How to install nVIDIA Graphics Driver in Linux?

So all my previous attempts to even boot to Linux Mint failed on my MSI GT75 Titan.

Yesterday I tried Ubunto 18.10 and what do you know! It booted right off the USB as a Live Image and everything was working out of the box like LAN/WLAN. Big improvement from the past where nothing worked on my laptop..

Now, I am using the basic Graphics Driver I see because the FN Key brightness up/down, I see the slider going up and down but the brightness doesn't change.

So I downloaded the latest nVIDIA Driver for linux: NVIDIA-Linux-x86_64-410.93.run

I double clicked on the file then got this Window and I see a little progress bar but it never ends...nothing happens...

what am I doing wrong here?

 

Linux has extremely poor support for graphics drivers. So if the newest doesnt work you can try older versions as well. Also even after getting drivers installed, chances are you're still not getting brightness control.

 

What the heck is this!?!? I need to reinvent the wheel to install a simple graphics driver and take a coding class!!

You see this is exactly why I can never even start using this OS! It's so not user friendly!

@Mr. Fox This is a joke man! Watch the video I bet you will turn it off towards the middle.

 

It is not as easy to do some things as it is with Windows, but the main issue I have with it is how limited everything is. Development is contingent upon volunteer spare time Linux fans that are generally not avid gamers, overclockers or the latest PC hardware junkies. So, the development that does occur is often limited to what they want and need from the OS, and the hardware they use to support their hobby. I totally get that, and it is understandable. But, it also is why I will keep using Windows in spite of what a sucky piece of crap Windoze OS X has become.

 

I understand that bro, but I can't even get started using this thing. I want to learn Linux by installing it and slowly exploring it but heck if I have to Google guides on how to install a simple driver and learn the Linux Codes to run them in the console, this doesn't temp me at all to even wanna try. Such basic things should not be so difficult in 2019

whatever happened to simply double clicking on an installer and have it run and do its job the way every other OS does?

 

Yes, I agree. It is very stupid. In so many ways it has not improved from where it was 15+ years ago. Even when you do get the GeFarts drivers installed they lack features and you have to manually edit configuration files to get partial functionality. It is totally BS. We live in a Windows world and we are spoiled by it. I do not mind using a terminal and entering commands to get things done. I even kind of enjoy that because I am an old school DOS guy, but I do not like it when the finished product is still a half-baked mess.

 

I was experimenting with Ubuntu customiser app to integrate all apps and drivers for ease of use but it didn't work out. The final ISO won't boot from USB correctly! Wasted 2 days.
In 5 years nvidia will ease up on Linux for easy driver operation like Win 10.
I still like those cmds even for Windows.
You guys should try learning to use Linux as an alternative since W10 will become a hot mess to be avoided and Azure will take-over! Re-purpose your older laptops and you will know why Linux runs faster than Windows on same hardware w/o any tweaks. Battery life will be pathetic on Optimus laptops. Intel+Radeons combo are the best for OS X and Linux.
I always wonder WTH Linux is faster after kernel upgrades constantly for 5 years and no slowdowns.
If you want a easy to follow always use Puget system as reference, https://www.pugetsystems.com/labs/h...h-NVIDIA-Drivers-and-any-Desktop-Flavor-1178/

 

I'm pretty sure we've covered this before, but just in case I'm mis-remembering - Live Boot uses the X.Org.X Server (open source) drivers. I didn't watch the video, but there are ways to recreate a Live Boot CD with the nvidia drivers. And creating a new Live Boot CD with those drivers is a complicated process.

However, with that said, if you actually go and install Ubuntu (or Linux Mint for that matter), during the install it asks what drivers to use nvidia's or the open source video driver (default). You simply choose the nvidia drivers. Also, I thought @Dennismungai said the wifi drivers would be there upon install as well. I think your biggest problem is trying to go off the Live Boot CD, which is a 'least common denominator' type of boot, and has never worked correctly for your MSI taptop.

Does the MSI let you boot up to an external drive or would you be willing to swap drives? An installation may be all you need to see it work properly on the taptop.

