First of all, excuse my naivete, but I have two questions. 1: Why is the nvidia license a problem for adding the drivers to an openSUSE repo but it doesn’t seem to be a problem for other distributions?
2: Why is the nvidia repo so complicated? I’ll expound upon this by stating that the latest driver (331.20) supports just about everything from what I can tell so why do they break it down into different packages for openSUSE? See here. Also, they do not seem to keep their repository up to date as I cannot install the x11-video-nvidia package because the only version they have is the ancient 96.xx driver with a broken dependency.
So, why do we have to rely on this nonsensical method for installing the nvidia drivers when other distros simply have an nvidia package that installs the driver regardless of what card they are using?
Apparently the nvidia driver possibly violates the Kernel’s license, so they cannot be shipped together.
Other distributions might not care that much about that problem.
2: Why is the nvidia repo so complicated? I’ll expound upon this by stating that the latest driver (331.20) supports just about everything from what I can tell so why do they break it down into different packages for openSUSE? See here.
Not at all.
The G03 (331.20) driver only supports GeForce 8 and up, for GeForce 6/7 you need G02 (304.xxx), for GeForce FX the G01 (173.xxx) variant.
Then there’s also the 96.xx and 71.xx versions for even older cards, but those won’t work with current kernels and X anyway.
And the page you link to tells exactly this.
And why do you not ask:
Why is nvidia shipping 3 (actually 4) different drivers? And even more different versions (long-lived branch, short-lived branch)?
See here: http://www.nvidia.com/object/unix.html
Also, they do not seem to keep their repository up to date as I cannot install the x11-video-nvidia package because the only version they have is the ancient 96.xx driver with a broken dependency.
The driver has been removed since it just doesn’t work on current openSUSE versions. See also here: https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=855454
But for some reason that x11-video-nvidia package reappeared in December after the repo disappeared completely for a few days. Something seems to have gone wrong on nvidia’s side there (they host the repo).
But again, this driver version DOES NOT WORK on openSUSE 12.3 AND 13.1.
Nvidia would have to release a new version that supports the current Kernel and Xorg. But don’t hold your breath.
And some nitpicking: why do you want to install x11-video-nvidia (96.43.23), when according to you the 331.20 (x11-video-nvidiaG03) “supports just about everything”?
So, why do we have to rely on this nonsensical method for installing the nvidia drivers when other distros simply have an nvidia package that installs the driver regardless of what card they are using?
Why is it nonsensical to click on a 1-click installer?
The driver cannot/will not be shipped in the distribution, period.
You either use the nouveau driver included, or install the nvidia driver in one of many possible ways.
But at least nvidia announced not too long ago that they plan to finally support the development of the open source nouveau driver. So maybe in a few years, you won’t have to rely on such a “nonsensical method for installing the nvidia drivers”…
The G03 (331.20) driver only supports GeForce 8 and up, for GeForce 6/7 you need G02 (304.xxx), for GeForce FX the G01 (173.xxx) variant.
Then there’s also the 96.xx and 71.xx versions for even older cards, but those won’t work with current kernels and X anyway.
Not according to nVidia’s website. Go here and click on supported products.
And why do you not ask:
Why is nvidia shipping 3 (actually 4) different drivers? And even more different versions (long-lived branch, short-lived branch)?
See here: Unix Drivers | NVIDIA
They’re not shipping 4 different drivers, they’re simply making available older versions of the drivers.
Why is it nonsensical to click on a 1-click installer?
I never mentioned anything about the 1-click installer. What is nonsensical is that the drivers are broken up into different support packages when clearly 331.20 supports all of them (as referenced above).
???
Where does that say that it supports a GeForce 7 series card, f.e.? (or even older ones?)
And no, I don’t mean GeForce 700…
They’re not shipping 4 different drivers, they’re simply making available older versions of the drivers.
Wrong.
Did you look at the page?
There’s:
Latest Long Lived Branch version: 331.20 (GeForce 8 and up, that’s the G03 package)
Latest Short Lived Branch version: 325.15 (GeForce 8 and up)
Latest Legacy GPU version (304.xx series): 304.117 (for GeForce 6 and 7, does also support newer cards; that’s the G02 package)
Latest Legacy GPU version (71.86.xx series): 71.86.15 (for the oldest cards)
Latest Legacy GPU version (96.43.xx series): 96.43.23 (for GeForce 4 series)
Latest Legacy GPU version (173.14.xx series): 173.14.39 (for GeForce FX series, that’s the G01 package)
And that’s only for x86. But I guess we can ignore the rest here anyway…
I never mentioned anything about the 1-click installer. What is nonsensical is that the drivers are broken up into different support packages when clearly 331.20 supports all of them (as referenced above).
Again, that’s completely wrong. The 331.20 DOES NOT SUPPORT older cards which ARE supported by G01 or G02.
And that division is done by nvidia, not openSUSE.
It does not support older chip sets. I need GO2 to work with my 6800+ and 220 based boards. So the Web site appear to be wrong. GO3 does support all recent cards older ones not so much!
In any case it is a NVIDIA problem not an openSUSE problem. Also not the OS name, openSUSE. openSUSE only ships open source programs. NVIDI drivers are NOT open source.
Ok, my mistake. I didn’t look in detail at all of them, but I did notice that it mentioned the legacy version is needed for Geforce 4xx which I took to mean 400 series, and I assumed the 6xxx and 7xxx were including 600M, 700M, etc. or whatever suffix they might have. No need to be a prick wolfi323.
