Help!

I just got RedHat 7.3 for my Pentium4 PC, but I've been struggling for over week to get X windows up and running. I've surfed the web including these forums and I've found other people with the very same problem I'm having, but what worked for them isn't working for me (or just as likely, I don't know what I'm doing).

The problem is I can't get the NVIDIA driver to install properly. Instead, I get the dreaded

(EE) NVIDIA(0): Failed to initialize the NVdriver kernel module!
(EE) NVIDIA(0): *** Aborting ***

message. I understand from the directions this means I must build the driver under my current kernel (2.4.18-3) so I got the source rpm's and tried to build the kernel first:

rpm -rebuild NVIDIA_kernel-1.0-3123.src.rpm

but the build fails because some header files are missing, I get errors like, e.g.

In file included from /usr/include/linux/timex.h:152
from /usr/include/linux/sched.h:14
from /usr/include/linux/vmalloc.h:4
from nv-linux.h:57
from nv.c:14:
/usr/include/asm/timex.h:10:21: asm/msr.h: No such file or directory

The files it couldn't find were indeed missing so I tried to rebuild the kernel source that came on my redhat CD, and that did leave the proper files in

/usr/src/redhat/BUILD/kernel-2.4.18/linux/include

I then tried to install the NVIDIA kernel from a tar file using

make install SYSINCLUDE=/usr/src/redhat/BUILD/kernel-2.4.18/linux/include

but now the make fails because it tries to include a bunch of .ver files and comes back with error messages like:

/usr/src/redhat/BUILD/kernel-2.4.18/linux/modversions.h:4:36: linux/modules/53c700.ver: No such file or directory

At this point I feel like I'm in way over my head given how little I know. What I'm doing seems too complicated and I think I'm chasing red herrings all over the place. Does someone out there known what I should do to get the driver to compile without running into problems with missing header files? Many thanks in advance...

http://www.nvnews.net then forums then nvidia graphics. This is where I posted for nvidia problems.Its a specialized forum for nvidia drivers. So you may have a better luck there.
Gonus

Welcome to LQ, Newbix.

OK, what seems to be the problem here is dependancies - all too common when dealing with RPMS...

Taking your case from a clean install point of view:
You should have the kernel source RPM installed... you don't need to 'rebuild' anything. You should find it on one of your CDs called something like kernelsrc-2.4.18-4rh.i386.rpm (or there abouts). Simply install this so that the header files are present - you do not need to rebuild your kernel!

Once you've done this, try rebuilding your NVidia drivers. Cross your fingers! Personally I would go with the .tar.gz files - they're much easier to work with

Hope this helps... don't forget to post here again!

Many many thanks to Thymox and gonus, I followed your advice and I've now got the graphical display up and running beautifully. I only wish I'd posted here a week ago and saved myself the frustration.

Here's what I did to solve the problem (in case somebody else out there who's as new to linux as I am runs into the exact same problem)

1) I found the "kernel-source-2.4.18-3.i386.rpm" file on CD 2 of 3 of the RH7.3 Operating System CD.

2) rpm -ivh kernel-source-2.4.18-3.i386.rpm

this creates two new directories (among other things):
/usr/src/linux-2.4
/usr/src/linux-2.4.18-3

both of which contain all the necessary header files.

3) after having untared the NVIDIA_kernel and NVIDIA_GLX files, switch to the NVIDIA_kernel directory and

make install SYSINCLUDE=/usr/src/linux-2.4.18-3/include

a couple of warning messages are issued during this installation about pointer type violations, but the last line reads

NVdriver installed successfully

(the smiley is my addition)

4) switch to the NVIDIA_GLX directory and

make install

5) startx

or reboot...

Glad you got it working I worked on mine for around 4 days. My problem was I was installing it in x bad idea.

Grats

Gonus

You had problems installing whilst running X? I've done this many times and not had a problem yet... you only really have to remember to shut down and restart X for the changes to take effect. Hey ho though.