[SOLVED] Nvidia-Driver broken on Stretch & Buster

Yesterday I tried installing the Debian packages of nvidia-driver on Buster from the non-free repositories and was given a warning that I held broken packages. Thinking maybe it was a Buster issue (a weird mid-freeze issue or something), I installed Stretch (9.9) and am having the same issue. What am I missing here?

After 'apt install nvidia-driver' as root:

# apt install nvidia-driver
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree       
Reading state information... Done
Some packages could not be installed. This may mean that you have
requested an impossible situation or if you are using the unstable
distribution that some required packages have not yet been created
or been moved out of Incoming.
The following information may help to resolve the situation:

The following packages have unmet dependencies:
 nvidia-driver : PreDepends: nvidia-installer-cleanup but it is not installable
                 PreDepends: nvidia-legacy-check (>= 343) but it is not going to be installed
                 Depends: nvidia-driver-libs (= 390.116-1) but it is not going to be installed or
                          nvidia-driver-libs-nonglvnd (= 390.116-1) but it is not going to be installed
                 Depends: nvidia-driver-bin (= 390.116-1) but it is not going to be installed
                 Depends: xserver-xorg-video-nvidia (= 390.116-1) but it is not going to be installed
                 Depends: nvidia-vdpau-driver (= 390.116-1) but it is not going to be installed
                 Depends: nvidia-alternative (= 390.116-1) but it is not going to be installed
                 Depends: nvidia-kernel-dkms (= 390.116-1) but it is not going to be installed or
                          nvidia-kernel-390.116
                 Depends: nvidia-support but it is not installable
                 Recommends: nvidia-settings (>= 390) but it is not installable
                 Recommends: libnvidia-cfg1 (= 390.116-1) but it is not going to be installed
                 Recommends: nvidia-persistenced but it is not installable
E: Unable to correct problems, you have held broken packages.

This is the report from nvidia-detect:

Detected NVIDIA GPUs:
01:00.0 VGA compatible controller [0300]: NVIDIA Corporation GP104 [GeForce GTX 1080] [10de:1b80] (rev a1)

Checking card:  NVIDIA Corporation GP104 [GeForce GTX 1080] (rev a1)
Your card is supported by the default drivers.
It is recommended to install the
    nvidia-driver
package.

And here is my sources.list:

deb http://deb.debian.org/debian/ stretch main non-free
deb-src http://deb.debian.org/debian/ stretch main non-free

deb http://security.debian.org/debian-security stretch/updates main contrib non-free
deb-src http://security.debian.org/debian-security stretch/updates main contrib non-free

# stretch-updates, previously known as 'volatile'
deb http://deb.debian.org/debian/ stretch-updates main contrib non-free
deb-src http://deb.debian.org/debian/ stretch-updates main contrib non-free

EDIT:
The problem was in the apt/sources.list --> missing contrib in the main repo source.

Hi,

E: Unable to correct problems, you have held broken packages.

I think that may be your problem. Have you put something on hold? You can check with:

dpkg --get-selections | grep -w hold

Or perhaps

dpkg l | grep '^h'

Evo2.

baumerang, to clarify:
it is not your driver that is broken.
it is the package manager.
you need to fix that first.
afterwards, go to the debian wiki and install the proprietary nvidia driver the way debian recommends:
https://wiki.debian.org/NvidiaGraphicsDrivers

Originally Posted by evo2 Hi, I think that may be your problem. Have you put something on hold? You can check with: dpkg --get-selections | grep -w hold Or perhaps dpkg l | grep '^h'

Unfortunately, no. No held packages (which would be odd, as I am on a fresh install). Also, following the wiki (which is out-of-date), it instructs you to install the headers for your kernel, which I have done. Still no help.

The sources.list was missing 'contrib.'