NVIDIA Releases New Linux Drivers

mlmitton writes "NVIDIA just released new Linux drivers (1.0-5328). But the early reports by users are less than encouraging. People are weighing in with mostly bad news about how well these new drivers work. Some people are finding that Neverwinter Nights doesn't work and they're reverting to the old drivers (4496). I spent a few long hours recently trying to get the old drivers to work with Fedora Core 1 so I'm going to hold off on these new ones."

Comments

changelog

[wo1verin3]

Changes:
This release adds support for the latest GeForce FX and Quadro FX GPUs, UBB
and FSAA Stereo, Red Hat Enterprise Linux 3.0, and GLX_SGI_swap_control,
improves XPixamp support, and reduces CPU usage when OpenGL applications
are syncing to vblank.

Complete Changelog/Readme

ATI and NVIDIA

[Bishop, Martin]

All the graphic chip makers need to get their act together and release better drivers for linux. It took some work getting my 9800 pro working with gentoo, and the worst part is that my card is also an All in wonder, and there is currently no support for it, even with GATOS.

Packages Ready to go

[PaulK]

There are prepatched 2.6.0 installers here.

Minion is working fast towards a resolution, but it still looks like the drivers are below existing 4496 performance levels.

The new drivers... A review of the problems...

[0x1337]

When X11 starts the drivers Oops, and default to ForceSW so no hw-accel.

Dmesg gives-
Unable to handle kernel NULL pointer dereference at virtual address 00000010
printing eip:
c024b6cf
*pde = 00000000
Oops: 0000
CPU: 0
EIP: 0010:[<c024b6cf>] Tainted: P
EFLAGS: 00013046
eax: 00000087 ebx: 00003246 ecx: 00000048 edx: 00000000
esi: 00000000 edi: dffe3000 ebp: dad75738 esp: dad75708
ds: 0018 es: 0018 ss: 0018
Process X (pid: 246, stackpage=dad75000)
Stack: dad96400 dad75764 c01105ac dad96000 00003099 e0d9eca6 00000000 00000048
dad75734 e0dadd1e dbc90800 00000000 dad75748 e0db88cd 00000000 00000048
dad75774 e0db0ee6 dad96000 00000000 00000048 00000080 d9e60000 dad96400
Call Trace: [<c01105ac>] [<e0d9eca6>] [<e0dadd1e>] [<e0db88cd>] [<e0db0ee6>]
[<e0db47b7>] [<e0db6170>] [<e0f51080>] [<e0dbcc1e>] [<e0d9da58>] [<e0f51080>]
[<e0f38b9d>] [<e0f7a5a0>] [<e0f51080>] [<e0f7a5a0>] [<e0f51080>] [<e0dba65c>]
[<e0f51080>] [<e0f7a60c>] [<e0f7a630>] [<e0f7a648>] [<e0f51080>] [<e0dbd809>]
[<e0f51080>] [<e0f51080>] [<e0e489d2>] [<e0f2bd01>] [<e0dd55f7>] [<e0dadd1e>]
[<e0db8818>] [<e0f28151>] [<e0dba1db>] [<e0f28151>] [<e0f28151>] [<e0dba22c>]
[<e0f52700>] [<e0e842db>] [<e0dd0ed8>] [<e0dde76d>] [<e0e842db>] [<e0e84ac1>]
[<e0dae41a>] [<e0d9f95b>] [<e0d9f830>] [<e0dae5a5>] [<e0db9d82>] [<e0f51080>]
[<e0e4b627>] [<e0e8473f>] [<e0d9f195>] [<e0e842db>] [<e0e84ac1>] [<e0e842db>]
[<e0e84ac1>] [<e0ecd0d4>] [<e0e7d552>] [<e0e66833>] [<e0db9d82>] [<e0f51080>]
[<e0e68481>] [<e0e96fc5>] [<e0dbe389>] [<e0e68345>] [<e0dc1102>] [<e0db9d82>]
[<e0f51080>] [<e0dac53b>] [<e0e68bc4>] [<e0e68abb>] [<e0f51080>] [<e0d9dbc5>]
[<e0f38c06>] [<e0dbcbf1>] [<e0f51080>] [<e0d9c8a2>] [<e0f51080>] [<c0114854>]
[<c013c590>] [<c013c7d5>] [<e0d9c61b>] [<c014a0cc>] [<c0108e7f>]

Code: 8b 46 10 8b 50 30 89 34 24 89 4c 24 04 8b 44 24 20 89 44 24

Ksymoops gives-
>>EIP; c02dc0c1 <pci_read_config_dword+41/80> <=====

>>ebx; c3fbe000 <_end+3c02138/20530198>
>>ebp; c3fbf760 <_end+3c03898/20530198>
>>esp; c3fbf72c <_end+3c03864/20530198>

