hello there
i just downloaded and installed mandrake 10.1 official. one of the first thing i wanted to do was to install my nvidia drivers. so i download the thing, uncompress it, install the kernel core package with my installation dvd and "urpmi kernel-source", close x and start the installer. but then, it didnt work. it said that it couldnt find the kernel module or whatever and propose to download it from nvidia.com. of course, that doesnt work and then it proposes to compile it. then this error message :

error : unable to determine the nvidia kernel module filename
make: ***no rule to make the target "print-module-filename"
aborting

what the hell is that? i used to be on mandrake 10.1 and i installed those damned drivers (last version) a ridiculously large number of times. even on fedora core 3, with this version of the drivers, it went well. so what's the problem? what should i do?



so long, and thanks for all the fish

oh well it worked.
for some obviously strange reason, after trying the same same thing a couple of times, it worked.
its a strange world we live in.
so if this thread could be deleted, i dont think it would make any harm.

That a common error that lots find when they try to install nvidia driver for the first time i.e. that you need the kernel that you're running, and the kernel-sources to match - cos that's how the nvidia installer makes the kernel module thingumyjig!

If you had a look at the readme at the nvidia site, it does say some stuff about how to update the driver if you already have an earlier version installed <smug looks>which I don't have to bother about, using gentoo</smug looks>

Plus, it can be a little confusing, because mandrake doesn't install the kernel-sources by default, you have to do that seperately - I suspect theres a reason for that, but I'll be buggered if I can work out what it might be!

Anyhow, well done getting them installed OK.

Good luck

regards

John