NVIDIA Driver Install

[Ric Moore]

On Thu, 2010-07-15 at 12:48 -0400, Bruce Marshall wrote:
> On Thursday, July 15, 2010, Billie Walsh wrote:
> > "Installation instructions: Once you have downloaded the driver, change 
> > to the directory containing the driver package and install the driver by 
> > running, as root, sh ./NVIDIA-Linux-x86-256.35-pkg2.run". I have to edit 
> > the instruction to reflect the actual file name, 
> > NVIDIA-Linux-x86_64-256.35.run.
> > 
> > The file is in my "Downloads" directory so I used Dolphin to open the 
> > directory and then open a terminal in that directory. I checked the "Is 
> > Executable" box in the permissions also. When I try to execute the file 
> > I get an error message that says I'm running "x server", whatever that 
> > is, and I should exit before running the file. I'm not sure what it 
> > means [ OK, I'm a dummy ]. Does that mean that somehow I need to boot 
> > into command line and run it somehow from there?
> 
> You really can't update or change a video driver while you are currently 
> running a video driver.   That's what you were trying to do.
> 
> The "x server" is the video package that runs your desktop video and it will 
> use a video driver that works with whatever video card you have.
> 
> What you need to do is to run the .run from a stand-alone terminal session.  
> This can be done by using:
> 
> ctl-alt-<f-key>       as in    ctl-alt-f3
> 
> and that will get you to a REAL  terminal session.
> 
> Then:
> 
> /etc/init.d/kdm  stop   (assuming your running kdm)
> 
> (or gdm if the above doesn't seem to work)
> 
> and then run your .run file.  To run the file, you will have to give it 
> execution flags   as in    chmod +x <path to .run file>/<name of .run file>
> 
> but it might also work if you just issue:   sh  <path to .run file>/<name of 
> .run file>
>    
> Those are the basics.
> 
> When you've done all that successfully, then:
> 
> /etc/init.d/kdm  start

I did that for years. But, system/hardware_drivers did the trick for me.
Then you don't have anything floating loose from outside the "standard"
install. The less I dink with my system, the better off I am. :) Ric