Page 1 of 1
Nvidia restricted drivers killed X
Posted: Sun Jan 04, 2009 9:20 am
by AnalBeard
Right, i installed Mint with mint4win yesterday and booted into it for the first time. I noticed that it was offering restricted drivers for installation, so i installed the 177 Nvidia driver and rebooted. Upon bootup, i'm presented with the command line, and i cannot start X. Any suggestions?
I'm running an 8800GTS OC.
Re: Nvidia restricted drivers killed X
Posted: Sun Jan 04, 2009 9:30 am
by AnalBeard
Err, i somehow missed the graphics hardware subforum, could someone move this for me please?
Re: Nvidia restricted drivers killed X
Posted: Sun Jan 04, 2009 7:08 pm
by AnalBeard
well after doing my own research, i found this thread -
http://www.linuxmint.com/forum/viewtopi ... 59&t=18830
the fix looks like exactly what i need, but now i've hit another hitch; i can't even type anything at the command line to log in, and yes, before anyone asks, my keyboard works fine (how else would i be typing this post?). To be honest, i'm about ready to jack it in with Linux, say what you will about Windows but in this day and age an operating system that can't even display a gui properly is a pretty poor affair.
thanks for all the help and support you've given me too guys.
Re: Nvidia restricted drivers killed X
Posted: Mon Jan 05, 2009 3:00 pm
by hotweiss
AnalBeard wrote:well after doing my own research, i found this thread -
http://www.linuxmint.com/forum/viewtopi ... 59&t=18830
the fix looks like exactly what i need, but now i've hit another hitch; i can't even type anything at the command line to log in, and yes, before anyone asks, my keyboard works fine (how else would i be typing this post?). To be honest, i'm about ready to jack it in with Linux, say what you will about Windows but in this day and age an operating system that can't even display a gui properly is a pretty poor affair.
thanks for all the help and support you've given me too guys.
Do you have Legacy USB support enabled in your BIOS? That should get your keyboard working...
As far as the Nvidia drivers are concerned, things are getting worse with the new drivers. Now you have to reconfigure xorg after updating your driver
To update my drivers I usually have to enter the following commands:
1. Press Ctrl-Alt-F1
2. sudo /etc/init.d/gdm stop
3. sudo apt-get remove nvidia*
4. sudo sh ./NVIDIA......run (what ever the driver is called)
5. reboot
6. oh no! X server is messed up
7. reboot into recovery mode
8. sudo dpkg-reconfigure xserver-xorg
9. reboot
Everything should be working now. The 180.18 drivers are really nice, you should give them a try.
Re: Nvidia restricted drivers killed X
Posted: Tue Jan 06, 2009 2:04 pm
by AnalBeard
thank you for that hotweiss, that has got me up and running with the 180.18 drivers, only problem is it does not detect my other monitor (on the same card). I kinda cheated a little as i couldn't type at the command line and just reinstalled Mint so i skipped a few stages of your guide, but i followed part of the tutorial in my above link to find out what the busid of my graphics card was (i have two), don't know if that could have caused it?
Re: Nvidia restricted drivers killed X
Posted: Tue Jan 06, 2009 2:27 pm
by hotweiss
AnalBeard wrote:thank you for that hotweiss, that has got me up and running with the 180.18 drivers, only problem is it does not detect my other monitor (on the same card). I kinda cheated a little as i couldn't type at the command line and just reinstalled Mint so i skipped a few stages of your guide, but i followed part of the tutorial in my above link to find out what the busid of my graphics card was (i have two), don't know if that could have caused it?
Did you try going into your Nvidia settings to see if you can get your monitor going there?
Just FYI, Nvidia is giving us Linux users a hard time, they haven't made their drivers open source and due to agreements with Microsoft, 2D acceleration is terrible... Next time around I'll give ATI a try, but supposedly the ATI drivers are just terrible.
Re: Nvidia restricted drivers killed X
Posted: Tue Jan 06, 2009 2:35 pm
by AnalBeard
this may be an exceedingly daft question, but where do i find the nvidia settings?
edit - ok, done that, but i've got the two monitors running on separate x servers, is this the correct way to be doing it? if i'm switching workspaces i'd rather have both screens switch at the same time.
and no, Xinerama doesn't work, if i enable it then upon restarting the xserver both my monitors turn on, display 'no signal', turn off and repeat another 5 times, until i get an error saying that there is a problem with the xserver, then if i ok this it goes back into the loop. any ideas?
Re: Nvidia restricted drivers killed X
Posted: Tue Jan 06, 2009 3:42 pm
by hotweiss
AnalBeard wrote:this may be an exceedingly daft question, but where do i find the nvidia settings?
edit - ok, done that, but i've got the two monitors running on separate x servers, is this the correct way to be doing it? if i'm switching workspaces i'd rather have both screens switch at the same time.
and no, Xinerama doesn't work, if i enable it then upon restarting the xserver both my monitors turn on, display 'no signal', turn off and repeat another 5 times, until i get an error saying that there is a problem with the xserver, then if i ok this it goes back into the loop. any ideas?
Can you try modifying your xorg by modifying the 0 to a 1 after xinerama?
One ether thing that you can do is to run the nvidia settings as root:
configure your xserver and save the xorg