Debian 10 Nvidia Install Fails

[RationalOrder]

Hello Debian Forum. I have taken interest in Debian 10 and wish to use it as a daily driver. I have installed Debian using the non-free unofficial ISO file and installation works fine. However I do wish to do some gaming on my laptop as well and of course that means I have to install the Nvidia Drivers. I tried following the Debian Wiki but I see that the tutorial for installing Nvidia Drivers still remains the most updated for Debian 9. I still followed the tutorial anyway and my machine did boot, however my Nvidia X Server Settings application did not work. Here are the steps I did:

su
dpkg --add-architecture i386
apt-get install nvidia-detect
apt-get install libavcodec-extra
apt-get install firmware-linux-nonfree
nvidia-detect (nvidia detect recommended the install of the nvidia-driver package or the legacy package)
apt-get install linux-headers-$(uname -r|sed 's/[^-]*-[^-]*-//') nvidia-driver
reboot

When I tried launching the Nvidia X Server Settings application through command line (nvidia-settings) an error was displayed an error (can't remember the exact error as I am not currently on Debian 10 at the moment but it said something short, something along the lines of no device found). My understanding has always been that if that application does not work, then the Nvidia Drivers did not install correctly. I looked up some additional solutions for why this was not working and I ran a command to generate a xorg.conf file. Upon reboot, my computer was stuck at a black screen. I was able to escape the boot hang to a terminal and removed the xorg.conf file and the system booted once again, however, this means I'm nowhere near any farther than when I started out.

I believe it is worth noting that I have not had a problem installing my Nvidia Drivers on any Ubuntu based distro. Please understand that I am not saying this to say Ubuntu is better or rub the issue in Debian's face, but rather just to say it in case there is a step which is done on Ubuntu during the auto installs that isn't done on Debian during my manual install, which I may be missing. Anyhow, on any of the Ubuntu spins, Linux Mint, and PopOS, my drivers install fine and the Nvidia X Server Settings Application works without a problem. My computer is an Acer Nitro 5 laptop with an Nvidia GTX 1050 graphics card. Thank you in advance for any help.

[stevepusser]

Doesn't that laptop have hybrid Optimus graphics? In that case, Debian presently offers only Bumblebee as a way to use the Nvidia card to accelerate the 3D rendering in the background before handing it back to the Intel GPU, which always is handling the display.

Check out the wiki for Bumblebee instructions.

[RationalOrder]

Thank you for the response. I don't honestly know for a fact that my graphics card is an Optimus graphics card. When I use the command lspci | grep -i --color 'vga\|3d\|2d' I do get two outputs, my Nvidia GTX 1050 (mobile) graphics card and an Intel card. I would think that qualifies as being Optimus, however, on Ubuntu based distro's I can install the needed Nvidia graphics driver normally without needing to install Bumblebee. If my card was indeed Optimus, then wouldn't installing the Nvidia drivers be impossible for every distro? I could be totally off though. The reason I'm asking is because it does seem much more tedious and difficult to install and configure Bumblebee rather than installing the normal graphics drivers, I know nothing about Bumblebee, and I don't know if it would offer the same level of performance as the regular Nvidia graphics drivers. Now, I'm not scared to get my hands dirty since it isn't hard in the grand scheme with tutorials galore, but it still is something I want to be sure of before going the extra steps.

[stevepusser]

Ubuntu may be using called nvidia-prime, but it's not available on Debian. Right now, setting up Bumblebee per the wiki is the only choice.

If your Intel hardware is 2016 or newer, you'll very probably need to also add the non-free section of the repo and install firmware-misc-nonfree to have it work correctly.

[RationalOrder]

Ah so that's why it works normally on Ubuntu based distros and not Debian. I did install Bumblebee and it appears that when I run the Optirun command for Nvidia Settings all is as it should be. Not the most convenient of work-arounds but I asked for a solution and I got one. So in the meantime this means my question is answered and this forum can be marked as solved. Thank you for your help.