[SOLVED] Manual install of nVidia drivers; garbled text during install

cjpembo · 2009-02-16 20:52:45

64-bit arch
nVidia binary driver
installed by hand

The nvidia-supplied install program is hardly readable when installing in a 64-bit arch setup. It seems like old screen content is not erased before new content is written; as well as a few other strange artifacts. Luckily I have performed the install enough times that I can get the job done by memory and the resulting driver works great.

I haven't had an opportunity to try in another 64-bit linux environment. Anyone here know it this is just a 64-bit issue? Perhaps an arch issue? It is surely not a show stopper; just an annoyance.

Thanks,

Chris

Certainly someone will ask why I don't just use the arch package. A (long?) time ago I did and some libGLs either got clobbered or not updated (I don't remember). So, now I just prefer to do it manually; especially with CUDA and such. It just works for me.

Last edited by cjpembo (2009-02-18 06:00:05)

cjpembo · 2009-02-17 00:40:13

Looks like a solution is offered at the nVidia forums:

ncurses needs to be compiled with the "--with-chtype=long" option for 64-bit, whatever that means.

It appears that a couple other apps have had problems with 64-bit ncurses:

http://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=54531
http://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=53767

Any ideas? Perhaps nVidia's installer needs updated?

Chris

Nepherte · 2009-02-17 12:23:13

Rebuild ncurses with abs and add the mentioned option to the configure line in the pkgbuild.

dhave · 2009-02-17 13:10:22

Nepherte wrote:

Rebuild ncurses with abs and add the mentioned option to the configure line in the pkgbuild.

I'm really glad to get this most-annoying problem fixed. I usually install new nvidia driver releases via the AUR or the Arch repos, but occasionally I use the factory installer. The garbled screen text of the install interface on my 64-bit system always drives me crazy. Thanks.

Last edited by dhave (2009-02-17 13:12:07)

cjpembo · 2009-02-18 05:29:10

No doubt I could rebuild ncurses with the required option. I'd like to understand what the option means. I'd hate to break other applications...

So, perhaps I'll just install a few ncurses-bases applications and give them a try before and after rebuilding ncurses. But first I'll look into what gentoo and redhat are doing.

Chris

cjpembo · 2009-02-18 05:59:28

Looks like gentoo 64-bit uses "--with-chtype=long"

http://gentoo-portage.com/AJAX/Ebuild/50182

as does this fedora 11 64-bit rpm:

http://rpm.pbone.net/index.php3/stat/22 … gelog.html

So, I guess I'll submit a bug report.

And... I found out that you can bypass the ncurses interface altogether when installing the nvidia drivers. Just use the "--ui=none" option:

sh NVIDIA-Linux-x86_64-180....pkg2.run --ui=none

Chris

cjpembo · 2009-02-18 06:49:06

One last comment:

When you rebuild ncurses, there are TWO locations in the PKGFILE to specify "--with-chtype=long".

I can confirm that this fixes the problem with the nvidia installer. I filed a bug report as well.

Chris

cjpembo · 2009-02-22 23:58:09

I was wrong: you only want to use the "--with-chtype=long" option for the second compile statement in the PKGFILE.

dhave · 2009-03-02 19:14:50

I just updated to ncurses-5.7-2.1 from core, and it looks as if the old garbed text problem with the nvidia installer is gone for good. I'm guessing the addition of "--enable-widec" to the configuration options in the PKGBUILD took care of this problem. This is without the "--with-chtype=long" option in the config string of the PKGBUILD.

The changelog for this update says:

* fix installation of non-wide charater (sic) libraries (FS#12124)

Discussion can be found here.

Last edited by dhave (2009-03-02 19:23:42)

Arch Linux

#1 2009-02-16 20:52:45

[SOLVED] Manual install of nVidia drivers; garbled text during install

#2 2009-02-17 00:40:13

Re: [SOLVED] Manual install of nVidia drivers; garbled text during install

#3 2009-02-17 12:23:13

Re: [SOLVED] Manual install of nVidia drivers; garbled text during install

#4 2009-02-17 13:10:22

Re: [SOLVED] Manual install of nVidia drivers; garbled text during install

#5 2009-02-18 05:29:10

Re: [SOLVED] Manual install of nVidia drivers; garbled text during install

#6 2009-02-18 05:59:28

Re: [SOLVED] Manual install of nVidia drivers; garbled text during install

#7 2009-02-18 06:49:06

Re: [SOLVED] Manual install of nVidia drivers; garbled text during install

#8 2009-02-22 23:58:09

Re: [SOLVED] Manual install of nVidia drivers; garbled text during install

#9 2009-03-02 19:14:50

Re: [SOLVED] Manual install of nVidia drivers; garbled text during install

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