Trace; c01aedfc <pci_conf1_read_config_dword+4c/50>
Trace; e08f8739 <[nvidia]os_pci_read_dword+20/27>
Trace; e090784e <[nvidia]_nv001370rm+2e/cc>
Trace; e09123fd <[nvidia]_nv001241rm+11/18>
Trace; e090aa16 <[nvidia]_nv000171rm+22a/268>
Trace; e0aaab60 <[nvidia]nv_linux_devices+0/580>
Trace; e090e2e7 <[nvidia]_nv001749rm+167/50c>
Trace; e0aaab60 <[nvidia]nv_linux_devices+0/580>
Trace; e0916776 <[nvidia]rm_update_agp_config+e/14>
Trace; e08f7495 <[nvidia]nv_agp_init+78/fb>
Trace; e0aaab60 <[nvidia]nv_linux_devices+0/580>
Trace; e0ad410c <[nvidia].data.end+275/31c9>
Trace; e0ad4130 <[nvidia].data.end+299/31c9>
Trace; e0ad4148 <[nvidia].data.end+2b1/31c9>
Trace; e0ad40a0 <[nvidia].data.end+209/31c9>
Trace; e0aaab60 <[nvidia]nv_linux_devices+0/580>
Trace; e0ad40a0 <[nvidia].data.end+209/31c9>
Trace; e0aaab60 <[nvidia]nv_linux_devices+0/580>
Trace; e091418c <[nvidia]_nv001274rm+7c/b8>
Trace; e0aaab60 <[nvidia]nv_linux_devices+0/580>
Trace; e0ad410c <[nvidia].data.end+275/31c9>
Trace; e0ad4130 <[nvidia].data.end+299/31c9>
Trace; e0ad4148 <[nvidia].data.end+2b1/31c9>
Trace; e0aaab60 <[nvidia]nv_linux_devices+0/580>
Trace; e0917339 <[nvidia]_nv0008

Re:Back to via

[mroch]

I've got an nForce2 board working (almost) perfectly under Gentoo. It seems to be a timing issue... either your board wants to cooperate at the moment you install, or it doesn't. The only thing you can do is try it. If it doesn't work under whatever distro you're using, try Gentoo. They've built a bunch of nforce stuff into their kernel, so support for mine was out-of-the-box.

If you have an nforce2 board, you probably have a fast enough processor to compile most software in a relatively reasonable amount of time. If you do decide to install Gentoo, make sure you check out the alternate installation guide so you can play Tux Racer while it's building your system. :)

Re:Good job NVIDIA

[skookum]

Screw wanting to see how they work, most people just want the source so that they can get it to work, period. Since they're binary only it means that they're usually tied to a specific kernel version and sometimes a specific distro. If you deviate from the path of the most popular distros you soon get into uncharted water.

They're in a catch-22: I'm sure they'd like to open the source but it's been mentioned before that some portions of the drivers contain licensed/proprietary code that they do not themselves control. In other words they couldn't even if they wanted to. (Plus, they seem to take drivers very seriously and might see it as giving away trade secrets to the likes of ATI, so maybe they don't even want to.)

Howto with Fedora Core 1

[ags]

I had lots of problems getting NVidia to work with FC1. Things would kind of work, but other things wouldn't. Getting TuxRacer to work is a good litmus test.

Then I found this page of unofficial FC1 FAQ. Yay...!!

Here's what to do - it worked for me:

Use these instructions if there are no RPMs available, or if the available RPMs don't work for you.

Make sure you have the lastest drivers.

Now print this out, or write it down. Then:

1. You must have kernel-source installed for this to work. Check the "Add/Remove Applications" tool in System Settings on the red-hat menu.
2. Shut down X (as root, do telinit 3 in a terminal).
3. Log in as root and go to the directory where you downloaded the nVidia drivers.
4. Type CC="gcc32" sh NVIDIA-Linux-x86-1.0-4496-pkg2.run --add-this-kernel.
5. There will be some whirring and wailing, and then do CC="gcc32" sh NVIDIA-Linux-x86-1.0-4496-pkg2-custom.run That will do a correct install of your nVidia drivers.
6. Follow nVidia's instructions to set up the driver. (Read the "EDITING YOUR XF86CONFIG FILE" section.)
7. You can now restart X by typing telinit 5.

If none of this works, do rpm -e --nodeps XFree86-Mesa-libGL and then restart your computer. The need to do this should soon be eliminated -- watch this FAQ or the fedora-list. Note that if you update XFree86, this package will be reinstalled and you will need to remove it again. This solves the "DRI" problem.

For what it worth..

[Vilou]

We're actually packaging nvidia drivers for Fedora core 1 for the http://rpm.livna.org/ repository.
See : http://bugzilla.livna.org/show_bug.cgi?id=45

Feedback from the Clueful Ones is welcome.
Good day.