In regards to driver updates, I usually wait for the patches to come from Ubuntu or Linux Mint and those are handled even more simply that Windows driver installation. But if you want a version that was built a few days ago, I will grant you that point that changing them is a very tedious process.

 

right, so I will try to actually install it this time rather than booting from the live USB.

One question before I do this, will it detect my RAID 0 array so I can install it on that or is there anything I need to do beforehand to make it see the RAID Array?

Also, do I need to disable Secure Boot if I'm installing it in UEFI?

 

This might be a bit confusing since when I did it, the the partition section of the isntaller will show the RAID volume as 'dmraid mapper' (or something like that) AND the individual drives of the RAID show up as well, but I do wish they would address this.

In any case, it is a matter of choosing the correct device ( just choose the device with the correct sizing, which will be the 'mapper', dmraid mapper, or whatever it is labeled ). My x7200 was given to a colleague, so I don't have it in hand for reference. Also, I tried doing a quick search for some help sites, as RAID installation is now handled in the GUI install. ( The stuff I found was from the old text based installation days. ) If you run into questions, and can post from another device, I will get my old x7200 from the co-worker in order to help.

In regards to secure boot. I see some distributions have been signed with the Microsoft keys (or whatever keys are stored in your UEFI) to allow it to install, but if you can disable it, you wouldn't have to worry about it.

 

Secure Boot disabled and Legacy OROM must be enabled. Usually you can boot the USB drive and install ubuntu or any OS with secure boot turned on. But, instead of wasting time and figuring out what went wrong at 100% copy progress dialog we'll disable secure boot.
@jclausius and @Dennismungai Any idea what's wrong with CUBIC or Ubuntu Customizer failing at initramfs screen. I checked out Livecd creator manual from Ubuntu and I'm doing everything right. In a VM it boots fine with latest apps, drivers and kernel.
I had to give up temporarily and used stock Xubuntu 18 LTS and updating took alot of time and optimising the OS is still pending!

 

This is correct, and also applies to systems where proprietary drivers are present too, such as Pop_Os! with NVIDIA drivers. Infact, for Optimus systems, they recommend that you avoid using that live media for installation for a reason.

If your system is a Skylake-based laptop (or beyond), that's a no.

Yes.

For the most common wireless hardware (from Atheros, older Killer Networking chips such as the 1435 and 1535, and current generation Intel WiFi chips), this applies.
Some, such as older Broadcom hardware, the newer Killer 1550, among others (notably the cheap hybrid Bluetooth+ wifi combos found on some Dell systems), may not work out of the box.

This applies primarily to the shim loader (grub-efi, systemd-boot, etc). Note that secure boot can also be put into user managed mode, where you use your own signing keys, etc. This is optional, and a bit more complex.

I agree with this statement wholeheartedly, especially when it comes to Linux-based installers (Anaconda, used in Fedora, etc).
They're a long way from being usable.

The first part is real. Support for stuff such as HDR is pretty much in the works. To this day, using the proprietary drivers especially from Nvidia means that you cannot have a persistent group of settings saved on reboot without using hacks like these (see the bash aliases entry) or relying on your desktop environment settings tools. And then there's the devil named DKMS. When it works, its' heaven. When it inevitably fails (for issues not directly fixable by an end user, such as ABI conflicts with device drivers and Xorg), you're **** out of luck unless you downgrade drivers.
For brightness control, welcome to ACPI. That spec vendors break hilariously, relying on Windows-specific methods to work around them, and Linux users are left out in the dark. Case in point: The infamous Foxconn case.

 

Agreed.

A bad idea in practice. CSM is a devil whose depths of treachery remain fully unknown.

No idea. It's not a project I've worked with. However, it seems the boot images are functionally correct as they boot in a VM, though its' by no means a guarantee it will boot on a physical machine, considering issues such as KMS failure may prevent boot due to unforeseen ACPI issues. You may need to pass options to your boot loader related to ACPI workarounds to achieve a clean boot. See this for an example.

