Install Nouveau on Slackware-13.1 for nVidia GPU owners

Didier Spaier · 05-19-2010, 07:26 AM

As Pat stated in the Changelog, Slackware-13.1 don't ship the nouveau X driver (yet).

But it's not hard to get it either.

1. Upgrade your kernel to 2.6.34
2. Get and install the driver:

Code:

git clone git://anongit.freedesktop.org/git/nouveau/xf86-video-nouveau/
cd xf86-video-nouveau
./autogen.sh
make
su
cp src/.libs/nouveau_drv.so /usr/lib/xorg/modules/drivers # for Slackware-13.1 or...
cp src/.libs/nouveau_drv.so /usr/lib64/xorg/modules/drivers # for Slackware64-13.1

3. set up a minimum xorg.conf (adapt if you already have one):

Code:

echo -e 'Section "Device"\nIdentifier "n"\nDriver "nouveau"\nEndSection' > /etc/X11/xorg.conf

4. (re) startx

Have fun

PS. There is no source tarball yet for this driver.

If you want to upgrade:

Code:

cd xf86-video-nouveau
git fetch
git rebase origin
./autogen.sh
make
su
cp src/.libs/nouveau_drv.so /usr/lib/xorg/modules/drivers # or
cp src/.libs/nouveau_drv.so /usr/lib64/xorg/modules/drivers # for Slackware64-13.1

But first backup the old one just in case

sahko · 05-19-2010, 08:55 AM

AFAIK, and its also mentioned on the nouveau website, the nouveau current git tree is compatible only with 2.6.34 (and higher)

cwwilson721 · 05-19-2010, 09:05 AM

And, if you need 3d acceleration, you HAVE TO USE THE NVIDIA PROPRIETARY DRIVERS. nouveau, while a good OSS choice, and a great replacement for the standard 'nv' drivers for X11, does not do 3d

adamk75 · 05-19-2010, 09:16 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by cwwilson721

And, if you need 3d acceleration, you HAVE TO USE THE NVIDIA PROPRIETARY DRIVERS. nouveau, while a good OSS choice, and a great replacement for the standard 'nv' drivers for X11, does not do 3d

It does if you compile it from source and enable gallium. But, of course, it's not going to be nearly as fast as the nvidia driver.

Adam

Didier Spaier · 05-19-2010, 09:18 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by sahko

AFAIK, and its also mentioned on the nouveau website, the nouveau current git tree is compatible only with 2.6.34 (and higher)

Yes, this is why upgrading the kernel is stated at step 1.

Didier Spaier · 05-19-2010, 09:40 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by cwwilson721

And, if you need 3d acceleration, you HAVE TO USE THE NVIDIA PROPRIETARY DRIVERS. nouveau, while a good OSS choice, and a great replacement for the standard 'nv' drivers for X11, does not do 3d

That's right, indeed, unless you use Gallium as already noticed by Adamk75 (I would not recommend that for general usage though as it's unsupported by nouveau developers). But I am not a gamer at all and do appreciate KMS and xranrd's usage.

meetscott · 10-29-2010, 10:01 PM

Man, I just did what Didier was suggesting and nouveau requires a later version of Xorg than Slackware Current has. It requires 1.8 and current has 1.7.7. Too bad. I was hoping to get suspend working and I was wondering whether this driver would work with my graphics card which is a Nvidia GeForce GTX 460M.

I am working on a recently purchased Serval Professional, in case anyone was curious. I guess I'm stuck on the Nvidia proprietary driver for now. I'll wait until current is updated.

cwwilson721 · 10-29-2010, 10:06 PM

The Nvidia driver is the only way to go if you want 3d accel, or even good compiz effects

Didier Spaier · 10-30-2010, 02:18 AM

@meetscot: if you want to use Nouveau and save you the hassle of recompiling X packages, just grab Robby's ones, see http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...0830-a-829336/

meetscott · 10-30-2010, 02:40 PM

Didier,
Thanks, I'll give those a shot. My main objective is getting suspend to work. I don't mind the Nvidia drivers but the display doesn't come back after invoking it. It's really glitchy on this system. But I'm willing to give this a shot to try make it go and this represents a possible solution.

meetscott · 10-31-2010, 11:40 AM

I think I'm going to have to live with booting and shutting down for now. It's bad enough that I'm running Slackware current on a system that's critically important to my work. Installing all these extra packages doesn't seem like a wise move. I'm sure I can do it. I'm sure I can figure it out. I'm sure I could roll it back out if I needed to. But I really can't afford to experiment with a system that I use every day to earn a living.

I think I'm going to wait until these things make their way into current. I simply lack the time to trouble shoot a broken system should something unexpected happen. I see too many posts with people having black screens and issues. That's not an acceptable outcome for me on this machine for any length of time :-(

I appreciate everyone working on this though. I'd normally be right there with you, but at this point I can't afford the down time.

Squall90 · 10-31-2010, 11:43 AM

What about HD vids (as file as well as flash vids on YouTube)? And if I'm going to try nouveau, what about vdpau? Since my new graphics card I use it as default with MPlayer and I'm very satisfied.

meetscott · 10-31-2010, 11:49 AM

Good point. I'm in that boat too. I sometimes need to use these to watch webinars to learn about certain technologies. I hate flash and I can't wait for it to go away completely. It always has poor behavior when you least expect it.