Howto update video drivers

English Install/Boot/Login
1

Just updated Leap 15.0 to 15.1 .

I like to play gnu-backgammon (gnubg) which has been working for me under 15.0 for a while. Now that I just upgraded 15.0 to 15.1 I’m having some video issues-- when I start gnubg the program runs but there is no longer is graphical output visible. My first thought is that it may be a driver issue (NVidia video card) so I downloaded the latest driver. In order to install the updated driver, I have to boot into text mode and not have the graphics drivers installed. The driver update doesn’t work in graphics mode, text mode only. How do I change my boot to not load the graphics drivers so that I can boot into a text console and then install the latest nvidia drivers?

(I looked at yast, but I didn’t see a place to modify what modules will be loaded)

Thanks very much,
Mark

2

You have two quick choices.
#1 Switch to a Virtual Terminal (e.g. by CTRL+ALT+F1) login as superuser and issue:

systemctl isolate multi-user.target

and you exit from the default graphical target; you can then login as any other user if needed in one of the available VTs if needed.
When done maybe it is better to reboot rather than return to the graphical target.

#2 If you don’t mind to reboot to get to a text session, simply add a “3” (without quotes) to the boot line (press “E” at the GRUB boot menu).

3

Well,all is not so good…

I did get into text mode and did install the updated NVidia drivers. Then, when I booted, I came up into text mode again.But, during boot I saw the graphics display (3 green dots in the middle of the screen telling me that there is a graphics mode lurking in there somewhere). So, (in text mode) I logged into my account and tried

$ startx

and after the “normal” messages I saw the following

(===) Using config file: “/etc/X11/xorg.conf”
(===) using config directory: “etc/X11/xorg.conf.d”
(===) Using system config directory “/usr/share/X11/xorg.conf.d”
VGA Arbitration: Cannot restore default device. (EE) Server terminated with error (1). Closing log file.
xinit: giving up
xinit: unable to connect to X server: Connection rfused
xinit: server error

xinit failed. /usr/bin/Xorg is not setuid, maybe that’s the reason?
If so either use a dispaly manager (strongly recommended) or adjust /etc/permissions.local and run “chkstat --system --set” afterwards

So my question now is how to proceed to get the graphical display back? I’m not changing anything on the system without some guidance because I don’t want to mess things up more than they already are.

Thanks for any suggestions.

Mark

4

You didn’t mention that maybe you have an “Optimus” laptop?
Please show the result of:

sudo lspci -nnk | grep -E 'VGA|3D' -A3

(paste the result between CODE tags, use the # button above the editing line)

5


{Nyuk,nyuk} If I could "cut and paste" on the linux machine, I wouldn't be in the state I am now in, so I'll transcribe:

```
#lspci -nnk | grep -E 'VGA|3D' -A3
01:00.0 VGA compatible controller [0300]: NVIDIA Corporation GM107 [GeForce GTX750] [10de:1301] (rev a2)
Subsystem: ASUSTeK Computer Inc. Device [1043:8517]
Kernel driver in use: nvidia
Kernel modules: noveau, nvidia_drm, nvidia
``` <br><br>

BTW, not a laptop, a home built desktop.

Thank you,<br>Mark

6

This one’s proving hard to get rid of – it don’t work no more – it’s been superseded …

Please use “systemctl isolate graphical.target”.

7

From where?

  • Which provider?
  • Which source?
8

Which GUI are you using?

  • GNOME?
  • KDE Plasma?
  • Something else?

[HR][/HR]Is that GUI behaving as expected for the case of other applications?
[HR][/HR]Please note that, the “gnubg” package has some dependency requirements: “zypper info --requires gnubg”.
Does “zypper verify” indicate any missing dependencies?

After you performed the upgrade from Leap 15.0 to Leap 15.1, did you execute the following system checks?

  • zypper verify
  • rpm --verify --all
  • rpmconfigcheck

[HR][/HR]Did you follow the openSUSE Guidelines for system upgrade?<https://en.opensuse.org/SDB:System_upgrade&gt; and <https://en.opensuse.org/SDB:Offline_upgrade&gt;.

9

Using config file: “/etc/X11/xorg.conf”

Often this is an problem so please rename this file and try it once more.

Question:
How do you install the graphic driver? Repo or the run-file?

Also show:

nvidia-settings -v
10

I ran:
$systemctl isolate graphical.target
====AUTHENTICATING FOR org.freedesktop.systemd1.manage-units====
Authentication is required to start ‘garphical.target’.
Authenticating as: root
Password: <************> #root password
PolicyKit daemon disconnected from the bus,
We are no longer a registered authentication agent.

11

Driver downloaded from the NVidia site.
Source file:
NVIDIA-Linux-x86_64-430.34.run

Which provider? (sorry, I don’t understand what you are asking for)

Mark

12

(graphics installled from run file downloaded from NVidia site)

From your first suggestion, I now can get into GUI. (just need to fix resolution) So, I’m going to work on the system some more and see if this is totally fixed. I will report back later.

Thank you,
Mark

13

The systemd control CLI has to be executed by the user “root”.

14

Wait a minute – originally, you seem to have mentioned that, the GUI was running OK with the default openSUSE NVidia driver …

What happens to the GUI if, you revert to the openSUSE default Leap 15.1 installation?
[HR][/HR]I have a suspicion that, the original issue with GNU Backgammon not displaying, is due to an unresolved dependency which arose during the Leap 15.0 to Leap 15.1 upgrade …

15

Hi
Why 430.34, latest is 440.44? The Leap 15.1 rpms (G05) should work fine as well…

I have the 440.44 running fine with a GT710 card and Leap 15.1 with Gnome DE.

To install the drivers, I use;


systemctl set-default multi-user.target
systemctl reboot
./NVIDIA-Linux-x86_64-440.44.run -aq
systemctl set-default graphical.target
systemctl reboot

But from your lspci output it seems the driver is working…?

16

I am back to normal operations. Since you were so kind to reply, allow me to respond. The GUI was working fine in 15.0, but I had problems going to 15.1 . What it came down to was my “/etc/X11/xorg.conf” file was messing things up. Renaming the xorg.conf file to something else, and letting the system do its thing worked. I only had to reset the desktop video resolution and I’m back in normal operation.

I’m going to try to work with the folks on the gbg mailing list since they seem to be aware of the problem…or I can just add some time to the rest of my day to do things other than play games. Hmmmm…I’ll have to ponder that https://forums.opensuse.org/images/icons/icon10.png.

Thank you for the help,
Mark

17

I’m saying that this is solved. Moving “/etc/X11/xorg.conf” out of the way (I renamed it) allowed the system to discover the hardware and get everything booting properly. Then all I had to do was to reset the resolution from 640 X 480 to 1280 X 1040 (that’s what my hardware supports) and all is well.

Thank you to everyone who helped me with this.

Mark