[SOLVED] Mint 20.2 Mate, Nvidia Drivers and Monitor issues

[tommo1975]

I have a Nvidia 1080Ti driving a 4k LG display (via DisplayPort, set as primary) and a 1080p Dell display (via HDMI) that I rotate 90 degree's to be horizontal.

With the Nouveau drivers this works fine, except I get choppyness when scrolling webpages and in some games.

I hoped that maybe Nvidia drivers might fix the choppyness, but installing Nvidia-driver-470 via Driver manager means my LG 4k monitor has no display (black screen), whilst my Dell has a max resolution of 1024x768 @ 76Hz.

Monitor Preferences shows a single monitor as "Unknown" and "Detect monitors" does nothing. I have no options in the Resolution or Refresh Rate drop downs other than what I listed above.

Attempting to load Nvidia X Server Settings results (after a long pause) in a blank window appearing with two options - Help and Quit - and nothing else.

Reverting to Nouveau returns me to a 'perfect' set-up.

(I do recall having a little more success with Nvidia Drivers on an earlier attempt, but this lasted one reboot before encountering the same issue I get now, so I reverted to Nouveau).

I'm not sure how to proceed to investigate what might be going on?

(If it's relevant, Nouveau detects my LG as a "Goldstar Company Ltd 27")

[Moonstone Man]

I'm not sure how to proceed to investigate what might be going on?

We can assist with that but we need additional information. We usually start with the output of inxi -Fxz from a terminal, which you can copy/paste back here. Wrap the output in code tags [code]output.here[/code]. You'll see the code tags icon </> when you reply.

[tommo1975]

Sorry, forgot to do this prior to writing my post, so had to post and then go and reinstall Nvidia drivers, get that output and then revert the driver again in order to post it...

Here it is ;

Code: Select all

System:
  Kernel: 5.4.0-80-generic x86_64 bits: 64 compiler: gcc 
  v: 9.3.0 Desktop: MATE 1.24.0 
  Distro: Linux Mint 20.2 Uma base: Ubuntu 20.04 focal 
Machine:
  Type: Desktop Mobo: ASUSTeK 
  model: ROG CROSSHAIR VII HERO (WI-FI) v: Rev 1.xx 
  serial: <filter> UEFI: American Megatrends v: 0804 
  date: 07/09/2018 
CPU:
  Topology: 8-Core model: AMD Ryzen 7 2700X bits: 64 
  type: MT MCP arch: Zen+ rev: 2 L2 cache: 4096 KiB 
  flags: avx avx2 lm nx pae sse sse2 sse3 sse4_1 sse4_2 
  sse4a ssse3 svm 
  bogomips: 127740 
  Speed: 2212 MHz min/max: 2200/4000 MHz 
  Core speeds (MHz): 1: 2179 2: 2175 3: 1683 4: 1681 
  5: 2245 6: 2243 7: 1765 8: 1851 9: 2190 10: 2200 
  11: 2194 12: 2187 13: 2195 14: 2188 15: 1684 16: 1686 
Graphics:
  Device-1: NVIDIA GP102 [GeForce GTX 1080 Ti] 
  vendor: eVga.com. driver: nvidia v: 470.57.02 
  bus ID: 0a:00.0 
  Display: x11 server: X.Org 1.20.9 
  driver: fbdev,modesetting,nouveau unloaded: vesa 
  resolution: 1024x768~76Hz 
  OpenGL: renderer: llvmpipe (LLVM 11.0.0 256 bits) 
  v: 4.5 Mesa 20.2.6 direct render: Yes 
Audio:
  Device-1: C-Media CMI8788 [Oxygen HD Audio] 
  vendor: ASUSTeK Virtuoso 100 driver: snd_virtuoso 
  v: kernel bus ID: 05:04.0 
  Device-2: NVIDIA GP102 HDMI Audio vendor: eVga.com. 
  driver: snd_hda_intel v: kernel bus ID: 0a:00.1 
  Device-3: AMD Family 17h HD Audio vendor: ASUSTeK 
  driver: snd_hda_intel v: kernel bus ID: 0d:00.3 
  Sound Server: ALSA v: k5.4.0-80-generic 
Network:
  Device-1: Intel I211 Gigabit Network vendor: ASUSTeK 
  driver: igb v: 5.6.0-k port: c000 bus ID: 06:00.0 
  IF: enp6s0 state: up speed: 1000 Mbps duplex: full 
  mac: <filter> 
  Device-2: Realtek RTL8822BE 802.11a/b/g/n/ac WiFi 
  adapter 
  vendor: ASUSTeK driver: rtw_pci v: N/A port: b000 
  bus ID: 07:00.0 
  IF: wlp7s0 state: down mac: <filter> 
Drives:
  Local Storage: total: 1.40 TiB used: 60.19 GiB (4.2%) 
  ID-1: /dev/nvme0n1 vendor: Samsung 
  model: SSD 960 PRO 1TB size: 953.87 GiB 
  ID-2: /dev/sda vendor: Samsung model: SSD 860 PRO 512GB 
  size: 476.94 GiB 
Partition:
  ID-1: / size: 937.40 GiB used: 60.18 GiB (6.4%) 
  fs: ext4 dev: /dev/nvme0n1p2 
Sensors:
  System Temperatures: cpu: 46.8 C mobo: N/A 
  Fan Speeds (RPM): N/A 
Info:
  Processes: 336 Uptime: N/A Memory: 31.35 GiB 
  used: 887.0 MiB (2.8%) Init: systemd runlevel: 5 
  Compilers: gcc: 9.3.0 Shell: bash v: 5.0.17 
  inxi: 3.0.38 
  

[tommo1975]

Been doing some troubleshooting after reading similar posts on here.

I noticed that inxi - Fxz output was indicating I had software rendering even with Nouveau (Open GL : Renderer : llvmpipe) so that led me down the path of checking secure boot, especially as "mokutil --sb-state" was telling me "Secure boot disabled. In set-up mode". I checked my BIOS and everything looked fine, but I deleted keys anyway. "mokutil --sb-state" now tells me "Secure boot disabled" and inxi -Fxz now tells me "Open GL : renderer : NV132".

With that change in state with the Nouveau driver, I attempted once more the Nvidia driver install and.... no difference. Same symptoms, same inxi output as previously shared.

[roblm]

Follow the instructions in this post and then try re-installing the Nvidia driver or reboot if it is still installed:
viewtopic.php?p=1895521#p1895521

[tommo1975]

Yep, now fixed!