Linux Mint Forums

I notice that you seem to be running as root, which is something you should not do, and as far as I know neither lspci nor glxgears need root permission to run. Mint has the "sudo trick" like all Ubuntu and I (warmly) recommend sticking to that.
Your problem might (just might) be a bit to much "generic" devices. The driver "nvidia" is the right one.
Still I recommend reinstalling the driver using "envy" and if you've got the latest version you don't even have to log out to a text based terminal.
Just type envy in any terminal and carry on. First uninstall and then install.

I had a similar problem with the same error output....

reinstalling driver through envy fixed the issue

I also suggest uninstalling and then reinstall using Envy, i had no problems installing nvidia driver, worked first time the Envy way

Great to read its sorted cturtle, enjoy