Got a new card -- a shiny EVGA Nvidia GeForce 8800GTS 320 Superclocked. I installed it December 16, got it working on the 17th with the latest stable Nvidia driver (100.14.19), got antsy and installed the beta 169.04 driver on the 20th, and found out today (the 21st) that Nvidia released their 169.07 driver as of yesterday. So, I did the third driver installation this week -- now that's getting practice! This is on my Gutsy 64-bit Intel platform.
OK, I will share what I learned, since there are some things that are different with this one, compared to my GeForce 7900GS. And thanks to Plun on Ubuntu Forum for doing this first.
For my convenience, I'll just assume you found a way to wedge this guy into your desktop hardware. I've got a big Antec P180 case, and the Nvidia card goes all the way from the back edge to the drive bay in front. The 6-pin PCI power plug that powers the card literally has to mash up against the front of a hard disk drive. But it fits, more or less -- 2 slots wide and as long as the opening for the motherboard.
1. Installing the driver.
EDIT: For Gutsy, just use Envy -- it's up to date now (30 JAN)
For Hardy Heron, until Envy is updated you're going to have to install the downloaded Nvidia driver. Follow this guidance and it should work for you:
Go to the Nvidia drivers site, and (depending on whether your system is 32-bit or 64-bit), download the appropriate 169.09 driver here:
http://www.nvidia.com/Download/index.aspx?lang=en-us
Download it to your /home/user/Desktop.
Now do Alt-F2 "kdesu kate /etc/default/linux-restricted-modules-common" without the quote marks, and give it your password when prompted.
With the file open in Kate, insert "nv" and "nv_new" in the DISABLED_MODULES line, so that line looks like this:
and "save" it. Close kate and open the Konsole:
Exit the Konsole. Do Ctrl-Alt-F1 and switch to a tty terminal. Log in, cd to Desktop and:
to stop the X server, then
{ This will run the installer -- answer the questions carefully -- some need a "no" to proceed, until the last one -- do NOT have it write the xorg.conf file at this point }
and (hopefully) observe the Nvidia splash screen prior to your GUI Kubuntu login screen.
2. Booting. The "quiet" option, which is a normal *buntu kernel boot option, puts this card in "black" mode, or else to sleep.
So, open /boot/grub/menu.lst with kate in Super User mode, and delete the word "quiet" from the kernel boot line, and save it. I need no "vga=" options to see the splash screens on my Samsung SyncMaster 1100 -- it is possible that other monitors may need one of those options. So the only boot options that I have are "ro" and "splash".
EDIT: Later info suggest the boot code "xdrvr=fbdev" is helpful for the 8000-series cards (I haven't personally needed to try it).
3. X Server. The "composite -- enable" option in /etc/X11/xorg.conf is not desirable for this card -- it will interfere with compiz. (In *buntu -- but interestingly the compositing option is still required for Mepis 7 to run compiz). So, when the Nvidia installer offers the option to write an xorg.conf file for you, either decline the offer, or else make sure that you leave the "--composite" option off the
command. So, here's the "guts" of my fully-functional xorg.conf file -- note what happened to the "compositing" option:
4. Eye candy. Open Adept Manager, and mark the following packages for installation:
compiz-core
compiz-fusion-plugins-extra
compiz-fusion-plugins-main
compiz-kde
compiz-plugins
compizconfig-settings-manager
emerald
and "Apply" to install them.
In a Konsole window, verify your glx capability with
you should see a graphic of the gears and and a frames-per-second (fps) rate calculation in the Konsole window. If that looks good, hit "Esc" to close the glxgears, and enter
to test the emerald window decorator. If that seems to work, you are ready to cross your fingers, say an incantation to the little monkey-god, and run
Possibly you will observe a flicker of the screen, and Ctrl-Alt right-arrow will cause your desktop to rotate or slide. That's the indication you've been looking for! You can open KMenu>Settings>Advanced Desktop Effects Settings to fine-tune the compiz display (in "General", set horizontal size to 4, then "x" "Desktop Cube" and "Rotate Cube", "Wobbly Windows", etc.). Also, the emerald theme manager is under that menu item, so if you follow instructions (and install subversion first) you can get an interesting collection of window decoration themes for Emerald to use with compiz.
That's it -- I hope this helps those with GeForce 8000-series video hardware!
