Nvidia on Ubuntu

Because I wanted to run a local Artificial Intelligence platform called Ollama, I wanted to ensure that my GPU was fully utilized in the system since GPUs are the particular type of hardware best suited for these Vector calculations. And, I have a 'decent' GPU - Nvidia GeForce RTX 4060 (the best you could get when I built the system in 2024). In trying to install the latest Nvidia driver, I set off on a week-long journey of learning, frustration and perseverance discovering the inner workings of Ubuntu 24.04, Xorg, the Linux kernel and kernel modules, DRM, Secure Boot, initramfs and more.

I still do not have the Nvidia driver loaded - even after 40+ reboots and attempts. Instead I'm using the Nouveau driver but at least I have a working system and I believe now that I've finally figured out what needs to be done to disable Nouveau and install Nvidia - a project that I am approaching with greater scrutiny now. I'm documenting the things that I encounter in this journey.

Why not just continue to use Nouveau, a project of the freedesktop community? I mean "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" - right? In principle, I'd very much like to use nouveau. I'm not even sure that any alternative is "better" in any way - especially since I am not a gamer. My use case is to get the best performance from local LLMs. As I become familiar with the methods to switch video drivers reliably, I intend to run benchmarks and explore the benefits of one configuration vs another.

Status

As of 2025-07-03, I'm still not running with an NVIDIA driver. According to a Reddit thread just days ago, it's always been rather messy getting the right system together. I should "upgrade your system either to Ubuntu 25.04 for Wayland experience and no working suspend to RAM, or to 24.04 if you need suspend to RAM, but are Ok with using X11 instead of Wayland."

Since I'm on 24.04, and I've tried using X11 instead of Wayland without success, I plan to ensure my home directory is on its own partition and reinstall the OS to 25.04

Opposite

To go the opposite route, purging all proprietary drivers and installing the open source Nouveau driver, you pretty much just sudo apt install xserver-xorg-video-nouveau You might find seemingly good content/tutorials by linuxconfig, but I'm intentionally not linking to their site or YouTube videos because their content is plausible, but sketchy - IOW, it is Artificial Intelligence slop.

About this System

In your desktop environment, you can access 'System Settings' -> 'About this System' (KInfoCenter) to display basic info about your Software and Hardware environment including the 'graphics processor'. Mine says NV197 - which is the codename given to the card by the Nouveau project. You can click on 'Show More Information' which reveals a multi-tab dialog for OpenCL, OpenGL, Vulkan, Window Manager and X-Server with extensive Graphics info.

Or, you can also get details from a variety of CLI commands like glxinfo, lspci etc.

glxinfo | grep -E "OpenGL version|OpenGL renderer"

OpenGL renderer string: NV197

OpenGL version string: 4.3 (Compatibility Profile) Mesa 24.2.8-1ubuntu1~24.04.1

If you are on a TTY (without a display), lspci shows the same info

lspci | grep VGA

01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: NVIDIA Corporation AD107 [GeForce RTX 4060] (rev a1)

After the installation of Nvidia drivers fails, you won't have a functioning GPU, since you will no longer have the nouveau driver available either, and so the output of the same glxinfo command will show that "llvmpipe" is the renderer.

OpenGL renderer string: llvmpipe (LLVM 19.1.1, 256 bits)

OpenGL version string: 4.5 (Compatibility Profile) Mesa 24.2.8-1ubuntu1~24.04.1

LLVMpipe is a software rasterizer within the Mesa 3D graphics library that utilizes the LLVM compiler infrastructure to perform rendering entirely on the CPU. It acts as a software fallback when a dedicated GPU or its drivers are unavailable or malfunctioning, allowing OpenGL applications to run without hardware acceleration. Essentially, LLVMpipe takes over the rendering process when the GPU can't or shouldn't be used.

If dpkg shows xserver-xorg-video-nouveau is installed, then you can switch to it from e.g. "Driver Manager" in Settings.

Synaptic will allow you to view drivers, but you won't be able to switch from that interface (you'll get an error message about a lock file).

