NVIDIA AND ATI

English Hardware
#1

i have opensuse 11.1 on a portable hard drive

I was wondering if there was a way to put NVIDIA and ATI drivers on opensuse

because i have one computer that has an nvidia graphics card

and the other a ATI graphics card.

#2

Typically openSUSE comes with

  • Frame buffer graphic driver (not so commonly known about) and
  • Vesa graphic driver (works mostly on all graphic cards) and
  • one or more free opensource “openGL” graphic drivers (for ATI and separate for nVidia).
    openSUSE does not come packaged with proprietary drivers, although there are proprietary drivers.

To be more specific …

In the case of nVidia this means:

  • fbdev - frame buffer driver (comes with openSUSE) very slow. Very limited in resolution colours. Survives a kernel/xorg update.
  • vesa - vesa driver (comes with openSUSE). Slow (not as slow as fbdev). Survives a kernel/xorg/update.
  • nv - openGL driver for nvidia (comes with openSUSE). Better performance than vesa. Survies a kernel/xorg update. Probably does not support special desktop effects.
  • nvidia - proprietary nVidia driver (go to here: NVIDIA - openSUSE ) . Best performance. Will break when there is a kernel/xorg update.

In the case of ATI this means

  • fbdev - frame buffer driver (comes with openSUSE) very slow. Very limited in resolution colours. Survives a kernel/xorg update.
  • vesa - vesa driver (comes with openSUSE). Slow (not as slow as fbdev). Survives a kernel/xorg/update.
  • ati - openGL driver for ATI older hardware (comes with openSUSE) Better performance than vesa. Survies a kernel/xorg update. Probably does not support special desktop effects.
  • radeon - openGL driver for ATI radeon hardware (comes with openSUSE). Better performance than vesa. Survies a kernel/xorg update. Probably does not support special desktop effects.
  • radeonhd - openGL driver for ATI HD radeon hardware (comes with openSUSE). Better performance than vesa. Survies a kernel/xorg update. Probably does not support special desktop effects.
  • fglrx - proprietary ATI driver (go to here: ATI - openSUSE ) Best performance. Will break when there is a kernel/xorg update.

Typically one will install an ATI or nVidia driver by one of two methods:

  • add the appropriate software repository (ATI or nVidia) to one’s software package manager, and then install the appropriate rpms with the driver. Then boot to run level 3 and run “sax2” with appropriate arguments to configure/modify the xorg.conf file.
  • download a " .run " file that is a binary that will custom build the driver on one’s PC (for ATI or nVidia as appropriate). Then configure/modify the xorg.conf file (typically via “sax2” with appropriate arguments). This is often called “the hardway” although it is NOT hard.
    Sometimes extra steps are required.

Note kernel updates almost always break the proprietary driver. The repositories do not always have the updated driver after a kernel update, and hence typically the “hardway” of installing the ATI/nVidia driver has a better probability of working.

#3

@oldcpu: I read the OP and I thought they meant that they would like to be able to setup X for two different graphics card environments, depending on which computer the external drive (containing openSUSE) is plugged into. I’m not sure how this could be tackled. Maybe with 2 grub entries pointing to 2 different root file systems?

I know recent Ubuntu and Fedora distros (using new Xorg versions), have virtually done away with xorg.conf, and use hal to detect the graphics hardware at boot and load the correct drivers.

#4
  • jeloudevla

the VESA driver in the kernel should work for both cards.
Else you could install both drivers, configure one xorg.conf for ATI and one for NVidia and copy them in place depending on the hardware you are using.

Uwe

#5

ferrari was right, i have two graphics cards that are completely different one is NVIDIA the other is ATI. is there away for both of them to talk on suse? etc NVIDIA on my desktop ATI on my friends computer?

#6

how would i configure to xorg files?

step by step would be great, as im a bit of a rookie

at the momment i can use nano and terminal pretty well but its the “what to type as a command” i get mixed up.

#7

is there a program like Evy

that might detect the graphics in your computer?

for suse??

11.1

#8

sorry its called Envy

#9

Not aware of anything like that. I think you either accept a basic vesa driver (to cater for either graphics chipset), or try recent distro like FC11, or Ubuntu 9.04. BTW, have a read of this blog concerning ‘no xorg.conf required’.

In theory, it would be possible to write a script to detect the graphics hardware (and have it executed at boot time before X starts) and link xorg.conf to appropriate xorg file version stored somewhere, but not practical, and I’m not up for the job!

#10

sorry its called Envy

Just had a look at Envy. Looks interesting. As a Python app it may be able to be adapted for openSUSE. Sadly no RPMs available AFAIK.

#11

ok so just give me a couple more clues how would i do two xorg config files without or telling it to boot with one graphics card or the other

#12

Why not simply create three partitions, one for each graphics card/computer and a third as a (shared) /home? Install openSUSE on first machine, install ATI driver. Repeat procedure on second machine, install NVIDIA driver. Edit GRUB menu to give you the choice at boot time. Done.
An openSUSE installation is small enough for this to be not too wasteful of disk space. That’s assuming you’re using the drive as a boot drive on both machines, with no further complications such as co-existence with Windows etc.
I’m sure this approach could be further refined by an inventive partitioning scheme, maximising the shared space and minimising the duplication.

#13

so the two partitions would be two be two boot partions

and one home partition?

#14

Yes.

(The forum software says the message is too short :-))

#15

It is. :wink:

This one as well.

#16

how do i tell grub to boot the 4th partition?

its mounted as a local partition, and it recongnises the bz image but not the kernel file in grub

how do i set it up so that the kernel file is on the local partition.

#17

ok i have chosen to install with a root and a boot partition

i have the root partition set to boot, but how do i edit the grub config to also boot the boot partition as the ATI partition with ATI graphics not Nvidia.

I don’t know how to tell Grub to boot the partition that is the boot partition for the ATI graphics.

#18

Not quite sure what you’ve done there. What I had in mind was to create the partitions before installation, then go through two entirely different installations for the ATI and NVIDIA versions, but using the same /home. The second installation would presumably pick up the existing first one and add it to the Grub menu - leaving you to edit it later as they will have the same names? (Guessing here).

#19

Assuming you have performed two installations as gminnerup described, then you will have two root partitions (one for NVIDIA and one for ATI). From a terminal (with root privileges) execute these commands so we can see how your installations have been set up:

cat /boot/grub/menu.lst

fdisk -l

#20

before installation yast 2 setup wouldn’t let me mount 2 root partitions

so i created a boot and a root partition

now the root partition has a folder in it called boot.

that folder is now redirected and mounted to the boot partition.
how do i unmount that folder.