NVIDIA 169.12 Linux Display Driver Released

We know NVIDIA has been working on a new Linux display driver release, with the GeForce 9 series having been introduced just this past week, and today a new driver release has arrived for Linux, Solaris, and FreeBSD.

However, this new 169.12 display driver doesn't introduce support for the GeForce 9600GT and its official changes are limited to maintenance items.

The release highlights for the NVIDIA 169.12 driver include improving power management support for GeForce 8 series GPUs, improved stability on some GeForce 8 series GPUs, further improved GLX_EXT_texture_from_pixmap out-of-memory handling, nvidia-xconfig fix for modifying xorg.conf configurations without a "Module" section, and various bug-fixes. Among the other bug-fixes are addressing a bug that broke TwinView with TV-Out on some G80 GPUs, incorrect PowerMizer state being reported, and OpenGL crash fixes (the release notes mention running Counter-Strike with WINE). That's it for the official changes in this binary driver release.

The NVIDIA 169.12 driver replaces the 169.09 release, which was released just a month ago and consisted of maintenance fixes. Since that, however, NVIDIA had quietly released the 171.05 Linux driver. NVIDIA's 171.05 driver is only endorsed for use with their Tesla S870 GPU Computing Systems, but we have had no problems using this driver with GeForce ASICs. Most notably in this driver update was introducing an nvidia-smi utility, for providing system-state and diagnostic information using the System Management Interface. Interestingly though, today's driver release still resides in the 169.xx branch.

With NVIDIA's binary driver continuing to lack support for the GeForce 9600GT and this most recent driver still being based in the 169.xx series, we wonder what NVIDIA may be working on for the near future, but we will save that for another article. When it comes to the changes found in the 169.12 driver, we welcome especially the continued GeForce 8 bug-fixes and further improvements to GLX_EXT_texture_from_pixmap out-of-memory handling. We are still exploring today's release to see if there are any other unpublicized changes of interest, but so far there is none.

The NVIDIA 169.12 Linux driver can be downloaded for x86 Linux and x86_64 Linux.

Source

^^ The update already hit Hardy repos

Yeah I also checked that when checking for hardy updates.
Am yet to install it though.
Hope to see significant improvement in graphics performance.

^^ Ahh.. My bad.. Its 169.09 only

Updated cause they released new restricted modules..

S

Are these for ubuntu also??

Sunny1211993 said:
Are these for ubuntu also??

no. it's for windows only

Ofcourse it's for ubuntu, it says linux driver and not just a package..

Sunny1211993 said:
Are these for ubuntu also??

linux means any operating system that uses Linux Torvaldis' Linux Kernel.
And ubuntu is a GNU based OS that uses the Linux Kernel.

S

But guyz,as as prakash told me that the 169.09 were not compatible with ubuntu GG!!
thats y im asking.
heres my thread- *www.thinkdigit.com/forum/showthread.php?t=81293
I hope i can get my ubuntu working now
Ill give it a try right away

can anyone tell me how to integrate these drivers into the ubuntu installation source???
Man, i'm having a tough luck installing ubuntu 7.10 on my hp pavilion notebook.

^^Try installing hardy heron alpha 5 and it will work like a charm.
Hardy has a new kernel which supports almost all hardware that comes installed in hp pavillion notebooks.

T

thanks for the news

I guess hardy will be out in another month or so, and hence we have not long to wait before we get to see huge FPS raise in UT3 and UrT4.1

M

Sunny1211993 said:
But guyz,as as prakash told me that the 169.09 were not compatible with ubuntu GG!!
thats y im asking.

You can use it, but for that you'll need to get kernel header and compile the ABI for installing binary drivers then install the nvidia driver.

mehulved said:
You can use it, but for that you'll need to get kernel header and compile the ABI for installing binary drivers then install the nvidia driver.

then edit your post and make it YOU can't do that. He is still a newbie.

S

mehulved said:
You can use it, but for that you'll need to get kernel header and compile the ABI for installing binary drivers then install the nvidia driver.

ahem.......................how???
tell me a simpler way.
A linux distro compatible with my GPU.be it any any any distro

Simpler way to do what mehul said

S

even envy isnt compatible with my GPU.I tried it long ago.
Y did i buy a G92 core GPU???grrrrrrrrrrrr

Envy does not support it?! :O That's weird! How did you come to the conclusion that it does not support your GPU?

S

kalpik said:
Envy does not support it?! :O That's weird! How did you come to the conclusion that it does not support your GPU?

it gives some fugging error.xserver -dev something.
i currently have 8800GTS 512 G92 SLI.
I am ready to disable SLI for ubuntu but someone help me plz

Please give the exact error.

S

ill need to install ubuntu for that.
can i use SLI in ubuntu?

I don't have much info on SLI, i think ubuntuforums.org is a better place to find out more about that.

but first try this without SLI. there is not a single reason in ubuntu as to why you need to use SLI. Crysis is the only game where SLI makes some sence. Doom 3, Quake 4 and Unreal Tournament 3, the three bigshot games on Linux, can stay comfortable without an SLI setup.

and as I told you before, please wait till hardy comes out if you want to install ubuntu. Its only maximum 50 days away.

S

MetalheadGautham said:
but first try this without SLI. there is not a single reason in ubuntu as to why you need to use SLI. Crysis is the only game where SLI makes some sence. Doom 3, Quake 4 and Unreal Tournament 3, the three bigshot games on Linux, can stay comfortable without an SLI setup.

and as I told you before, please wait till hardy comes out if you want to install ubuntu. Its only maximum 50 days away.

What about fedora?should i try that?
or if anyone can tell me how to recompile the kernel.ill do it plz tell

F

First of all did you even try to do what is in this thread?
*www.thinkdigit.com/forum/showthread.php?t=81293

Second of all stick to a thread. Also do you get an error like Kalpik said? if so what does it say. Post the exact error please.

thanks for the info

Nvidia 169.12 now available in Hardy repos