Graphics w/EVGA/NVidia GeForce GTS 250--slow response

Just have installed 11.4 on an EVGA X58 I7 LGA1366 platform, 6 GB of RAM, with twin EVGA/NVidia GEForce GTS 250 SLI cards. X11 is configured for the desktop spread across all 4 monitors. I added the NVidia repo, downloaded the NVidia drivers and desktop widget. I am running the default kernel. The NVidia items showing installed via YAST are the nvidia gfx02 kmp desktop graphics driver kernel module for GEForce6xx and newer GPU’s, the Nvidia G02 graphics driver for the same version card and the x11-xorg-driver-video-nouveau accelerated opensource driver for NVidia cards.

Graphics performance is horrible-- moving windows results in jittery motion, starting new programs requires a lot of time, sometimes windows leave “trails” and blur when they are moved… and whenever anything is moved I see (via GKrellm) CPU usage go way up. I am guessing this is to service the graphics.

So I am not satisfied that I have the correct driver installed for the video cards. Additionally I question that the noveaux accelerated open source driver is there as well–I would assume that was part of the install package.

From the NVidia page, using their tools to insure the correct driver is selected, I downloaded NVidia Linux-X86_64-260.19.44.run. I do not find this same driver designation (minus the .run) on any of the repo listed drivers in YAST.

I assume that to manually compile the driver I downloaded its going to be configure-make-make-install or something similar. I do have (in prep for this) gcc, make and the kernel.src installed. Question is should I uninstall the existing drivers and NVidia packages before trying to build and install the NVidia package that I downloaded directly from their site?

Any suggestions would be deeply appreciated.

Brief note after messing about since the last post—to give you an idea of how bad video performance is, when streaming a flash video on one monitor, if a window on another monitor is moved, it causes the video to freeze.

if you are going to use the nvidia.run instead of the rpm in the repos there are a few things YOU MUST DO FIRST
yes in caps

  1. install gcc and i also like the full dev group auto tools and all
  2. the kernel source
  3. BLACKLIST nouveau
  4. and /or step #1 READ “the_hard_way”
    SDB:NVIDIA the hard way - openSUSE
    not so hard

BUT there is a kde warning !!! heed it

and unless you have been installing the .run drivers for years
USE WHAT IS IN THE REPO and install the rpm !!!
you will save your self trouble

John

Many thanks for the kind information. I do notice that you mentioned 11.3. Same for 11.4??

Regards and thanks again