Installing NVIDIA-Linux-x86-96.43.23-pkg1.run command not found
 

I"m trying to install nvidia legacy driver, when it's downloaded it is downloaded as an executable file.
The file in Downloads is "NVIDIA-Linux-x86-96.43.23-pkg1.run"
I've tried running
&
neither work but if I'm in GUI I can double-click on file & it will start to run & tell me it needs to be executed as root.
properties state that it's a "shell script (application/x-shellscript)". How can I execute from CLI.

Assuming you're logged in to the CLI as root, try:

Or better yet - go to the directory where the installer is and:

Although I would recommend to use a bit newer installer available from the NVidia page. Latest version is 310.xx as opposed to 96.xx

also this might help in next step :
last time i tried to install nvidias official driver it told me that i should shutdown xserver to be able to install the driver. so depending on your distro you need to do this before starting installation.

The 96.XX drivers are legacy drivers for cards from the Geforce 2 and 4MX series, no newer driver will work with those cards. So this might in fact be the correct driver to use, depending on which card the OP is trying to use.

I haven't done it on Debian, but usually you'll do something like:

Ctrl+Alt+F3 (or any of the other TTYs)
log in as root
init 3 (or whatever other command drops you out of X for your distro)
cd /home/user/Downloads (or wherever the file lives)
chmod +x NVIDIA-Linux-x86-96.43.23-pkg1.run
./NVIDIA-Linux-x86-96.43.23-pkg1.run
follow the installation instructions, when it's done run "init 5" or whatever command restarts X for your distro

Init commands won't start/stop X11 on Debian, since the runlevels aren't configured by default. Just use the "service" command to shut down whichever display manager is running, eg:

You are coorect I downloaded & actually got it installed. The legacy driver was supposedly an updated version that was supposed to work with the 3.0 kernel, but it was crap, the flashplugin kept crashing.
Would you believe that the old ATI Rage 128 worked better?

Have you tried to just use the nouveau drivers instead? They should work fine with that hardware.

I thought the nouveau driver installed automatically. If it did actually install gnome3 was starting in fallback mode & couldn't play games on facebook, that's why I tried the nvidia driver. After nvidia driver failed install the ATI card which was still in the box & it worked in getting the facebook game to work.
The machine belongs to a friend who's trying to learn linux & he's come a long way, but being hindered by these old machines, so I'm just going to let him use 1 of my machines, have to wait about a week to get a new psu for it.