 

Couldnt have summed it up better.
Linux is a playground. You can do so much with it and its pretty lightweight, but someone gotta love this type of thinkering, otherwise stay away from linux.

 

Atleast on my AW w/o Legacy OROM enabled all GUI are rendered in 640x480, no wifi, no bt etc.. in livecd and on few latest Dell AMI BIOS legacy OROM is disabled by default and it doesn't have issues like AW. The same thing applies to my rusty old lenovo with UEFI, legacy OROM is disabled by default once secure boot is disabled. I think the wordings on AW are a typo.
I tried booting on 4 PCs and all had same issue even on Intel+radeon and intel only setups.

 

Short story: you clicked on a file that was meant to be run from the terminal. Downloading the NVIDIA binary straight from their website can be a little tricky if you aren't used to Linux. There is a much easier way.

Long story: For the NVIDIA binary package, there is a README

Or you can just install the nividia driver package from Ubuntu, easy peasy: https://help.ubuntu.com/community/BinaryDriverHowto/Nvidia#Installation

Good luck & remember: your lack of knowledge isn't a Linux problem

 

You should disable that worthless filth no matter what you are doing on any OS.

 

I thought it was required for Fast Boot to work properly?

 

@Mr. Fox

Ok I am done with this BS. I have no patience to figure out **** that should work so simply, even installing the OS doesn't work, it can't even see my RAID Array

 

I don't know what to say with that error. On the x7200, the RAID array I created in the BIOS just shows up. It is strange it doesn't find any devices (hard drives) in your system.

If you haven't you've already restored your Windows partitions, does Linux Mint 19.1 give you the same type of problem?

 

I didn't need to restore anything as I didn't format as I mentioned the installer didn't see nothing.

Linux Mint was worse, it would start the installation, then ask me if I want to install 3rd party apps and drivers like graphics cards and whatnot, so I select yes and enter a password as it requests but then it freezes there.

I am not wasting any more calories on Linux thanks a lot for your help bro

 

I'm sorry it doesn't work, but I also understand about how much effort would be required and your frustration and want to just move on... Besides in the end, after many hours, it may still not even work on your taptop's make.

It seems most MSI laptop models have some Linux issues, but something like a Clevo or AW may make a better Linux install candidate:

https://ubuntuforums.org/showthread...d364b39d54858f9128e88&p=13654645#post13654645

https://forum-en.msi.com/index.php?topic=313651.msg1796665#msg1796665

 

Any particular reason you're using BIOS raid?

mdadm (software RAID) performs very similarly since BIOS RAID is software driven anyway. In the case of mdadm it'll work across any distro and hardware as well.

 

Never use non LTS versions of any distros. They are more buggy and wrecks the hardware esp. (display with zero backlight). I really thought my display was poof...
If you're okay with AHCI then its better. Even bloated and non-optimised Linux distro will simply fly on your setup.
The reason why terminal is preferred is because you can see progress of update in real time even if you don't use -v or verbose option. The GUI appears stuck 90% of the time so I use xterm all the time.
Never opt for OEM install instead use Try Ubuntu or Install Ubuntu options. They break more things very often post-install.
Linux works best on older PCs so if you have one, you can use Xubuntu or Lubuntu on it.
In RAID mode, I think the SSD will be detected as /dev/raid0(nvme) instead of /dev/sda. I think your USB drive is incorrectly detected as SSD.
As for single click exe installation, I'd recommend you to install Q4wine from ubuntu repo.
Not all games run perfectly but some of them do.

 

@Vasudev

I got notification, that you quoted me in this thread. LOL I never posted in this thread (except for now). This is really weird.

Take a look. If I click on the notification, it gets me to post #24.



PS. This is to make you laugh !!! You BROke into the boring fluency of this forum LOL

 

The notification was correct. I quoted your post earlier and when I wrote my post the quoted posts were merged eventhough I removed it from multi-quote. I had to go into editor mode to cut the HTML tags and pasted it in 13r3 thread.

