best advice for installing nvidia

[rayandrews]

I'm trying to install the nvidia drivers on bookworm. It seems to be rather more difficult that in was on bullseye. I've checked the internet and there's dozens of tutorials, all of them different. So far I've edited my /etc/apt/sources.list:

deb http://deb.debian.org/debian/ bookworm main non-free-firmware contrib
deb http://security.debian.org/debian-security bookworm-security main non-free-firmware contrib
deb http://deb.debian.org/debian/ bookworm-updates main non-free-firmware contrib

... some tutorials say 'non-free' should be used, others 'non-free-firmware'. Anyway with the above, I still can't find 'nvidia-detect' or 'nvidia-install'. Some of the tutorials want me to rebuild my kernel -- I sure didn't have to do that with bullseye. I don't want to dig myself into a hole, so I'm asking for the best advice on how to do this.

Tx.

[None1975]

Just check Debian wiki. Everything is very clearly explained and written there. It couldn't be easier.

... some tutorials

You should always use the official documentation (I mean the Debian wiki).

[rayandrews]

Thanks, this is the first I've ever heard of the wiki.

[rayandrews]

... did everything asked, but for some reason it's trying to work with the:

depmod: FATAL: could not search modules: No such file or directory
cat: /var/tmp/mkinitramfs_ZNYPMC/lib/modules/5.10.0-26-amd64/modules.builtin: No such file or directory

... with the wrong kernel. I'm running:

6.1.0-18-amd64

Should I uninstall the older kernel? I tend to keep them around in case of trouble but, apart from this, there hasn't been any trouble with 6.1.

I tried purging the driver and reinstalling but it claims it's already installed. And it *is* installed but with the wrong kernel. Which BTW is not officially installed. It's in my /boot directory because I wanted the option of booting Debian 11 until such times as Debian 12 is completely tested, but bookworm doesn't list it as installed so it seems strange that the nvidia installer would have noticed it at all.

[wizard10000]

You need to add non-free to the entries in your sources.list. Should look like this -

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deb http://deb.debian.org/debian/ bookworm main non-free-firmware contrib non-free
deb http://security.debian.org/debian-security bookworm-security main non-free-firmware contrib non-free
deb http://deb.debian.org/debian/ bookworm-updates main non-free-firmware contrib non-free

Then do an apt update and you should be fine.

Hope this helps -

[rayandrews]

Wiz:

I got as far as that. 'non-free-firmware' and 'non-free'. All the software is found, it's just that somehow the install script latches on to the wrong kernel. Then it can't find any modules cuz they aren't there. I've never tried to look at an install script, where might this one be? If I can take a look I might find the problem. It must be a bit strange what I've done, having the older kernel in /boot even though by rights I'd expect the installer to ignore it. So one might consider it a bug, but a forgivable one.

Weird thing is that I've deleted the 5.10 kernel and tried to purge and reinstall the driver but it keeps just saying that the driver is already installed. The first time it went thru the whole nine yards of the installation, but since then is just does 'nothing' and reports it's installed.

[milomak]

what does this return

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dpkg -l | grep nvidia

[rayandrews]

... a whole lot:

