Nvidia based EVGA GTX550TI issues and a solution

I recently moved from 12.2 to 12.3 but in the process I had several issues with getting my nvidia card to work in accelerated graphics mode.

Things I tried that did not work.

Add nvidia repository and install the latest nvidia G03 drivers with Yast, (this is supposed to be the right way to do this)
Try to run the nouveau drivers using Yast (these drivers work, kind of, but do not provide all of the cards functions. They also interfere with the nvidia driver in some cases.)
Try the slightly older nvidia G02 drivers using Yast (these did not work any better than the G03 drivers)
Tried to play with xorg.conf (found out that opensuse has not really been using xorg.conf since 11.2 or so).
Tried installing SAX3 and using that.

I added the “video” group to my login account as I was getting odd errors about the nvidia driver not being able to access a /dev file. (this actually helped that issue so I guess it is not a (things that did not work but it did not fix the issue by itself)). This addition can be done using Yast.

I tried some things along the way that completely made my system not work, among them running nvidia-config from a console as root which creates a xorg.conf file. I had to rename the xorg.conf file to something else to get my graphical interface to start without locking up part way through.

I played with GRUB settings so it defaulted to 1280x1028 (my monitors base resolution) so I could see all the apps. It was defaulting to something like 640x480 or less. I used Yast to change this in the bootloader section.

In case you did not know, you can start Yast in curses mode on one of the command line consoles, (curses is a text based console that you have to use tab, space, arrow keys, and enter to maneuver in.) If you have a command line, you just type in yast and it will start.

I tried to list some of things that did not get me where I wanted to be so you can avoid it and just go straight to what worked for me

The last thing I tried that worked.

Downloaded the latest driver from nvidia’s website, (which is the same version as the one on Yast after adding the nvidia repository for 12.3.)
Did a control Alt Backspace until the X session stopped. (It is usually better to not be in X during installation as it ties up files used to support X and those files are what you are trying to update)
Did a control alt F2 to get a console and logged in as root
I went to where I downloaded the nvidia .bin file.
used chmod 777 (nvidia bin file name) to make it executable
Ran ./(nvidia bin file name) ./ is shorthand for “run it from the local directory where you are at”. That is a default for windows but not for linux.
I watched it run and answered a few questions and agreed to a few things during the installation.
After the installation showed it completed successfully I ran shutdown -r now, which reboots the system from a command line.
The system came back up and I verified that the nvidia module was loaded, lsmod | grep nvidia . (list loaded modules and filter for the text nvidia)
I examined the xorg log file at /var/log to verify it showed no fatal errors in loading the nvidia module.
I verified I had working acceleration by opening up a game and playing it with no issues.
You can also run glxgears but all that tells you is there is some kind of acceleration. It is not a benchmark and running a game is a better test that all is well.

dzimmerm

Thanks for your tutorial.
This is a “get help section” of the forum
do consider posting your future faqs in https://forums.opensuse.org/english/get-technical-help-here/how-faq-forums/unreviewed-how-faq/

Ok, will do that!

dzimmerm

Note, it is not necessary to do the “chmod 777”.

Instead just navigate to the directory where the .run file is located and type:


sh nvidia-bin-file-name.run

where nvidia-bin-file-name.run would be the name of the downloaded nvidia bin file.

In fact I normally type


sh nvidia-bin-file-name.run -q

to minimize the number of questions I am asked.