Install problem on MSI GX600

English Install/Boot/Login
1

well, this brand should be approx. 5 years old. The motherboard is “Microstar International-MS-163A (REV:1)”
Intel Dualcore Centrino and Nvidia Geforce 8600M GT

I got the same issues by installing 11.4 and 12.1. So, with some tricks I got the laptop installed with Opensuse 12.1. The 64 bit version prints with mistakes, checked on a HP AllInOne and a PIXMA. the 32 bit version prints properly. However nouveau works really on the limit, so sometimes and erratically the machine hangs by booting. If I follow all advices about how to uninstall nouveau (nice driver) then I can compile and install the proprietary nvidia driver, but after that this one doesn’t work. I always use the last stable version. Equally by nvidia like by nouveau Xorg doesn’t find “useful screens”. Xorg -configure generates some xorg.conf with 4 different graphic cards and screens, declared as unusable by the propritary nvidia driver.
Any idea about how to put on the work this nvidia proprietary driver?
Thanks

2

Check this post: http://forums.opensuse.org/english/get-technical-help-here/install-boot-login/468953-no-login-xserver-nvidia.html#post2412763

3

Thanks again, Flux. I will also do that tonight. Like you see, the most of my friends want to get SUSE. :slight_smile:

4

Hi Flux, I checked what you adviced and even a bit more. Basically they say “find some other distributin, bye bye” and they don’t know how right they are…
By the next distro I got the proprietary nvidia driver out of the box, just with 2 mouse clicks. The driver is pretty old, but gives on a 8600 model 19000 frames/sec. not too bad…
The driver (clearly precompiled):
nvidia 173.14.30
server version number 11.0
server vendor string The X.Org Foundation
nv-control-version 1.16

in addition they must have some script running in the background and selecting the right choice among 3 different ones.
the stuff comes clearly from ubuntu, associated distro even don’t test it.
i saved the installation just in case you would have some interest on further details.

5

I usually get this one with 0 mouse click on Ubuntu, since it seems to be activated by default.

Yes, and you should activate the “current” one - which is not as current as the name indicates.

This is from Ubuntu Oneiric :

$ **lsb_release -d**
Description:    Ubuntu 11.10
$ **uname -r**
3.0.0-16-generic
$ **grep NVIDIA /var/log/Xorg.0.log | head -5**
   940.988] (II) Module glx: vendor="NVIDIA Corporation"
   940.988] (II) NVIDIA GLX Module  **280.13**  Wed Jul 27 17:12:07 PDT 2011
   940.990] (II) Module nvidia: vendor="NVIDIA Corporation"
   940.990] (II) NVIDIA dlloader X Driver  280.13  Wed Jul 27 16:55:26 PDT 2011
   940.990] (II) NVIDIA Unified Driver for all Supported NVIDIA GPUs
$ **hwinfo --gfxcard | grep -e Device -e Driver -e Model**
  Model: "ASUSTeK A8N-VM CSM"
  Device: pci 0x0240 "GeForce 6150"
  SubDevice: pci 0x81cd "A8N-VM CSM"
  Driver: "nvidia"
  Driver Modules: "nvidia"
  Driver Info #0:
  Driver Info #1:
$ **dpkg -l |awk '/nvidia/ { print $2, $3 }'**
nvidia-173 173.14.30-0ubuntu8
nvidia-common 1:0.2.35
nvidia-current **280.13**-0ubuntu6
nvidia-settings 280.13-0ubuntu2
$ **lsmod | grep nvidia**
nvidia              11713772  30 
$ **modinfo nvidia_current | grep filename**
filename:       /lib/modules/3.0.0-16-generic/updates/dkms/nvidia_current.ko

You and “they” were just not able to install the right nvidia driver, neither on openSUSE, nor on Ubuntu. Because Ubuntu installs this old proprietary driver, it makes the installation a lot easier for most people. Without even checking “a bit more”, you should have got the nvidia driver installed under openSUSE, and even a newer version. I don’t know how it would have increased the video performance - I’m not a graphics guy.