Adding nVidia PCI card to system

[Marc Zuverink]

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

Carroll Grigsby wrote:
> Marc Zuverink wrote:
> 
>> Recently switched from Mandriva to Ubuntu and have a situation
>> regarding nVidia cards.
>> In Mandriva my PCI nVidia GForce2 MX 400 was automatically configured
>> properly by the installer and I had no problems.  When installing
>> Ububtu the installer froze up and would not finish the installation
>> after the detection stage of hardware.  The screen would go black with
>> a non-blinking cursor, and the system would freeze up.  The install
>> would not finish and I would have to restart.   The restart would
>> result in an unfinish/incomplete install.
>> I removed the card and reinstalled relying on the onboard Intel
>> graphics and had no problems.
>> However I would now like to reinsert the nvidia pci card, but am
>> unsure of the process.
>> Could someone please help me out with this?
>>
>> Thanks.
> 
> 
> Marc:
> Strange, I'm using the AGP version of the same card on Ubuntu 5.04
> (Hoary) and it Just Works. IIRC, the installer chose a higher resolution
> than I prefer but that was quickly changed. About the only thing that I
> can suggest is trying a different PCI slot. (I assume that you disabled
> the onboard video in the BIOS.)
> 
> -- cmg (another ex-Mandrake/Mandrive user)
> 

Yes I manually disabled the onboard and checked several times not
trusting myself.

I have had this problem on other distros but since I was only testing
them out I did not feel like solving the problem.  Suse has done the
same thing with the card.

Just to make sure the video card still works, I pulled out my hard
drives threw in an old 80 gig and did a Mandriva 2006 install and a
Slackware 10.2 install, both distros that i have used in the past and
both distros that configure this card properly without having to do mote
that change "nv" to "nvidia" after installing the driver from there site.

I should also mention that toying around I printed the Mandriva
XORG.CONF file and tried using a test editor to change the settings on
the box and then shut down leaving the driver settings to "nv" since and
I had not installed the driver from nvidia or from the repositories. I
insterted the card and X would not start. Actually I could not even get
a console. I shut down, I removed the card and I restored the file to
its orig working state using the onboard video.

I am at lose of what to do.  I think that you may indeed be correct
about the screen resolution.

I know that on my daughters machine that when I installed, when it got
to the X part of the configuration it asked me what resolutions I wanted
to use.  When I install on my box with the same install cd, whether with
the nvidia card in or just the onboard I am never confronted with an
option of any type.

I just do not know what to do next, without better graphics I am going
to go nuts.
- --
Marc Zuverink <marc_zuverink at sbcglobal.net>

Knowledge comes, but wisdom lingers.
  - Alfred Lord Tennyson
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.1 (GNU/Linux)
Comment: Using GnuPG with Thunderbird - http://enigmail.mozdev.org

iD8DBQFD1MQAwmKHivkPyMcRAt43AKCezuhzHF/EDa3AQrTaVET36DZGyACfYXVw
o3TTxEKL0zYzd77MEHekyCM=
=cs4a
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----