 

Got it. Now I know how to make 'ghost' alerts LOL

 

Your platform is supported. Anything newer than Broadwell (Skylake+) isn't.

And tied to this:

Explains the crash you're seeing above. mdraid cannot detect any storage therein and the frontend installer just dies.

 

That probably explains why I had no issue seeing the RAID volume on the x7200 with its i7-970

 

Ultra Male and Mr Fox install linux distro on absolute new hardware which is a mystery for linux kernel unless its upstream release! Now everyone is slowing progressing towards Linux as an alternative for Win 10 since they can avoid stupid license fees that force users w/ alpha software and clean installing every 6 months.

 

This describes how to build a live USB image with the proprietary NVidia driver:

https://askubuntu.com/questions/69432/livecd-with-nvidia-binary-drivers

*Don't* double click on the installer after you've downloaded it. It's actually a shell script, but when downloaded it isn't executable and file managers might not recognize the ".run" extension. Instead, after it's downloaded, open a shell (command window) and type

sudo sh ./NVIDIA-Linux-x86_64-410.93.run

After you install that driver, you can follow the instructions in the link above to build a live USB image.

You do need to be willing to use the command line when necessary on Linux.

 

Is that in reference to BIOS RAID or in general? Because there are plenty of people running Linux on hardware much newer than Skylake, much less Broadwell. See the multitude of articles on Phoronix: https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=search&q=Coffee Lake

 

Exactly.

 

I think this goes to @Ultra Male's point that he shouldn't have to do this. It should just 'work'.

And while I run Linux myself, I understand the reasoning behind his objections.

 

Err, or click the 'more details' button at the very least. You can look at the system log with Ctrl+Alt+F1 through F5, depends on the distro.

 

From a User perspective, you're correct.

However, from a developer perspective things are more complicated. For example, it's not practical to build Nvidia Binary drivers into any open distro due to licensing limitations. It's also unreasonable to expect Nouveau to function all that well (given it's based primarily on reverse engineering due to lack of source material). Ironically, AMD are lightyears ahead in this particular endeavour.

Similarly, with DMRAID, I suspect that there's simply nobody who works on it because there are far superior options available (zfs-raid, LVM + mdadm etc). Don't forget, Intel themselves could contribute to the DMRAID module themselves and yet they don't.

In reality, the only reason FakeRaid exists at a BIOS level is because Windows hasn't really had any robust storage options as Linux has had for many years.

 

I do too, but he's already trying to do something non-default (use BIOS RAID; I'm not aware that any motherboard has it configured by default, if for no other reason than the problems it creates when trying to upgrade hardware). For that matter, Windows out of the box has its own problems, which @Ultra Male's quite aware of, as he provides a service of fixing it up to people. Those problems are of a rather different type, to be certain.

Linux is different from Windows. Most laptops, unless bought from a purpose vendor, come with Windows preinstalled. Installing Linux is inherently more effort than that; doing it well does require some knowledge.

 

Fake-RAID or not, expert knowledge or not, the point is moot. Ultra Male wanted to install, and that install failed on him. End of story. He's done. Kaput. No more. I find this discouraging, as I really think he would sing Linux's praises if he could get to use it.

With that in mind, this is NOT an untypical story. I've had many non-tech friends, shy away from Linux. That is unfortunate. Linux will not make as many in-roads into PC-land as it could when users are frustrated like this. And this is a shame, since Microsoft, in their evolution of Windows 10, is driving more and more people to the point of making a change.

Also, I think part of this can be placed at the feet of MSI as well. It's too bad they can't hire 2 or 3 folks to be their 'Linux' team, coming up with articles, shell scripts, and whatever else it would take to help their customers get onto Linux. But for all I know they may have incentive from MS on Windows pricing or looking at keeping expenses down to even do such a thing.

 

The fact of the matter is, Linux at it's core is fundamentally at odds with 2 things here. Fake Raid AND Nvidia binary drivers. These are not problems that you can magically make go way unless Intel and Nvidia both suddenly open sourced their drivers AND actively contributed them to the Kernel.