And, oh by the way, stay the hell away from "Restricted Drivers Manager"!
OK, I will share what I learned, since there are some things that are different with this one, compared to my GeForce 7900GS. And thanks to Plun on Ubuntu Forum for doing this first.
For my convenience, I'll just assume you found a way to wedge this guy into your desktop hardware. I've got a big Antec P180 case, and the Nvidia card goes all the way from the back edge to the drive bay in front. The 6-pin PCI power plug that powers the card literally has to mash up against the front of a hard disk drive. But it fits, more or less -- 2 slots wide and as long as the opening for the motherboard.
1. Installing the driver.
EDIT: For Gutsy, just use Envy -- it's up to date now (30 JAN)
For Hardy Heron, until Envy is updated you're going to have to install the downloaded Nvidia driver. Follow this guidance and it should work for you:
Go to the Nvidia drivers site, and (depending on whether your system is 32-bit or 64-bit), download the appropriate 169.09 driver here:
http://www.nvidia.com/Download/index.aspx?lang=en-us
Download it to your /home/user/Desktop.
Now do Alt-F2 "kdesu kate /etc/default/linux-restricted-modules-common" without the quote marks, and give it your password when prompted.
With the file open in Kate, insert "nv" and "nv_new" in the DISABLED_MODULES line, so that line looks like this:
Code:
DISABLED_MODULES="nv nv_new"
Code:
sudo apt-get install linux-headers-`uname -r` build-essential gcc gcc-4.1 xserver-xorg-dev sudo apt-get --purge remove nvidia-glx nvidia-glx-new nvidia-settings nvidia-kernel-common sudo rm /etc/init.d/nvidia-* sudo rm /lib/linux-restricted-modules/.nvidia_new_installed
Exit the Konsole. Do Ctrl-Alt-F1 and switch to a tty terminal. Log in, cd to Desktop and:
Code:
sudo /etc/init.d/kdm stop
Code:
sudo sh NVIDIA-Linux-x86-169.07-pkg1.run
Code:
sudo /etc/init.d/kdm start
2. Booting. The "quiet" option, which is a normal *buntu kernel boot option, puts this card in "black" mode, or else to sleep.
So, open /boot/grub/menu.lst with kate in Super User mode, and delete the word "quiet" from the kernel boot line, and save it. I need no "vga=" options to see the splash screens on my Samsung SyncMaster 1100 -- it is possible that other monitors may need one of those options. So the only boot options that I have are "ro" and "splash".
EDIT: Later info suggest the boot code "xdrvr=fbdev" is helpful for the 8000-series cards (I haven't personally needed to try it).
3. X Server. The "composite -- enable" option in /etc/X11/xorg.conf is not desirable for this card -- it will interfere with compiz. (In *buntu -- but interestingly the compositing option is still required for Mepis 7 to run compiz). So, when the Nvidia installer offers the option to write an xorg.conf file for you, either decline the offer, or else make sure that you leave the "--composite" option off the
Code:
nvidia-xconfig --add-argb-glx-visuals
Code:
Section "Monitor"
Identifier "Generic Monitor"
HorizSync 21.0 - 120.0
VertRefresh 52.0 - 140.0
Option "DPMS"
EndSection
Section "Device"
Identifier "Generic Video Card"
Driver "nvidia"
Option "Coolbits" "1"
EndSection
Section "Screen"
Identifier "Default Screen"
Device "Generic Video Card"
Monitor "Generic Monitor"
DefaultDepth 24
Option "AddARGBGLXVisuals" "True"
SubSection "Display"
Depth 24
Modes "1600x1200"
EndSubSection
EndSection
# Section "Extensions"
# Option "Composite" "Enable"
# EndSection
4. Eye candy. Open Adept Manager, and mark the following packages for installation:
compiz-core
compiz-fusion-plugins-extra
compiz-fusion-plugins-main
compiz-kde
compiz-plugins
compizconfig-settings-manager
emerald
and "Apply" to install them.
In a Konsole window, verify your glx capability with
Code:
glxgears
Code:
emerald --replace
Code:
compiz
That's it -- I hope this helps those with GeForce 8000-series video hardware!
And, oh by the way, stay the hell away from "Restricted Drivers Manager"!
It doesn't want to let me raise the resolution.
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