Although switching drivers from the system settings interface appears to complete without error, I'm not sure how well it works - if at all.

I was getting a broken desktop (single monitor, no good results from things like nvidia-smi) after installing Nvidia drivers, and so I tried switching to nouveau - and it somehow eventually worked.

apt-get remove -y --purge '^libnvidia-.*' && apt-get remove -y --purge '^nvidia-*' && apt-get remove -y --purge '*575*' && apt -y autoremove
apt -y autoclean
shutdown -r now
(recovery mode)
vim /etc/default/grub
update-grub

After doing a couple of reboots changing the boot 'modeline' and 'nosplash' options from a recovery console or the TTY, I didn't seem to get anywhere. But when I issued a 'startX' command, and the system booted into the GNOME desktop instead of KDE (?!!??), then I had dual monitors again. Amazingly nvidia-smi returned results, but glxinfo says now that I'm using onboard graphics from the CPU (not the GPU) but it doesn't say LLVMpipe

OpenGL renderer string: Mesa Intel(R) Graphics (RPL-S)

OpenGL version string: 4.6 (Compatibility Profile) Mesa 24.2.8-1ubuntu1~24.04.1

sudo lsmod|grep -i nvidia
nvidia_uvm           2158592  4
nvidia_drm            139264  5
nvidia_modeset       1736704  6 nvidia_drm
nvidia              11550720  81 nvidia_uvm,nvidia_modeset
ecc                    45056  2 ecdh_generic,nvidia
video                  77824  3 xe,i915,nvidia_modeset

Grub right now is 'normal'

GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="quiet splash"

The NVIDIA persistence daemon is running

systemctl list-units --type service --all | grep nvidia

 nvidia-persistenced.service                           loaded    active     running      NVIDIA Persistence Daemon

dkms shows that kernel modules are installed for two kernels

dkms status
nvidia/575.57.08, 6.8.0-60-generic, x86_64: installed (Original modules exist)
nvidia/575.57.08, 6.8.0-62-generic, x86_64: installed (Original modules exist)

GUI is stuck

Unable to select a proprietary driver in "Software Sources"

In theory, the GUI (see image) allows you to effortlessly choose and switch between multiple drivers. There are even YouTube videos that show how it's supposed to work. In practice, at least on my system, installing a second driver is not possible from a Graphical desktop environment.

If you go into the Graphical User Interface (GUI) for "System Settings" and then "Hardware -> Driver Manager" it would appear to allow you to simply choose to use a proprietary driver from Nvidia. But all the choices are disabled (grayed out). Every attempt I made to "install an Nvidia driver" - whether through a graphical package manager like Synaptic, or the CLI using apt or dpkg, would just result in a "non-working" graphics system where I didn't even have dual monitor support.

X.org

Here is the Xorg.log file from my first boot into a clean system having no Nvidia drivers.

Nouveau

The XServer is loading the nouveau driver package xserver-xorg-video-nouveau.

From the package description:

This driver for the X.Org X server (see xserver-xorg for a further description) provides support for NVIDIA Riva, TNT, GeForce, and Quadro cards.

This package provides 2D support including EXA acceleration, Xv and RandR. 3D functionality is provided by the libgl1-mesa-dri package.

This package is built from the FreeDesktop.org xf86-video-nouveau driver.

Inspection

dpkg can show us what packages are installed with 'nouveau' in the name.

dpkg -l | grep -i nouveau

ii  libdrm-nouveau2:amd64         2.4.122-1~ubuntu0.24.04.1    amd64    Userspace interface to nouveau-specific kernel DRM services -- runtime
ii  xserver-xorg-video-nouveau    1:1.0.17-2build1             amd64    X.Org X server -- Nouveau display driver

And, lsmod can show us what kernel modules are loaded with 'nouveau' in the name.

