based distros the Module-Assistant takes all the grunt work out of setting up nVidia Drivers.
http://wiki.debian.org/NvidiaHowTo?

Hi, jbumgarjr

My understanding of the nvidia driver requirements is as follows:

If you make a graphics hardware change, you have to re-install the nvidia driver. My guess is that the installation process probes the hardware and writes the configs.

Your original post states you have changed hardware, but no word on whether or not you re-installed the driver. Going back to the on-board hardware should work because that's the hardware that was present when you first installed the nvidia driver.

I can second the notion that installing the NVidia installers from the command line with full kernel sources and no X running is a snap. This would work on all distros equally well, as long as you have the full kernel sources.

I build my own kernels, and always have the current one in /usr/src/linux. That is the default location, and the NVidia driver looks for it there. With those sources in place, all I have to do is stop X completely (logout -> end current session in KDE), and then run the NVidia installer as root. It builds all the kernel modules, and even modifies your xorg.conf, keeping a backup of the old. Run startx from there, and you're back in X with NVidia drivers.

Everytime I build a new kernel I have to do this, but it literally is less than 90 seconds to complete.

Peace,
JimBass

Poor responses!
 

None of you, in your infinite Linux knowledge have answered this man's question! I too am having trouble finding a distro that will work with my Nvidia card OUT OF THE BOX! While trying to google my problem, I found this thread and was so overcome with disgust that I made an account just to comment on this. He JUST TOLD you that he doesn't want to spend forever trying to figure out how to make the card work. I know that you all of you, it takes 4 seconds because you all know exactly what you're doing, but for us noobs, NON OF THIS IS EASY!

If you follow the instructions it is easy. There is nothing to "work out" or "mess with" you just follow the instructions for your distribution.

Wow... no need to get angry.

I can understand the desire to have an easy solution. We can blame nVidia for the (normally minor) trouble one has to go through to use their drivers.If there were a Linux distribution that worked with nVidia cards "out of the box" there would have been a simple answer to the original poster's question. The simple fact is that there isn't a distribution that uses all of an nVidia graphics card's features without having to download and install nVidia's driver. The vendor doesn't very closely with Linux developers and insists on developing their own drivers. The "nouveau" driver that ships with Linux does a decent job -- especially given that it it works only because of the incredible job that the guys reverse engineering the nVidia cards have been able to pull off -- but may not work as well as one would like, particularly if the user is into gaming.

My experience with the nVidia driver process is something like (sorry, I didn't take detailed notes) this:

* Download the driver file from the nVidia web site. You'll likely have to search for your adapter to get the correct driver file. I have a fairly old adapter (6200) but it is still handled by the latest driver. (On the other hand, I have an old MX400 adapter in a system that has to use one of their "legacy" drivers. YMMV.) It'll have a file extension of ".run". Alternately, you might see a note on their site that directs you to use your distribution's package manager. If you're using a distribution that is no longer actively supported, you'll probably have to use the ".run" file method.

* Make sure "X" isn't running.

* Execute the ".run" file using "sh whateverfilename.run". This will ask you some questions that you can normally answer "Yes" to. During the installer's execution, it will build the driver. NOTE: during this phase, your installation must have the kernel development package installed as the driver compilation process will need the header files (and possibly the kernel sources, as well). If you're not sure, use your distribution's package manager to see if they're installed. In my case I could use(the sort and less steps are optional) to verify that the kernel header package was installed. If they're not you need to grab your CDs/DVDs and installed them using your package manager/software manager.

* The installed will normally tweak your Xorg configuration file so that the new nVidia driver will be used.

And that is, normally, about it.

I will admit that there can be some oddball errors that can crop up. For example, I'm still working on getting the legacy driver working on that system containing the MX400 adapter. (Heck, the thing is at least 10 years old so I'm not all that surprised that I'm experiencing this little adventure.)

Also, I poked around on the nVidia web site and found that the "173.14.36" driver seems like it might be the best driver for the card that the original poster mentioned. BUT... "5200" is a little too generic of a description. Most of the cards that I saw were listed as "FX5xxx", "5xxxLE", or something similar. It would be best to have an accurate description before downloading the wrong driver and getting a headache trying to make it work with an adapter that it doesn't support.

Hope this helped a bit...

--
Rick

That card appears to be a pain with Linux. Try Linux Mint. If the open-source driver gives poor results, here's a tutorial on installing the proprietary one (a messy job, but the instructions are very clear: print them out and follow carefully)

http://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopi...a+5200#p650947

PS. Here's a similar post, which may give you some ideas
http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...ox-4175440894/

So the simple answer is still no?

I am like the OP...I do not want to become a linux guru just to play a few games, I just want to have a WORKING 3d setup without jumping through hoops and stopping this, editing that, and starting something else...I would like to use a simple installer, restart and be done with it....I would even pay for a proper driver. Why does every linux guru over complicate everything?

I'm beginning to think Rube Goldberg would love Linux!
Oh and btw, I have used Nvidia's installer, and it too left me with a black screen.

This is the very reason why Linux will NEVER be mainstream and adopted by the masses. It is too complicated, and when you ask for help, you get some smart alec giving some obscure set of instructions that only an engineer can understand.

I have only seen 1 distro that asked if I wanted to use proprietary Nvidia drivers upon install, but it too went to a black screen.

The simple answer is that the original poster's card is unsupported by NVIDIA so is unsupported on any OS.
With any supported card the installation of NVIDIA drivers on Linux, depending on distribution, either involves installing the system then using something like "third party driver manager", typing a few commands, or downloading the driver from NVIDIA then typing a few commands. For example, in Debian (chosen because I have used it fine with a few NVIDIA cards) the instructions are here. Note that there are about 4 steps to the process -- hardly complicated.
There is hardware (including laptops with hybrid Intel/NVIDIA setups) but in the case of normal NVIDIA cards they are supported virtually as well as under Windows.

As a side note, the OP posted in 2006, this was necro'd in 2012 and then again yesterday

Thanks and apologies to pothers. Since I had a post on the thread I hadn't realised it was necroposted this time as I hadn't realised I'd bee on here that long. My excuse for the fist time, however, is absent :o.

nvidia is perhaps not the best choice of graphics card if you want to use Linux, try intel they seem to work most closely with Debian comes to development.

Fred.

Please back up that statement with facts.

The GeForce FX 5200 is problematic in some systems. Not all, and it depends on the situation.

1. The only real driver support it is going to have is through Nouveau (the free xorg drivers).

2. There are drivers for the GeForce FX 5200 (the 173.14.39 drivers), but they only support xorg-server-1.15. If your distribution still has this, then you're in luck.

Nouveau is improving so you have to give it a chance. Things like OpenCL support are being added and Mesa is very expansive to incorporate these features. You can get s3tc support if your distribution has a package for libtxc_dxtn, and driconf is a fairly decent control panel. Each new release gets better, so given time, it will improve.

You have to remember that Mesa is not the same as Nvidia's OpenGL implementation. It's similar, but not exactly as some apps work fine with Mesa, but not all apps.

For an exact distribution, it will depend so do research. Nouveau works fairly good, but yes, the Nvidia driver is better in some regards. It might be worth your effort to research distributions that offer older versions with support.

Why do you assume this is desired? Why do you assume we want a community that is made up of click and drool types? Why do you think you have to be an engineer to do or understand anything that is said in this old thread?

This is a very uneducated statement.

ReaperX7,
yes use Nouveau, if you can. Intel nor any other commercial provider will not produce drivers for old hardware.

Fred.