I tried installing NVIDIA drivers in 12.10 via x-swat repository, and primus, and nouveau, and a million things i found on the net and everything just broke the system, until I finally got bumblebee to run and it was okay for some days, but the next upgrade again broke the X and I had to do low-level stuff. Fortunately 13.04 was released and I did a clean install.
Now in 13.04, I need some way that is stable enough to get my GPU benefits without spending all-nighters every time I update my system.
In that line, I downloaded the NVIDIA Linux drivers from NVIDIA site (310.44 version) shown for my GeForce GT635M graphic card. (BTW is this the latest version? I saw 310.88 somewhere on internet), but now am stuck with the below questions:
How to install this .run file in Ubuntu 13.04 without breaking anything now, or in the future updates.
Is installation of proprietary drivers stable enough?
I am sort of mixed up about the various terms I have read about - primus, nouveau, bumblebee, optirun, etc. Can anyone help me with some accurate and decent reading material/websites where I can read and understand what is what?
Is there a GUI I can use for config and stuff post installation.
Why I am not getting the available drivers listed in the additional drivers section of the settings GUI? For me that proprietary drivers page is all greyed (disabled). There are no device driver options listed. Is there a way to get my Nvidia drivers to show up here?
As suggested by Tuxest, the below commands give the provided output:
Results of sudo lshw -c video
:
*-display
description: VGA compatible controller
product: 3rd Gen Core processor Graphics Controller
vendor: Intel Corporation
physical id: 2
bus info: pci@0000:00:02.0
version: 09
width: 64 bits
clock: 33MHz
capabilities: msi pm vga_controller bus_master cap_list rom
configuration: driver=i915 latency=0
resources: irq:46 memory:f7400000-f77fffff memory:d0000000-dfffffff ioport:f000(size=64)
Rsults of lspci -nnk | grep -iA3 vga
:
00:02.0 VGA compatible controller [0300]: Intel Corporation 3rd Gen Core processor Graphics Controller [8086:0166] (rev 09)
Subsystem: ASUSTeK Computer Inc. Device [1043:1447]
Kernel driver in use: i915
00:14.0 USB controller [0c03]: Intel Corporation 7 Series/C210 Series Chipset Family USB xHCI Host Controller [8086:1e31] (rev 04)
01:00.0 VGA compatible controller [0300]: NVIDIA Corporation GF108M [GeForce GT 635M] [10de:0de3] (rev ff)
03:00.0 Network controller [0280]: Atheros Communications Inc. AR9485 Wireless Network Adapter [168c:0032] (rev 01)
Subsystem: AzureWave Device [1a3b:2c97]
Kernel driver in use: ath9k
Does is all look OK? Why is Nvidia not displayed in the first command output?
Update: I installed the 319 drivers along with bumblebee and the system is running just fine, but have a follow-up question here. I need to update the system kernel, and I am afraid to proceed.