If I had seen this thread earlier I would've suggested ditching Fake Raid altogether and this grand total of 3 commands to install nvidia drivers.

• sudo add-apt-repository ppa:graphics-drivers/ppa
• sudo apt-get update && apt-get dist-upgrade -y
  
• sudo apt-get install nvidia-415

It's not hard, it's just different, which is where most people throw up their arms in complaint.

Otherwise, Linux works fantastically well and a hell of a lot better than Windows as far as core usability. Particularly when it comes to updates. Once you've installed your Nvidia drivers you basically just "apt-get update && apt-get dist-upgrade" for a couple of YEARS before thinking about build updates (or just use the Package Updater GUI included in many distros). Windows updates happen automatically and almost always leave broken garbage in it's wake AND you have to manually clean up the "old" installation after it.
Not to mention saving your settings/profile is literally a matter of taking a copy of your "/home/<username>" directory and dumping it back out onto the new installation. The idea is so simple and yet absolute light-years ahead of Windows in execution.

For the most part, Intel only machines and even modern AMD machines have no such issues these days. At least the days of compiling your own WiFi driver modules and Binary GPU blobs blowing your Xorg config to hell every update are gone.

 

Thats how I was able to install nvidia drivers and I'm running linux mint 19 (ubuntu based linux). Was pretty straightforward.

 

So I installed Linux Mint 19.1 Cinammon. But this time I broke the RAID and installed it in UEFI/AHCI. All went well, it even installed the nVIDIA Driver 390 automatically but there is a 418.43 driver update from nVIDIA's site that I am not able to install even with your commands above.

Even though I have the nVIDIA 390 driver installed, the colors are so washed out it's hurting my eyes

 

Installing the driver from nvidia will wreck the display with no backlighting. I tried them and wrecked my entire installation and had to use MR to restore clean image with ubuntu drivers installed for nvidia.
Use 415.xx driver. Usually all features from 418/419 are backported in 415/410 drivers. So, drivers in ubuntu work a lot different than windows. Nvidia stock uses non optimal values to kill OpenGL,Vulkan,OpenCL and even CUDA support making the laptop utter useless.

 

The 418 Driver is still fairly new, it may take some time for it to be considered stable enough to build into the graphics drivers ppa. Installing direct from Nvidia is always a bit of a "do at your own risk" situation.

If you followed my commands you should have the 415.27 driver, as that's what they explicitly install (as of this post). The 418 driver only released on the 22/02 so it's no surprise they haven't made it into the PPA yet.

I can only guess that this is a basic colour setting issue (possibly stemming from a mismatched or corrupted EDID). Most laptop panels are 6 bit + FRC and without the correct EDID from the panel it may just be sending raw 6bit only (resulting in washed out colours or banding). Have you looked in the NVCPL to see what settings it has? It may just be a simple tick box you need. Under the GPU->DisplayPort setting (usually something like GPU -> EDP-0 <insert-panel-name) you'll get some colour controls for the range, dithering and depth.

 

If he's using custom icc profiles then displaycal must be used with correct profile installed and updated to run at startup after logging in.
If icc profile hasn't been modified or corrupt then I feel disabling dithering fixes most issues. Actually, for me w/o dithering it hurts my eyes and produces washed out colors.

 

You'd be surprised how inaccurate that is. Linux is widely used in the HPC world; in fact, Windows is nowhere to be seen.

Linux is anything but limited; many of my peers, seniors, and professors in my CS major course use it to a great extent. It gets a lot of things done, with little hassle. You don't need to turn off a billion privacy-invading features, for instance. In return, you learn exactly how operating systems work (as @Ultra Male has proven so colourfully: 'do I need to take a coding class to learn Linux?' Answer: yes).

You lot only like Windows because it's familiar.

I'd argue it's the other way around: why not run one command,

Code:

sudo apt install Chrome

chrome for a Chrome install, or just one command,

Code:

pacman -Syu

for a complete system update? Why do I need to click through a dozen menus? Why do I need to find virus-free packages of obscure things I need? Why do I need to fiddle with the registry, instead of having everything in neat, plaintext .config files?

