Changing video cards

[ZIYAD A. M. AL-BATLY]

On Sat, 2005-04-09 at 21:00 -0500, John T. Moran wrote:
> I'm running the i686-smp kernel. Can I run this reconfig using this 
> kernel and get 3d hardware acceleration? Would I need to then install 
> the drivers from nvidia after reconfiguring or will just reconfigure 
> take care of that?
> 
> Sorry for sounding stupid but I'm trying to learn the ins and outs. 
> Coming from windows, I'd just slap the card in, boot, install the 
> drivers and be done. I wish Ubuntu had a hardware detection during boot 
> that would handle this more automatically like other distros I've seen. 
> Sure would make life easier.
> 
> John Moran
> 

(No one is stupid because he/she is trying to learn (a stupid one is the
one how doesn't want/refuse to learn!). We (almost) all were the same as
you and we asked to learn!.)

As for your question: just install the package
        linux-restricted-modules-686-smp
and issue the command:
        sudo dpkg-reconfigure xserver-xorg
and when asked choose the "nvidia" driver (not "nv" but "nvidia", if you
didn't find it listed, just type it yourself!).

Reboot, or run from console (the credit to this one goes to Daniel Stone
who also replayed to you):
        sudo invoke-rc.d gdm restart
and you're set. You don't need to install anything from NVIDIA's website
as the above mentioned package include the driver ready to use (thanks
to the good people at Ubuntu for this).

Ziyad.