GeForce RTX 3090 Nvidia-SMI Error and No /dev/nvidia/* Folders

Hi,

I’m using a virtual machine on Debian, and this GPU server has a GeForce RTX 3090 allocated to my user. I have installed the NVIDIA drivers with the following command:

apt install nvidia-driver firmware-misc-nonfree

and have installed cuda with

 apt install nvidia-cuda-dev nvidia-cuda-toolkit

However, nvidia-smi is returning this error:

NVIDIA-SMI has failed because it couldn’t communicate with the NVIDIA driver. Make sure that the latest NVIDIA driver is installed and running.

Also, there is no folder named /dev/nvidia/. When I reinstall the driver, it says it’s up to date to the latest driver. Could you please direct me on how to solve this issue?

 description: Computer
    product: Standard PC (Q35 + ICH9, 2009)
    vendor: QEMU
    version: pc-q35-9.2
    width: 64 bits
    capabilities: smbios-2.8 dmi-2.8 smp vsyscall32
    configuration: boot=normal uuid=38dae963-cca6-4304-9bfb-bd1628983ce1
  *-core
       description: Motherboard
       physical id: 0
     *-cpu
          description: CPU
          product: Intel(R) Xeon(R) Gold 6238R CPU @ 2.20GHz
          vendor: Intel Corp.
          physical id: 400
          bus info: cpu@0
          version: 6.85.7
          slot: CPU 0
          size: 2GHz
          capacity: 2GHz
          width: 64 bits
          capabilities: fpu fpu_exception wp vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 clflush mmx fxsr sse sse2 ss ht syscall nx pdpe1gb rdtscp x86-64 constant_tsc arch_perfmon rep_good nopl xtopology cpuid tsc_known_freq pni pclmulqdq vmx ssse3 fma cx16 pdcm pcid sse4_1 sse4_2 x2apic movbe popcnt tsc_deadline_timer aes xsave avx f16c rdrand hypervisor lahf_lm abm 3dnowprefetch cpuid_fault invpcid_single ssbd ibrs ibpb stibp ibrs_enhanced tpr_shadow vnmi flexpriority ept vpid ept_ad fsgsbase tsc_adjust bmi1 avx2 smep bmi2 erms invpcid mpx avx512f avx512dq rdseed adx smap clflushopt clwb avx512cd avx512bw avx512vl xsaveopt xsavec xgetbv1 xsaves arat umip pku ospke avx512_vnni md_clear flush_l1d arch_capabilities
          configuration: cores=8 enabledcores=8 microcode=83899138 threads=8
     *-memory
          description: System Memory
          physical id: 1000
          size: 16GiB
          capabilities: ecc
          configuration: errordetection=multi-bit-ecc
        *-bank
             description: DIMM RAM
             vendor: QEMU
             physical id: 0
             slot: DIMM 0
             size: 16GiB
     *-firmware
          description: BIOS
          vendor: Proxmox distribution of EDK II
          physical id: 0
          version: 4.2025.02-3
          date: 04/03/2025
          size: 96KiB
          capabilities: uefi virtualmachine
     *-pci
          description: Host bridge
          product: 82G33/G31/P35/P31 Express DRAM Controller
          vendor: Intel Corporation
          physical id: 100
          bus info: pci@0000:00:00.0
          version: 00
          width: 32 bits
          clock: 33MHz
        *-display
             description: VGA compatible controller
             product: bochs-drmdrmfb
             physical id: 1
             bus info: pci@0000:00:01.0
             logical name: /dev/fb0
             version: 02
             width: 32 bits
             clock: 33MHz
             capabilities: vga_controller bus_master rom fb
             configuration: depth=32 driver=bochs-drm latency=0 resolution=1280,800
             resources: irq:0 memory:80000000-80ffffff memory:8328b000-8328bfff memory:c0000-dffff
        *-usb:0
             description: USB controller
             product: 82801I (ICH9 Family) USB UHCI Controller #4
             vendor: Intel Corporation
             physical id: 1a
             bus info: pci@0000:00:1a.0
             version: 03
             width: 32 bits
             clock: 33MHz
             capabilities: uhci bus_master
             configuration: driver=uhci_hcd latency=0
             resources: irq:16 ioport:9100(size=32)
           *-usbhost
                product: UHCI Host Controller
                vendor: Linux 6.1.0-33-amd64 uhci_hcd
                physical id: 1
                bus info: usb@2
                logical name: usb2
                version: 6.01
                capabilities: usb-1.10
                configuration: driver=hub slots=2 speed=12Mbit/s
        *-usb:1
             description: USB controller
             product: 82801I (ICH9 Family) USB UHCI Controller #5
             vendor: Intel Corporation
             physical id: 1a.1
             bus info: pci@0000:00:1a.1
             version: 03
             width: 32 bits
             clock: 33MHz
             capabilities: uhci bus_master
             configuration: driver=uhci_hcd latency=0
             resources: irq:17 ioport:90e0(size=32)
           *-usbhost
                product: UHCI Host Controller
                vendor: Linux 6.1.0-33-amd64 uhci_hcd
                physical id: 1
                bus info: usb@4
                logical name: usb4
                version: 6.01
                capabilities: usb-1.10
                configuration: driver=hub slots=2 speed=12Mbit/s
        *-usb:2
             description: USB controller
             product: 82801I (ICH9 Family) USB UHCI Controller #6
             vendor: Intel Corporation
             physical id: 1a.2
             bus info: pci@0000:00:1a.2
             version: 03
             width: 32 bits
             clock: 33MHz
             capabilities: uhci bus_master
             configuration: driver=uhci_hcd latency=0
             resources: irq:18 ioport:90c0(size=32)
           *-usbhost
                product: UHCI Host Controller
                vendor: Linux 6.1.0-33-amd64 uhci_hcd
                physical id: 1
                bus info: usb@5
                logical name: usb5
                version: 6.01
                capabilities: usb-1.10
                configuration: driver=hub slots=2 speed=12Mbit/s
        *-usb:3
             description: USB controller
             product: 82801I (ICH9 Family) USB2 EHCI Controller #2
             vendor: Intel Corporation
             physical id: 1a.7
             bus info: pci@0000:00:1a.7
             version: 03
             width: 32 bits
             clock: 33MHz
             capabilities: ehci bus_master
             configuration: driver=ehci-pci latency=0
             resources: irq:19 memory:8328a000-8328afff
           *-usbhost
                product: EHCI Host Controller
                vendor: Linux 6.1.0-33-amd64 ehci_hcd
                physical id: 1
                bus info: usb@1
                logical name: usb1
                version: 6.01
                capabilities: usb-2.00
                configuration: driver=hub slots=6 speed=480Mbit/s
        *-multimedia
             description: Audio device
             product: 82801I (ICH9 Family) HD Audio Controller
             vendor: Intel Corporation
             physical id: 1b
             bus info: pci@0000:00:1b.0
             logical name: card0
             logical name: /dev/snd/controlC0
             version: 03
             width: 32 bits
             clock: 33MHz
             capabilities: msi bus_master cap_list
             configuration: driver=snd_hda_intel latency=0
             resources: irq:45 memory:83280000-83283fff
        *-pci:0
             description: PCI bridge
             product: QEMU PCIe Root port
             vendor: Red Hat, Inc.
             physical id: 1c
             bus info: pci@0000:00:1c.0
             version: 00
             width: 32 bits
             clock: 33MHz
             capabilities: pci pciexpress msix normal_decode bus_master cap_list
             configuration: driver=pcieport
             resources: irq:16 memory:83289000-83289fff ioport:8000(size=4096) memory:81000000-820fffff ioport:380000000000(size=34359738368)
           *-display
                description: VGA compatible controller
                product: GA102 [GeForce RTX 3090]
                vendor: NVIDIA Corporation
                physical id: 0
                bus info: pci@0000:01:00.0
                logical name: /dev/fb0
                version: a1
                width: 64 bits
                clock: 33MHz
                capabilities: pm msi pciexpress vga_controller bus_master cap_list fb
                configuration: depth=32 latency=0 mode=1280x800 visual=truecolor xres=1280 yres=800
                resources: iomemory:38000-37fff iomemory:38000-37fff memory:81000000-81ffffff memory:380000000000-38000fffffff memory:380010000000-380011ffffff ioport:8000(size=128) memory:82080000-820fffff```