lsmod | grep nouveau

nouveau              3096576  68
drm_gpuvm              45056  2 xe,nouveau
drm_exec               12288  3 drm_gpuvm,xe,nouveau
gpu_sched              61440  2 xe,nouveau
drm_ttm_helper         12288  2 xe,nouveau
ttm                   110592  4 drm_ttm_helper,xe,i915,nouveau
drm_display_helper    237568  3 xe,i915,nouveau
mxm_wmi                12288  1 nouveau
i2c_algo_bit           16384  3 xe,i915,nouveau
video                  77824  3 xe,i915,nouveau
wmi                    28672  4 video,wmi_bmof,mxm_wmi,nouveau

modinfo tells us details about the kernel module, including the dependencies.

modinfo (command)

What files does the nouveau driver install? dpkg -L xserver-xorg-video-nouveau

/.
/usr
/usr/lib
/usr/lib/xorg
/usr/lib/xorg/modules
/usr/lib/xorg/modules/drivers
/usr/lib/xorg/modules/drivers/nouveau_drv.so
/usr/share
/usr/share/bug
/usr/share/bug/xserver-xorg-video-nouveau
/usr/share/doc
/usr/share/doc/xserver-xorg-video-nouveau
/usr/share/doc/xserver-xorg-video-nouveau/README.Debian
/usr/share/doc/xserver-xorg-video-nouveau/changelog.Debian.gz
/usr/share/doc/xserver-xorg-video-nouveau/copyright
/usr/share/man
/usr/share/man/man4
/usr/share/man/man4/nouveau.4.gz
/usr/share/bug/xserver-xorg-video-nouveau/script

NVidia

Documentation for installing NVidia drivers is at https://docs.nvidia.com/datacenter/tesla/driver-installation-guide/

The installation guide for the v570 of the driver (46 chapters) is at https://download.nvidia.com/XFree86/Linux-x86_64/570.153.02/README/

I've read the whole thing.

Replacing Nouveau

See NVIDIA driver 570.153.02 README common problems #nouveau where it says basically

1. denylist it
2. modify your initramfs
3. modify Xorg to not load nouveau

We explore these in more detail below.

Over at StackExchange, a user asked how to switch graphics driver from nouveau to nvidia and succeeded in part by modifying the boot parameters in grub to deny nouveau. Note that the boot parameters were used only during the process to stop using one driver and install the other driver. It is not a configuration that would allow you to have two different boot menu entries in GRUB in order to use two graphics modes.

Over in the Manjaro Linux forums, a user asked a similar question: How do I switch between Nvidia and Nouveau drivers on boot? They tried using

modprobe.blacklist=nvidia systemd.setenv=GPUMOD=nouveau rd.driver.blacklist=nvidia nouveau.modeset=1 nvidia.modeset=0

But ultimately had to install the OS twice on different disk partitions in order to choose to boot one system or the other depending on what graphics driver they needed to use.

Denylist

I tried denylisting the nouveau driver and preventing it from doing modesetting by creating disable-nouveau.conf however I was unsuccessful in installing Nvidia drivers even with that in place, and performing operations from a recovery console.

I've looked at the initramfs and don't see where it is loading nouveau. Although I do see where the temporary disable-nouveau.conf file I created is read in.

Modify Initial Ram Disk

The initial ram disk is a gzipped CPIO archive

file /boot/initrd.img-6.8.0-62-generic

/boot/initrd.img-6.8.0-62-generic: ASCII cpio archive (SVR4 with no CRC)

But how do you examine it? with lsiniramfs

There are quite a lot of files that get named in it. So, pipe it through a pager like less

X.org.conf

I've looked at Xorg but I'm not sure how / if it is responsible for requiring nouveau - but I can clearly see that the package is installed.

