NVIDIA 435 Driver is not loaded on Ubuntu 18.04.

Graphics / Linux Linux
1

Hello, I have been unable to load drivers for my NVIDIA graphics in my Dell Precision 3541 Laptop. I suspect this is related to the fact that I have been unable to connect to any external monitors. Any help would be appreciated.

System information:
-OS: Ubuntu 18.04.04 LTS 64-bit
-Processor: Intel® Xeon(R) E-2276M CPU @ 2.80GHz × 12
-Drivers: Currently installed is recommended NVIDIA 435 (proprietary), although I also tried others (430,440).javascript:void(0);
-Graphics: Intel integrated, and an NVIDIA Quadro P620.

I have tried:
-Disabling secure boot.
-Blacklisting nouveau in grub file: GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT=“nomodeset” GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX=“nvidia-drm.modeset=1 nouveau.blacklist=1”
-“sudo prime-select nvidia”, which upon reboot leaves me without any graphics.
-Also, there is no file called “blacklist-nvidia.conf” in my root files.

Here is more information from terminal:

lspci -v | grep VGA
00:02.0 VGA compatible controller: Intel Corporation Device 3e9b (rev 02) (prog-if 00 [VGA controller])

nvidia-settings

ERROR: NVIDIA driver is not loaded

ERROR: Unable to load info from any available system

(nvidia-settings:5031): GLib-GObject-CRITICAL **: 13:53:08.572: g_object_unref: assertion 'G_IS_OBJECT (object)' failed
** Message: 13:53:08.574: PRIME: No offloading required. Abort
** Message: 13:53:08.574: PRIME: is it supported? no

xrandr
xrandr: Failed to get size of gamma for output default
Screen 0: minimum 1920 x 1080, current 1920 x 1080, maximum 1920 x 1080
default connected primary 1920x1080+0+0 0mm x 0mm
   1920x1080     77.00*

I’d be happy to provide any more information. Thank you in advance for help!
nvidia-bug-report.log.gz (88.4 KB)

2
  1. If possible, disable hybrid graphics from the system BIOS and select discrete graphics option. This shall make Quadro p620 as sole GPU, thus making your configuration far simpler and robust. Hybrid Nvidia graphics is known to be difficult to configure under Linux.
  2. Uninstall all of the older drivers that you have installed as mentioned in your post.
  3. Follow the driver installation steps as mentioned here: https://wiki.debian.org/NvidiaGraphicsDrivers. These instructions work for Ubuntu also.
  4. You may have to manually select the external monitor option by going to Gnome Settings

Disabling hybrid graphics and selecting discrete GPU as the only option is possible in HP Zbooks. I am not sure about Dell systems.

3

sarthakdae - Thank you for a response.

  1. I was unable to find an option to disable hybrid graphics in the BIOS. According to the forums I have read, it is not possible on Dell laptops: https://www.dell.com/community/Laptops-General-Read-Only/Enable-or-disable-the-hybrid-graphics-functio-on-Bios-Dell/td-p/3611249

  2. I uninstalled all NVIDIA drivers to start with a clean slate.

  3. Is there any particular reason to get drivers from the stretch-backports repository as described in the cited article? After struggling to authenticate the repository, but succeeding (sudo apt update completes with no errors), I am still unable to install the driver application with stretch-backports:

sudo apt-get install -t stretch-backports nvidia-driver 
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree       
Reading state information... Done
Package nvidia-driver is not available, but is referred to by another package.
This may mean that the package is missing, has been obsoleted, or
is only available from another source

E: Package 'nvidia-driver' has no installation candidate

Is there some kind of new package naming terminology that I am missing or something? I am able to get drivers without errors using:

sudo ubuntu-drivers autoinstall

And the fresh install does change my nvidia settings output, but the error persists:

nvidia-settings

ERROR: NVIDIA driver is not loaded


ERROR: Error querying enabled displays on GPU 0 (Missing Extension).


ERROR: Error querying connected displays on GPU 0 (Missing Extension).

** Message: 23:02:17.389: PRIME: No offloading required. Abort
** Message: 23:02:17.389: PRIME: is it supported? no

ERROR: nvidia-settings could not find the registry key file. This file should
       have been installed along with this driver at
       /usr/share/nvidia/nvidia-application-profiles-key-documentation. The
       application profiles will continue to work, but values cannot be
       prepopulated or validated, and will not be listed in the help text.
       Please see the README for possible values and descriptions.
  1. I am not sure how to manually select any monitor from GNOME settings. It doesn’t even detect any external monitor being plugged in.

Thanks again.

4

@tdstoff7
I apologize for suggesting Debian repositories to you. You have correctly used the Ubuntu repositories that are relevant to your OS. Actually what I meant were the instructions portions only, with Debian repositories replaced with relevant Ubuntu repositories. I should have been more clear in my reply.

As of now, the Nvidia hybrid graphics configuration is very fragile under Linux. Generally, it is advised to purchase hardware with Intel cards (best support) or AMD graphics (they have open source drivers mainlined in the Linux kernel).

In many laptop configurations, the external HDMI port is connected to the discrete graphics. Therefore, if the driver remains misconfigured then there shall be no output.