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4 /etc 0 % dpkg -l | grep nvidia
ii  glx-alternative-nvidia                    1.2.2                                amd64        allows the selection of NVIDIA as GLX provider
ii  libegl-nvidia-tesla-470-0:amd64           470.223.02-4~deb12u1                 amd64        NVIDIA binary EGL library (Tesla 470 version)
ii  libgl1-nvidia-tesla-470-glvnd-glx:amd64   470.223.02-4~deb12u1                 amd64        NVIDIA binary OpenGL/GLX library (GLVND variant) (Tesla 470 version)
ii  libgles-nvidia-tesla-470-1:amd64          470.223.02-4~deb12u1                 amd64        NVIDIA binary OpenGL|ES 1.x library (Tesla 470 version)
ii  libgles-nvidia-tesla-470-2:amd64          470.223.02-4~deb12u1                 amd64        NVIDIA binary OpenGL|ES 2.x library (Tesla 470 version)
ii  libglx-nvidia-tesla-470-0:amd64           470.223.02-4~deb12u1                 amd64        NVIDIA binary GLX library (Tesla 470 version)
ii  libnvidia-egl-wayland1:amd64              1:1.1.10-1                           amd64        Wayland EGL External Platform library -- shared library
ii  libnvidia-tesla-470-cbl:amd64             470.223.02-4~deb12u1                 amd64        NVIDIA binary Vulkan ray tracing (cbl) library (Tesla 470 version)
ii  libnvidia-tesla-470-cfg1:amd64            470.223.02-4~deb12u1                 amd64        NVIDIA binary OpenGL/GLX configuration library (Tesla 470 version)
ii  libnvidia-tesla-470-cuda1:amd64           470.223.02-4~deb12u1                 amd64        NVIDIA CUDA Driver Library (Tesla 470 version)
ii  libnvidia-tesla-470-eglcore:amd64         470.223.02-4~deb12u1                 amd64        NVIDIA binary EGL core libraries (Tesla 470 version)
ii  libnvidia-tesla-470-encode1:amd64         470.223.02-4~deb12u1                 amd64        NVENC Video Encoding runtime library (Tesla 470 version)
ii  libnvidia-tesla-470-glcore:amd64          470.223.02-4~deb12u1                 amd64        NVIDIA binary OpenGL/GLX core libraries (Tesla 470 version)
ii  libnvidia-tesla-470-glvkspirv:amd64       470.223.02-4~deb12u1                 amd64        NVIDIA binary Vulkan Spir-V compiler library (Tesla 470 version)
ii  libnvidia-tesla-470-ml1:amd64             470.223.02-4~deb12u1                 amd64        NVIDIA Management Library (NVML) runtime library (Tesla 470 version)
ii  libnvidia-tesla-470-nvcuvid1:amd64        470.223.02-4~deb12u1                 amd64        NVIDIA CUDA Video Decoder runtime library (Tesla 470 version)
ii  libnvidia-tesla-470-ptxjitcompiler1:amd64 470.223.02-4~deb12u1                 amd64        NVIDIA PTX JIT Compiler library (Tesla 470 version)
ii  libnvidia-tesla-470-rtcore:amd64          470.223.02-4~deb12u1                 amd64        NVIDIA binary Vulkan ray tracing (rtcore) library (Tesla 470 version)
ii  nvidia-detect                             525.147.05-7~deb12u1                 amd64        NVIDIA GPU detection utility
ii  nvidia-egl-common                         525.147.05-7~deb12u1                 amd64        NVIDIA binary EGL driver - common files
ii  nvidia-installer-cleanup                  20220217+3~deb12u1                   amd64        cleanup after driver installation with the nvidia-installer
ii  nvidia-kernel-common                      20220217+3~deb12u1                   amd64        NVIDIA binary kernel module support files
ii  nvidia-modprobe                           535.54.03-1~deb12u1                  amd64        utility to load NVIDIA kernel modules and create device nodes
ii  nvidia-persistenced                       525.85.05-1                          amd64        daemon to maintain persistent software state in the NVIDIA driver
ii  nvidia-settings-tesla-470                 470.161.03-1                         amd64        tool for configuring the NVIDIA graphics driver (Tesla 470 version)
ii  nvidia-support                            20220217+3~deb12u1                   amd64        NVIDIA binary graphics driver support files
ii  nvidia-tesla-470-alternative              470.223.02-4~deb12u1                 amd64        allows the selection of NVIDIA as GLX provider (Tesla 470 version)
ii  nvidia-tesla-470-driver                   470.223.02-4~deb12u1                 amd64        NVIDIA metapackage (Tesla 470 version)
ii  nvidia-tesla-470-driver-bin               470.223.02-4~deb12u1                 amd64        NVIDIA driver support binaries (Tesla 470 version)
ii  nvidia-tesla-470-driver-libs:amd64        470.223.02-4~deb12u1                 amd64        NVIDIA metapackage (OpenGL/GLX/EGL/GLES libraries) (Tesla 470 version)
ii  nvidia-tesla-470-egl-icd:amd64            470.223.02-4~deb12u1                 amd64        NVIDIA EGL installable client driver (ICD)
ii  nvidia-tesla-470-kernel-dkms              470.223.02-4~deb12u1                 amd64        NVIDIA binary kernel module DKMS source (Tesla 470 version)
ii  nvidia-tesla-470-kernel-support           470.223.02-4~deb12u1                 amd64        NVIDIA binary kernel module support files (Tesla 470 version)
ii  nvidia-tesla-470-smi                      470.223.02-4~deb12u1                 amd64        NVIDIA System Management Interface (Tesla 470 version)
ii  nvidia-tesla-470-vdpau-driver:amd64       470.223.02-4~deb12u1                 amd64        Video Decode and Presentation API for Unix - NVIDIA driver (Tesla 470)
ii  nvidia-tesla-470-vulkan-icd:amd64         470.223.02-4~deb12u1                 amd64        NVIDIA Vulkan installable client driver (ICD) (Tesla 470 version)
ii  nvidia-vulkan-common                      525.147.05-7~deb12u1                 amd64        NVIDIA Vulkan driver - common files
ii  xserver-xorg-video-nvidia-tesla-470       470.223.02-4~deb12u1                 amd64        NVIDIA binary Xorg driver (Tesla 470 version)

... and as far as I know I'm still using Nouveau.

[milomak]

that shows nvidia-detect is installed. what happens when you run it?

as root, can you run history | grep nvidia

[alternate_nate]

The problem is the kernel 6.1.0-18 and Nvidia driver. As you can see here:

viewtopic.php?t=158261
or here:
https://dev1galaxy.org/viewtopic.php?id=6417

So try kernel 6.1.0.19 or even 6.5.0.0. 6.6.13 works too. Or go back to 6.1.0.17. Whatever you can Install except 6.1.0.18, and you're good to go.

[sunrat]

@alternate_nate The issue was with the Nvidia driver when kernel 6.1.0.18 was released. It was fixed shortly after with new nvidia-driver packages in bookworm-updates repo.
There is no 6.1.0.19 kernel in the repo.
This issue seems different from those a few weeks ago as the problem looks like some residual config glitch with the old 5.10 kernel. OP has both the latest kernel and drivers which are working for almost everyone else.

@rayandrews please install inxi and show us the output of

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inxi -CGSxz

Also to show the state of your kernels:

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dpkg -l linux-image*

[alternate_nate]

Yes, but the problems with kernel 6.1.0.18 was for both 525.147.05-4~deb12u1 and 470.x.

And I could not get the newer 525.147.05-7~deb12u1 work with 6.1.0.18, although it should.
But 525.147.05-4~deb12u1 worked with 6.1.0.17 and 6.5.0.0 (and 6.6.13). Kernels 6.5.x and 6.6.x are in proposed repos, are they not?

525.147.05-4~deb12u1 have worked nicely since, except for kernel 6.1.0.18. As I said. And 525.147.05-7~deb12u1, of course.

Summary; try a newer kernel and and try first to remove all the 470.x and 525/535.x drivers and stuff. Then reinstall them.