systemctl status nvidia-persistenced
× nvidia-persistenced.service - NVIDIA Persistence Daemon
Loaded: loaded (/lib/systemd/system/nvidia-persistenced.service; enabled; preset: enabled)
Active: failed (Result: exit-code) since Thu 2025-04-17 10:23:07 EDT; 1 week 4 days ago
CPU: 337ms

Apr 17 10:23:07 debian-test-url-001 systemd[1]: Starting nvidia-persistenced.service - NVIDIA Persistence Daemon…
Apr 17 10:23:07 debian-test-url-001 nvidia-persistenced[558]: Started (558)
Apr 17 10:23:07 debian-test-url-001 nvidia-persistenced[558]: Failed to query NVIDIA devices. Please ensure that the NV>
Apr 17 10:23:07 debian-test-url-001 nvidia-persistenced[558]: Shutdown (558)
Apr 17 10:23:07 debian-test-url-001 nvidia-persistenced[551]: nvidia-persistenced failed to initialize. Check syslog fo>
Apr 17 10:23:07 debian-test-url-001 systemd[1]: nvidia-persistenced.service: Control process exited, code=exited, statu>
Apr 17 10:23:07 debian-test-url-001 systemd[1]: nvidia-persistenced.service: Failed with result ‘exit-code’.
Apr 17 10:23:07 debian-test-url-001 systemd[1]: Failed to start nvidia-persistenced.service - NVIDIA Persistence Daemon.```

nvidia-bug-report.log.gz (58.6 KB)

I followed this https://forums.developer.nvidia.com/t/nvidia-smi-no-devices-were-found-vmware-esxi-ubuntu-server-20-04-03-with-rtx3070/202904/50 and it was successful. We can close the thread.

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