NVidia 8800GT

From Jon's Wiki

Install Newer NVidia Driver

Stop X:

sudo /etc/init.d/gdm stop

Install stuff:

sudo apt-get install pkg-config xserver-xorg-dev build-essential
sudo apt-get --purge remove nvidia-glx nvidia-settings nvidia-kernel-common
wget http://us.download.nvidia.com/XFree86/Linux-x86/169.07/NVIDIA-Linux-x86-169.07-pkg1.run

Run the nvidia driver installer:

sudo sh ./NVIDIA-Linux-x86-169.07-pkg1.run

Follow the instructions and get it to configure X for you. Finally, a tweak:

sudo vi /etc/modeprobe.d/lrm-video

Comment out the line:

install nvidia /sbin/lrm-video nvidia $CMDLINE_OPTS"

Cross fingers and start X:

sudo /etc/init.d/gdm start

Fix The Fan Bug

The 169.07 driver has a fanspeed bug that runs the fan at 100% at all times. This is highly annoying, and the gutsy build of nvclock will not let you change the fanspeed on NVidia 8x00 cards:

johnno@zmog:~$ nvclock -f -F auto
Error: Your card doesn't support fanspeed adjustments!

Get nvclock from CVS:

mkdir nvclock-cvs && cd nvclock-cvs
cvs -d:pserver:anonymous@nvclock.cvs.sourceforge.net:/cvsroot/nvclock login
# no password, just press enter
cvs -z3 -d:pserver:anonymous@nvclock.cvs.sourceforge.net:/cvsroot/nvclock co -P nvclock

Get dependencies, compile and install:

sudo apt-get build-dep nvclock
cd nvclock
sh autogen.sh
./configure
make
sudo make install

Fix the fanspeed:

/usr/local/bin/nvclock -f -F auto

Add this to the bottom of /etc/init.d/gdm so it picks up every time X is restarted.