NVIDIA 340 driver install loop, compile from source or use nv? I'm lost.

device = 'GT216M [GeForce GT 330M]' (laptop)

I'm using FreeBSD version 15.0-RELEASE-p10.

I'm trying to get the NVIDIA 340 drivers working.

I managed to get them installed but they don't work with X. As per the handbook:


"If requiring Nvidia drivers prior to 340, note that they do not support kernel modesetting, and thus they must be used with the legacy sc(4) console driver, and a x11/xorg-server version prior to 1.20."

Does this mean I cannot compile them from source?

I went around and around with various AI's trying to get the drivers installed, only to find out I have to compile them from source. I wasted a few hours with this. I'm stuck with a tiny screen and it's difficult to even use a web browser with it, LOL.

But now, I discover they won't work with 15's xorg-server. Do I still have the option to compile or is this binding on both pkg installed and compiled source for NVIDIA 340 drivers?

If I can compile, how do I proceed, ask AI again? If I can't compile, I'm stuck with nv.

$ glxgears
Xlib: extension "GLX" missing on display ":0.0".
Error: couldn't get an RGB, Double-buffered visual


I get GLX errors since it's not working. Some AI said I had to add "glx" into the xorg config file some say it doesn't matter. AI is so confusing!
 
Same old driver:

There's a good chance the old 340 NVidia driver doesn't work any more with a recent Xserver. NVidia stopped support for these old cards a long time ago. The older 304 driver has been broken a long time for the same reason. The 390 driver still works (I have a system with a GT520) but it has no OpenGL any more. I suspect it'll stop working altogether some time in the future.
 
Time to drop -304|-340|-390 variants from ports?

We've kept these for anyone need them to allow old GPUs working, but need tricky work to install old version of X server to allow these drivers to work, which requires to track commit logs of x11-servers/xorg-server, determine on which commit the version switched to incompatible version, obtain matching version of ports, fixing up dependencies, ...

And more, there are possibilities that NVIDIA stops providing EoL'ed versions for downloading, and our current target to drop corresponding ports as group maintainers is the timing it happenes or not-to-be-fixed CVEs are released. (Currently, far older versions can be downloaded with i386 versions.)

If this kind of questions arises often, it would be the time to drop these not to confuse new comers.

Note that even -470 variants are EoL'ed upstream (NVIDIA) at Sep.2024 or before depending on GPU series. See linked pages from the link above, too.
Only supported legacy branch of drivers are -580 variants.
 
304 could certainly be removed, that's been entirely broken for a really long time. 390 still works, somewhat, 2D is fine, 3D is not. Don't have anything to test with the 340 version.
 
Back
Top