I am currently running a fresh install of opensuse 13.2 with KDE 4.14.2. I am using the 1-click install version of the Nvidia driver for my GeForce 6150SE nForce 430. Driver is listed as 304.123. My PC is a no OS desktop PC, which I bought 5 years ago, and has run linux – some kubuntu, but mostly opensuse (12.1, 12.3, 13.1 and now 13.2) – with few problems that couldn’t be solved with a little research and the excellent help here in these forums.
The first version of the driver for 13.2 must have been very buggy, because it simply didn’t work. I used another distro in the interim, and soon thereafter, after checking the forums, I read that the buggy driver was fixed, and I did a clean install of 13.2 and used the 1-click install method to install the updated driver. But now, while the driver has great resolution, the fan is really noisy. I have read through several posts, mostly dealing with the radeon driver, or with laptops. Any advice on what I can do with the nvidia driver on my desktop PC to fix the constant fan noise?
I did see a message which flashed during bootup or restart – not sure which – saying something about change fan setting in the bios to cool and quiet. I did this, but it didn’t change anything, so I set it back. There was also something that flashed having to do with acpi, but not sure of the exact statement.
By the way, the inside of the PC is clean, and fan blades are clean.
Where would I find the nvidia-xconfig file?
There is an nvidia X-server config application on the Kickoff menu under System > Configuration > Configure NVIDIA X Server settings?
Does that mean an nvidia-xconfig file was created?
Hi
There might not be one (that’s normal these days) but we can check, first if you run;
fgrep -r nvidia /etc/X11/*
Assuming we don’t see an output, then I would assume that we can create a new 50-device.conf file after backing up the old one somewhere, you also need to check the Device name in 50-screen.conf so they match.
Section "Device"
Identifier "<SAME AS IN 50-screen.conf>"
Driver "nvidia"
Option "Coolbits" "5"
VendorName "NVIDIA Corporation"
EndSection
Then I’m about at my limit, I always install the driver via the hard way (eg the run file) and create an xorg.conf with the tool, never worried about the rpms these days. Hopefully some other folk will add some advice.
One other thought, if you run the command, does it exist and do you get output;
Hi
OK, kewl, it did create the file, so you can add the option in the /etc/X11/xorg.conf file after the Driver line and reboot. If it fails to fire up the GUI, then it would need to be edited back out…
Now in saying that, it may not work, since in the output from nvidia-smi under fan it show N/A, but that (hopefully) changes when you add the option.
Adding the Coolbits to the xorg.conf file in the nvidia section definitely did the job. I shut down the PC twice. The first bootup after that, it was still a bit noisy. So I waited a little and shut the PC down again. The second bootup was quiet all the way until the KDE desktop loaded, then there was a little bit of noise. But there are more and more quiet “episodes” and the noise is reduced, when it occurs.
The fan settings don’t seem to have changed really, yet the fan is behaving much better than it was. Still, previously, I hardly heard it at all. Now I hear it in brief spurts, then it’s quiet. So an improvement; much better than the constant noise I was hearing before.
I’m sure the script will be useful, but since I am not very script savvy, I’m not sure how to detect and edit the variables.
