Nvidia drivers needed? or is my system just slow?
 

Hi guys, i'm a newbie to Linux and and trying to add all the bits and bobs to my new sparkly linux installation of mandrake 10.0. I've added a lot of eye cany at the moment but when i move any windows around, its quite slow at refreshing. I've checked my graphics settings and it recognised my Nvidia card. So i presume its has the nvidia drivers installed. Is this right? Or is mandrake 10.0 using a generic driver for my card?

Normally in <whispers> windows, the generic driver for my card results in really low graphics untill i install the new drivers from nvidia. Is this the same case with linux?

If i do need to install new drivers. I keep seeing posts about "Nvidia driver installs gone wrong" Could someone point me to a good site to download the driver (rpm?) from and to a helpful walk through (apparently i need to edit Xconfig86?) of what i need to do to set it up with minimum hassle (dont wanna lose my pretty window effects and stuff).


Any help would be appreciated.

Hi Maverick,

I'm having a nvidia graphics card, and experienced comparable problems, especially very slow 3D. I'm using Debian, and Debian uses the generic 'nv' driver. Lately I decided to install the nvidia drivers from nvidia, and the difference really surprised me, let's give some examples:

-The transparent menu's in kde sometimes disrupted xmms, now it works smoothly.
-Some OpenGL (3D) screensavers now work much more smootly
-Tuxracer (3D-racing game) reached about 2 frames per second, now 20 or 30 fps!

I think Mandrake installs generic drivers too, but I'm not sure. You can check that in the X-servers config file, which is probably /etc/X11/XF86Config-4. In the graphics device section you should find something like this:

This is what it looks like in my config. If the driver is 'nv' instead of 'nvidia', you know the generic driver is used.

I can't help you installing, unfortunately. But I wish you succes!

Sterrenkijker

go to the link in my sig for Nvidia driver install instructions & read through This Thread for all you'll ever want to know about the do's & dont's for installation & usage.

please note........... the new Nvidia 6111 drivers are apparently giving some people troubles. if that's the case with you, then go to the following link & get an older driver (6036 or 5336).......

http://www.nvidia.com/object/linux_display_archive.html

otis

Thanks guys , will def try it out tonight. Will post to let you know.

There is also a very easy to follow nvidia driver install How-To on www.linuxloader.com. Many have used it and had success the first time out. Give it a look, and check out some of the other configs for other software.

er..... BIG problem, i tried to install the install the 5336 version of nvidia following the insturctions given in linuxloader. I ran the program as super user from /home/mydownloads (is that okay?) and then i editted the bit from nv --> nvidia . Now when the system starts it comes up with gobbldy gook when it boots into X windows!!! HELP!

I've looked at all the other information and edited the XFConfig86 with "NvAGP" "3" option and thats no help. also tried changing the resolutions on each colour depth, yet that just give more goobly gook when i type startx. StartX says something about

(EE) Failed to initialize Nidivia kernel module
(EE) Aborting
(EE) Screens found but none have been usable

No screens found.



Can someone help me??? THis seems to be a common problem the suggested fixes havent worked for me!


I tried to overwrite the editted XF86Config with the backup old version. No help!

Maverick; Try adding the line
to your etc/modprobe.preload file.
Add it as the last line, with no quotes or anything like that.
This sorted out my 'no screens found' nvidia error.

if pongmaster's suggestion doesn't help, please post your XF86Config-4 file here.

but first, please go through the following checklist. if you can answer "no" to any of the following, then you need to fix that "no" to a "yes"...........

do you have a matching kernel & kernel source installed?

did you kill X to run the installer?

did you run the installer as root from command line?

when you edited the XF86Config-4 file, did you also do that while X was killed?

did you carefully check the syntax, punctuation, capitalization, etc. after editing said file?

did you remember to correctly save said file?

if "yes" applies to all of the above, then post the XF86Config-4 file here, please.

otis

It looks like you mispelled nvidia. Your error statment has it spelled Nidivia. It should be "nvidia" in XFConfig86-4 file. Be sure you didn't have a typo.

nice catch PDR60!

Maverick1182,

as i stated in the check list i posted above, check all your syntax/spelling in the XF86 file. if you have a mispelled word, missing punctuation, etc., it won't let X load.

otis

Sorry guys, i've commited the cardinal sin of multiple posts on the forum, if you check out the following link, i've added to the thread for Nividia problems in madrake, My copy of XF86COnfig-4 is in there.

ALso, the Nvidia typo was just me mistyping the error into the post as my version of linux wasnt workign at that point, i didnt know how to retrieve the log file from the linux partition when in windows.

http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...5&pagenumber=5