The installation process is quite easy to understand

Dec 8, 2014 08:42 GMT  ·  By

NVIDIA released quite a few drivers in the past few months and new Linux users might have a problem installing them manually. It's not exactly a complicate procedure and it won't work out of the box, unless you know what you are doing. This is the installation procedure for Ubuntu, which is the most used Linux desktop operating system.

NVIDIA doesn't have a proper installer for its drivers, but the Linux users don't really mind all that much. The fact that they have a ton of driver updates compensates for any grief that might be experienced by the user during the installation procedure.

Nonetheless, it might prove a bit of a challenge for new Ubuntu and Linux users, especially if they are gamers and they want the best and latest drivers.

The procedure is specific to Ubuntu systems, but it can be adapted for other distros as well. There are some Linux operating systems out there, like Arch for example, who will probably get the latest drivers, even the Beta one, in the repositories so all of this trouble is not really necessary.

Also, Ubuntu benefits from a third-party PPA repository that is regularly updated, so that might be a good source for this kind of driver upgrades.

Manually installing NVIDIA drivers is easier than you think

It might seem difficult for new users, but once they do this at least one time, they'll soon find out that there is really nothing to it, at least after they understand what they need to do.

First of all, NVIDIA drivers can't be installed (manually) when the display manager is running. In the case of Ubuntu, this is called the LightDM and it needs to be stopped, otherwise the installer won't run.

So, all you need to do is to follow a number of very simple steps. Download the drivers you need, 32-bit or 64-bit, and they should be available in RUN format. We'll use the latest Beta release as an example.

You will need to open a virtual terminal with this Ctrl + Alt + F1 key combination. The terminal is full screen and you will need to login, with root. Run these commands and follow the onscreen instructions:

code
sudo service lightdm stop
sudo chmod a+x NVIDIA-Linux-x86_64-343.36.run
sudo ./NVIDIA-Linux-x86_64-343.36.run
So, the first command will stop LightDM, the second one changes the properties of the RUN files, allowing the user to execute it, and the third command is needed to actually run the installation procedure for the driver.

That's pretty much it. If you have any additional questions, please leave a comment below.

Warning: If you decide to manually install NVIDIA drivers (or even from the PPA), please understand that you're doing this on your own risk.

Devs usually test the NVIDIA drivers that are available in the official repos and they can debug problems, but only for those versions.

This type of upgrades for the drivers can break your system, so please don't go bugging the Ubuntu devs for something they don't have any control over.

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