Installing the Nvidia Graphics Drivers

Introduction to the reader here.

Start - Nvidia Drivers from nvidia.com.

1. First we need to know what type of graphics card you have. Please do the following at the command window. To get to the command window do the following

[root@nVidia ~]#lspci -v "note the difference in board manufactures." 

These drivers will work on all Aftermarket cards as long as it has an nVidia Chipset.

01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: nVidia Corporation NV11 [Ge Force2 MX/MX 400] (rev b2) (prog-if 00 [VGA])

Subsystem: Chaintech Computer Co. Ltd Unknown device 1420 Flags: bus master, 66MHz, medium devsel, latency 248, IRQ 185 Memory at fd000000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=16M] Memory at e8000000 (32-bit, prefetchable) [size=128M] [virtual] Expansion ROM at fe9f0000 [disabled] [size=64K] Capabilities: [60] Power Management version 2 Capabilities: [44] AGP version 2.0 

As if you read the first line where it says "nVidia Corporation", you will see in the braces the video card model. As this specific card is a "Ge Force2 MX/MX 400".

Screenshot: Do one of Output lspci Supported Graphics Cards by nVidia here: Provide a link List is to long to put in How To.

Please beaware that you need to back up your original /etc/X11/xorg.conf to /etc/X11/xorg.conf.bak before getting started.

[root@nVidia ~]cp /etc/X11/xorg.conf /etc/X11/xorg.conf.bak

0.1. Now to Select the newest driver please go to:

http://www.nvidia.com/Download/index.aspx?lang=en-us Where it says "Option 1", select the "Product Type" from the drop down box. Next, "Product Series", "Operating System", and "Language". Screenshot: Here

0.2. Drivers can be obtained from here by manually downloading.

0.3. Installation

you are gonna need a few things to build the drivers so as root in a terminal run this command

[root@nVidia ~]#yum install kernel-headers kernel-devel gcc

this will get you all you need to build the drivers.

After you have downloaded the driver (save it in the root folder). You need to be root to do so and install the driver. Now in you terminal you will need to type the following. Click on: Applications | Accessories | Terminal and type - telinit 3

[root@nVidia ~]#telinit 3 

Screenshot

Here This will take you to runlevel 3 where you can install the driver.

[root@nVidia ~]#sh NVIDIA-Linux-x86-96.43.05-pkg1.run...... The install will begin.

Put steps here...

To get back to your desktop type the following.

[root@nVidia ~]#telinit 5 

0.4. Applications | Systemtools | NVIDIA X Server Settings

You may want to go to "X Server Display Configuration" to configure your screen resolution. Next you will want to Click on "Save to X Server Configuration File". When the dialog box come up you will want to save it to"/etc/X11/xorg.conf" then click on "Save". Now click on "Quit" to exit the application.

0.5. Do screenshots for the above???

Problems: If you have problems like Black Squares for Icons, downgrade the driver to the next lowest one before you come to the forums or lists for help. Can be done by the reverse of the installation.

Add agpart problems of forcing the driver.

References: http://www.nVidia.com

Start - Drivers "DKMS" from the rpmforge repo.

Start - Drivers "KMDL" from atrpms.

Start - Drivers "kmod" from ELRepo ( http://elrepo.org ).

0.6. Advanced

• One thing that seems to add some time to my boot times is the nvidia logo popping up while booting up. So time to open a terminal and lets get rid of that pesky logo. Terminal open su to root as always and use your favorite text editor.

vim /etc/X11/xorg.conf 

• Go to your Device Section

   Section "Device"
       Identifier     "Videocard0"
       Driver         "nvidia"
       Option         "NoLogo" "True"
EndSection

• Notice the Option "NoLogo" "True" that I have added this will remove the logo appearing while booting up and logging in.

Compiz

Many people like the wizz bang flashy effects of compiz if you would like those here is what you need to do. Here we go again open a terminal and su to root. First command

yum install compiz 

• Now you are going to have to add more things to your xorg.conf file. So favorite text editor time again

vim /etc/X11/xorg.conf 

• Device Section again but it should look like this

Section "Device"
    Identifier     "Videocard0"
    Driver         "nvidia"
    Option         "AddARGBGLXVisuals" "True"
    Option         "DisableGLXRootClipping" "True"
    Option         "NoLogo" "True"
EndSection

• Save your changes. Now log out of your X or desktop environment it will drop you back to gdm or kdm. Then login again and you should be able to use desktop effects all you want. For instance in gnome you can go to System --> Preferences --> Desktop Effects and enable them. There are many different ways to manage effects and such for compiz this will get you started, enjoy.