dpkg -l | grep -E "xorg|xserver"
ii  python3-xkit                                             0.5.0ubuntu6                                  all          library for the manipulation of xorg.conf files (Python 3)
ii  x11-xserver-utils                                        7.7+10build2                                  amd64        X server utilities
ii  xorg                                                     1:7.7+23ubuntu3                               amd64        X.Org X Window System
ii  xorg-docs-core                                           1:1.7.1-1.2                                   all          Core documentation for the X.org X Window System
ii  xorg-sgml-doctools                                       1:1.11-1.1                                    all          Common tools for building X.Org SGML documentation
ii  xserver-common                                           2:21.1.12-1ubuntu1.4                          all          common files used by various X servers
ii  xserver-xephyr                                           2:21.1.12-1ubuntu1.4                          amd64        nested X server
ii  xserver-xorg                                             1:7.7+23ubuntu3                               amd64        X.Org X server
ii  xserver-xorg-core                                        2:21.1.12-1ubuntu1.4                          amd64        Xorg X server - core server
ii  xserver-xorg-input-all                                   1:7.7+23ubuntu3                               amd64        X.Org X server -- input driver metapackage
ii  xserver-xorg-input-libinput                              1.4.0-1ubuntu24.04.1                          amd64        X.Org X server -- libinput input driver
ii  xserver-xorg-input-wacom                                 1:1.2.0-1ubuntu2                              amd64        X.Org X server -- Wacom input driver
ii  xserver-xorg-legacy                                      2:21.1.12-1ubuntu1.4                          amd64        setuid root Xorg server wrapper
ii  xserver-xorg-video-all                                   1:7.7+23ubuntu3                               amd64        X.Org X server -- output driver metapackage
ii  xserver-xorg-video-amdgpu                                23.0.0-1build1                                amd64        X.Org X server -- AMDGPU display driver
ii  xserver-xorg-video-ati                                   1:22.0.0-1build1                              amd64        X.Org X server -- AMD/ATI display driver wrapper
ii  xserver-xorg-video-fbdev                                 1:0.5.0-2build2                               amd64        X.Org X server -- fbdev display driver
ii  xserver-xorg-video-intel                                 2:2.99.917+git20210115-1build1                amd64        X.Org X server -- Intel i8xx, i9xx display driver
ii  xserver-xorg-video-nouveau                               1:1.0.17-2build1                              amd64        X.Org X server -- Nouveau display driver
ii  xserver-xorg-video-qxl                                   0.1.6-1build1                                 amd64        X.Org X server -- QXL display driver
ii  xserver-xorg-video-radeon                                1:22.0.0-1build1                              amd64        X.Org X server -- AMD/ATI Radeon display driver
ii  xserver-xorg-video-vesa                                  1:2.6.0-1                                     amd64        X.Org X server -- VESA display driver
ii  xserver-xorg-video-vmware                                1:13.4.0-1build1                              amd64        X.Org X server -- VMware display driver

Module Signing

On systems with Secure Boot enabled (mine), you most likely need to sign the module. See Signing NVIDIA Kernel Module. However, I didn't get an explicit message that signing was a problem; and I did see that the installation process signs the module with a generated key. I assume that the MOK process hooks into the trust system somehow.

When troubleshooting keeps turning up mysteries, you have to check your assumptions.

sudo modprobe nvidia
modprobe: ERROR: could not insert 'nvidia': Key was rejected by service

See Kernel modules

Tools and Troubleshooting

Ubuntu wants you to use the 'ubuntu-drivers' tool.

NVIDIA seems to just settled on a new mechanism rather than downloading the (former?) .run installers: wget https://developer.download.nvidia.com/compute/cuda/repos/ubuntu2404/x86_64/cuda-keyring_1.1-1_all.deb dpkg -i cuda-keyring_1.1-1_all.deb apt update apt install nvidia-open

NVIDIA distributes a script called nvidia-bug-report.sh that you can and should run to collect detailed information about any problems.

Interesting Notes

Usually, when you have 'sudo' or root privileges you can do more. One exception is the X-Server. Root access to the server may be restricted. In that case,

glxinfo

will give

Error: unable to open display

A regular user will have no problem running glxinfo.

Different Desktop Environments

As a regular user, my DE is KDE Plasma (using Kubuntu) rather than the GNOME default of Ubuntu

Subpages

• Kernel modules
• commands
• modinfo
• ubuntu-drivers

Digital Restrictions Management = Electronic methods to control what you can and can't do. In the context of video graphics, it means Direct Rendering Manager.

Machine Owner Key used in the UEFI for SecureBoot