Upgrade question: Removing old GLX package

[Haines Brown]

I'm upgrading to newest nVidia GeForce 3 driver for RedHat 7.3. One step involves removing the rpm for GLX

$ rpm -e NVIDIA_GLX

I assume this package has a version number, but I don't know how to find out what it is.

If I try to run the rpm command without it, I'll end up having installed the NVIDIA_kernel RPM with the wrong GLX package, and so find myself stuck, unable to run X and without knowing how to either retreat or to advance to a workable X

[sdv]

rpm -aq | grep -i nvidia

[Haines Brown]

To update the nVidia driver, I need to uninstall the GLX package, but to do so I need its version, and asked how to do that.

There was a suggestion that I use:

rpm -aq | grep -i nvidia

However, it returns nothing. (I played a bit with case). When I ran:

[root@hartford-hwp root]# rpm -q nvidia
package nvidia is not installed

I'm running the PNY GeForce3, which was present when I compiled my kernel. In the graphics device section of my XF86config-4 I have

Section "Device"
Identifier "NVIDIA GeForce 3 (generic)"
VendorName "NVidia"
VideoRam 65536

Haiines

[bwkaz]

Try rpm -qa | grep -i nvidia instead. I'm not sure what -aq tells rpm to do, but -qa says to list all installed packages. Then the grep narrows it down to anything containing the string "nvidia", and the -i option tells grep to be case-insensitive.

[Haines Brown]

My aim is to find the version of nvidia that I've got installed. But running the following command returns nothing:

[root@hartford-hwp root]# rpm -qa | grep -i nvidia
[root@hartford-hwp root]#

Likewise, rpm -qa | grep -i nvidia > /opt/tmp/-nvidia just creates an empty "-nvidia" file.

My setup is more or less a default install from the Red Hat 7.3 distribution disks. Was the video driver installed from an rpm file on disk? I don't see one there. If I can't find the rpm file, where would I look for the driver so read its version directly?

Haines Brown

[bwkaz]

What?

This completely confuses me...

If rpm doesn't list anything installed that contains the "nvidia" string, then you don't have anything nVidia installed. Period. The nVidia binary drivers (the ones on http://www.nvidia.com/view.asp?IO=linux_display_1.0-3123) were not installed with RedHat 7.3. You should not have to remove anything to get the nVidia drivers installed...

What have you done so far? What happens when you install the NVIDIA_kernel package that NVchooser tells you to, then the NVIDIA_GLX rpm, then make the changes to XF86Config-4, then run startx? Because in a nutshell, those are the instructions you need to follow. That's just about it.

Of course, there are issues if the NVchooser says you have to go with the .src.rpm kernel instead, but even that isn't too hard to do.

[Haines Brown]

I"m beginning to suspect the source of my confusion.

I'm now running a straight install of 7.3, the kernel of which was compiled with an nVidia card present. I assume a driver was ithen compiled from source, which is why there's no nVidia feedback. with an rmp -query

I"ve done nothing with the graphics on my system until this point (I never installed any driver by hand). I now simply wish to do an upgrade of the driver.. The nVidia README says that after upgrading the driver, I must first remove the NVIDIA_GLX package and then install the newer version.

The upgrade directions are straightforward enough, but I did not start it because I did not know what might be the effect of upgrading the nVidia driver (first step) and then being unable subsequently to upgrade the GLX package (removing the old GLX package was step 2). I did not know if the driver depends on the GLX package being present?

To remove the GLX package according to the directions, I use the rpm -e command, which implies the GLX package is an RPM file, and therefore I can use rmp -q to get its full name. But the problem I originally raised that apparently I do not have the NVIDIA_GLX package installed.

So,

1. Does a straight RH7.3 instlallation install a nVidia driver, but no GLX package?

2. Related to that, can the card run with just the driver and no GLX package?

3. If my system has an nVidia driver at present, but no GLX package, then do I ignore the README directions (to uninstall the old and install the new GLX package) and go ahead with a strait rpm -u of the GLX package?

[bwkaz]

There are two different drivers for nVidia video cards.

There's the open-source driver named "nv", that comes as a part of XFree86. This driver, since it doesn't support 3D capabilities (because the developers don't have access to the specs of the cards), doesn't need anything special to be running in the kernel. So yes, while your Linux kernel was compiled with the nVidia card installed, nothing specific to your card was compiled into your kernel. The Linux kernel configuration process (which is part of the Linux kernel compiling process) does not autodetect anything, BTW, so even if there was anything specific to nVidia hardware in the standard Linux kernel, it wouldn't have gotten included unless you told it to include it yourself.

There is also the closed-source "nvidia" driver that you are trying to install. This is not an upgrade like the driver documentation is talking about an upgrade, because the old driver in your system is completely independent of the one you're trying to install. This closed-source driver, since it does support 3D (and, incidentally, all GeForce cards rather than just the 2's and 3's like "nv" does), requires some special kernel stuff to be running. That's the NVIDIA_kernel package.

NVIDIA_GLX is the "nvidia" driver itself, and the OpenGL implementation to match.

In short, the upgrade directions are not what you want to be following. You want to be following the normal installation directions.

So:

1) Yes, but one that doesn't support 3D, doesn't work with GeForce4's yet, and is independent of the drivers posted on nVidia's site.

2) The card can run, if it's a GF2 or GF3, but without any 3D support. Again, it's an independent driver.

3) Just follow the normal installation instructions rather than the upgrade ones.

[Haines Brown]

Thank you, for you have cleared things up nicely.

In short, I was unaware that a default RedHat installation provided a generic nv driver but no GLX support, and so I simply need a straigfht installation of both files I downloaded from the nVidia site to upgrade my driver and add GLX support.

[Haines Brown]

Just to follow up for anyone keeping their eye on this thread, I want to report my present situation.

As best I can make out, I downloaded the correct rpms and I'm sure I followed the right installation procedure. However, the result was a X server crash. It took a lot of fumbling before I managed to escape having to run in text mode (accessing this forum with lynx seemed a bit of a challenge!).

When I got the server crash log, it said to report problems to xfree86@xfree86.org. They were responsive, but the problem was obviously with the nVidia driver install, and they pointed me back here.

Now that I know how to back out. I'm willing to try again. But I'm going to take it very carefully.

Thanks for the help so far.

Haines Brown