[mythtv-users] [ATrpms-users] Updated from fedora 10 to 12 and have issues with nvidia driver loading

Gabe Rubin gaberubin at gmail.com
Thu Nov 26 18:06:55 UTC 2009


On Thu, Nov 26, 2009 at 9:46 AM, Jarod Wilson <jarod at wilsonet.com> wrote:
> On 11/26/2009 12:08 PM, Gabe Rubin wrote:
>>
>> As many pointed out, adding  "nouveau.modeset=0" at the end of the
>> kernel line in grub.conf is the solution.  I also specified a VGA
>> mode, but that caused more problems so I changed that to "vga=normal".
>>  Not sure if a vga argument is needed.
>
> Its not. And nouveau.modeset=0 isn't strictly required. If you have the
> nouveau module blacklisted, a newly built initrd won't include the nouveau
> module, and you can boot w/o any extra params.

I have this stanza in /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist.conf:
blacklist nouveau


That did not help me until I actually added the kernel parameter in
grub.conf.  I did reboot.

>
>> I guess I will need to add this to the kernel line each time I upgrade
>> the kernel.
>
> No. The kernel update mechanism is bright enough to carry args from your
> existing grub stanza to the new one.
>
> However, as I said above, if nouveau is blacklisted, a newly created initrd
> (including the one that'll be created when you install a new kernel) won't
> have have the nouveau module in it, and thus won't need the param anyway.

That is good to know (although, as I said, blacklisting did not seem to help).

>
>> Also strange, it appears that atrpms script write to
>> /etc/modprobe.conf to specify the driver version when that has been
>> depreciated and it should go into /etc/modprobe.d/local.conf.
>
> Or better yet, /etc/modprobe.d/<somethingunique>.conf.
>

Any way to make this automatic or is that just the choice of the
package distributor (i.e., should I let Axel know about this situation
or can I fix it myself)?

>> This seems like such a big deal and really surprised that it was so
>> hard to figure out (I did not see it in the release notes and my
>> googling did not show it, although obviously others were able to
>> figure it out).
>
> Its pretty well covered in the rpm fusion wiki, not sure if its spelled out
> in the ATrpms docs anywhere. Its definitely NOT covered in the Fedora docs,
> because, well, it has to do with a binary-only driver that Fedora doesn't
> ship.
>
That is understandable.  I don't use rpmfusion so did not look there
until directed to.  Hopefully these messages on the mythlist and
atrpms list will let others find it.

>> I personally don't think that fedora should make it
>> this difficult to run the nvidia drive and attempt to impose the
>> nouveau driver upon users.
>
> Um. I'm not even sure where to begin with a reply to this. Fedora ships a
> functional driver that Just Works, complete with kernel mode setting,
> dual-head support, etc, and that shouldn't be "imposed" on people? And the
> Fedora project is supposed to do what exactly to make it as easy as possible
> for you to install a 3rd-party binary-only driver?
>

Re-reading what I wrote, I see why offense could be taken to what I
said.  I respect that fedora comes shipping with a free (in all senses
of the word) and functional driver for nvidia cards.  I said "impose"
because my thinking was if you have to much with grub.conf and add
kernel parameters, that is very tricky for most users to figure out
how to get the binary drivers going.  Of course, the reality is
probably is that fedora wants to ship a highly functional system that
works out of the box without resorting to the binary non-free stuff
and if someone wants to use the nvidia binary, they should figure out
how to do it.  My frustration was that it took a lot of time for me to
figure out how to do that, which was the result of the choice to put
in nouveau.  But upon reflection, that was not a bad thing that the
fedora team did, and I should not have implied or directly stated that
it was.


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