Linux is extraordinarily powerful, as is the command line. The sooner this is impressed upon the general public, the better.

 

I think you kind of missed the point. I like Linux, but it is very limited because it doesn't provide support for the software I want to run. I don't like Windows 10, but I use it. It works, but it's not a good product. I do like Windows 7... a lot.

So far I've not even been able to install Linux on my X299 Dark motherboard, and it seems from the web searching I have been doing that X299 isn't fully supported. It looks like you have to do goofy things to get it to partially function, like disabling Hyperthreading in the BIOS, and there are still ACPI errors. This is not user-friendly and I don't have enough hours in a day to start over learning from scratch. I need it to at least work so I can learn in my spare time if we want to see Windows die. (I do want to see Windows die, but I don't want to not be able to run all of the software I enjoy using.)

Edit: I am typing this from an OpenSUSE Live session. It looks like SUSE might be my only real hope of having a functional Linux installation on an X299 motherboard. Ubuntu 18 and the latest Mint are not compatible (constant lock-ups either during the bootloading process or shortly after arriving at the desktop). I have only gotten this far because I chose failsafe mode. Even SUSE locks up in normal booting mode.

 

I don't know your exact system configuration, but there are plenty of people running Linux on various X299-based motherboards; Phoronix was testing i9 CPUs on such systems in 2017. I don't disbelieve that you've had problems, but I haven't seen reports of such problems, and you're running up to date versions of Linux that certainly should be stable. I presume you're not overclocking; if you are, the first thing you should do is to reset to the standard settings, and make sure your BIOS is up to date.

One question, what graphics card are you using? "Safe mode" is probably using a generic VGA driver. If you have a very new NVidia card, I could see having trouble.

To address another point, Linux isn't simply developed by hobbyists in their spare time. Linux has substantial backing by large corporations; many if not most of the core developers of major components are working on it full time.

I don't think it's very fair to say that Linux is very limited because it doesn't support the software you run. That may very well mean it's not a good choice for you, but that doesn't mean that it's very limited broadly speaking.

 

No, you don't need to take a coding class to use Linux. Modern distributions try to make it very easy to not have to use the command line.

I'm admittedly a hard core command line user myself, but then again I've been using UNIX and Linux for 35 years and have worked for multiple UNIX and Linux mothership companies as a system software engineer/engineering manager/technical project manager. I rarely use Windows, but I find it very frustrating not having a good programmable command line available to see what's going on underneath. If I have problems with some software I'm used to cloning a copy of it and trying to dig into whatever's going on.

I'm admittedly not much of a gamer (the hardest core game I play is Minesweeper at 10x10, which a Z80 should be able to handle comfortably). So I can't speak very much to that aspect of things.

 

Correct. It's not a good choice for me. I'd love for it to be.

See my signature. Yes, I overclock everything and my GPU is a 2080 Ti. All I can find on the web while searching for solutions is lots of people struggling with Linux on X299 systems. Some are getting them to work with limited functionality. I finished the installation. I am replying from OpenSUSE right now. I have 640x480 maximum screen resolution and trying to figure out how to get a usable display driver installed. It took me about a half hour to get my wired network connection working, but figured it out through trial and error. Not sure why that wasn't just automatically done by the OS setup. Should have been. It was automatic with the Live USB environment.

 

@rlk, while I agree with the rest of your reply,

I did say ' learn' Linux. Use it? Definitely not. Linux Mint, Fedora, U/Xubuntu, Antergos, Manjaro all make it very easy to use it.

I only have one gripe: I use my touchpad to a very large extent, and Linux has very poor support for multi-touch gestures. After Windows implemented its Precision Touchpad drivers, I've never been able to use Linux with my touchpad properly.

Have you considered using Arch Linux? The install is more involved, but I tend to feel the obfuscation of so-called 'easier-to-use' distros actually make it more difficult to troubleshoot issues. There is a user on the Arch Linux wiki that has even gotten VFIO to work with his X299 system.