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I've been unable to make my friend's PC graphics card work with Ubuntu 19.04, 19.10 and elementary OS 5.0 (18.04 based) since I first tried in April.

The card is a GTX 1660 and whenever I install NVIDIA 435 or 440 drivers (whether from the official repo, the ppa or using the .run from NVIDIA's website), I get a black screen, the monitor keeps shutting on and off (no signal) and I can only ssh into the machine. In the Windows partition 10 it works perfectly, and before I install the NVIDIA drivers in Ubuntu all I get is a very poor resolution like that in secure graphics mode.

Usually, the nvidia-smi command gives a driver error, but I've just formatted and fresh-installed again today to try for the thousandth time with the new 435 driver from the official repo (not the ppa), and at least I get a nvidia-smi response with everything seeming ok. But still, no signal. Any recommendations? Blacklist nouveau (I had already tried that before)?

It's been a lot of months waiting for better support for these quite new cards (or so I thought), and I'm starting to get desperate. The machine status now is:

  • Fresh installed Ubuntu 19.10 which defaults to driver 435
  • Updated everything and rebooted
  • Black screen so can't even install openssh

Any idea?

Edit:

I've found that I can set the BIOS setting Initial display output to IGFX instead of PCIE 1 (it's a Gigabyte motherboard), plug the HDMI cable to the motherboard's video output instead of the Nvidia gpu one, and then I can get to the desktop.

Awkwardly for me, everything seems to indicate the NVIDIA GPU is in use (is that even possible connected to the integrated gpu?). Even the gears tests make the GPU usage jump to 100% in the NVIDIA settings app. Despite of this, if I instead boot Windows, the NVIDIA app says I'm not connected to an NVIDIA card.

Edit 2: adding /var/log/Xorg.0.log

[     8.088] (II) config/udev: Adding input device HDA NVidia HDMI/DP,pcm=8 (/dev/input/event15)
[     8.088] (II) No input driver specified, ignoring this device.
[     8.088] (II) This device may have been added with another device file.
[     8.088] (II) config/udev: Adding input device HDA NVidia HDMI/DP,pcm=7 (/dev/input/event14)
[     8.088] (II) No input driver specified, ignoring this device.
[     8.088] (II) This device may have been added with another device file.
[     8.088] (II) config/udev: Adding input device HDA NVidia HDMI/DP,pcm=3 (/dev/input/event13)
[     8.088] (II) No input driver specified, ignoring this device.
[     8.088] (II) This device may have been added with another device file.
[     8.089] (II) config/udev: Adding input device HDA NVidia HDMI/DP,pcm=9 (/dev/input/event16)
[     8.089] (II) No input driver specified, ignoring this device.
[     8.089] (II) This device may have been added with another device file.
[    10.955] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): DFP-0: disconnected
[    10.955] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): DFP-0: Internal DisplayPort
[    10.955] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): DFP-0: 2660.0 MHz maximum pixel clock
[    10.955] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): 
[    10.955] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): DFP-1: disconnected
[    10.955] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): DFP-1: Internal TMDS
[    10.955] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): DFP-1: 165.0 MHz maximum pixel clock
[    10.955] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): 
[    10.955] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): DFP-2: disconnected
[    10.955] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): DFP-2: Internal DisplayPort
[    10.955] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): DFP-2: 2660.0 MHz maximum pixel clock
[    10.955] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): 
[    10.955] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): DFP-3: disconnected
[    10.955] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): DFP-3: Internal TMDS
[    10.955] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): DFP-3: 165.0 MHz maximum pixel clock
[    10.955] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): 
[    10.987] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): LG Electronics LG Ultra HD (DFP-4): connected
[    10.987] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): LG Electronics LG Ultra HD (DFP-4): Internal TMDS
[    10.987] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): LG Electronics LG Ultra HD (DFP-4): 600.0 MHz maximum pixel clock
[    10.987] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): 
[    10.987] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): DFP-5: disconnected
[    10.987] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): DFP-5: Internal DisplayPort
[    10.987] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): DFP-5: 2660.0 MHz maximum pixel clock
[    10.987] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): 
[    10.987] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): DFP-6: disconnected
[    10.987] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): DFP-6: Internal TMDS
[    10.987] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): DFP-6: 165.0 MHz maximum pixel clock
[    10.987] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): 
[    11.077] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): DFP-0: disconnected
[    11.077] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): DFP-0: Internal DisplayPort
[    11.077] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): DFP-0: 2660.0 MHz maximum pixel clock
[    11.077] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): 
[    11.077] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): DFP-1: disconnected
[    11.077] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): DFP-1: Internal TMDS
[    11.077] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): DFP-1: 165.0 MHz maximum pixel clock
[    11.077] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): 
[    11.077] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): DFP-2: disconnected
[    11.077] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): DFP-2: Internal DisplayPort
[    11.077] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): DFP-2: 2660.0 MHz maximum pixel clock
[    11.077] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): 
[    11.077] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): DFP-3: disconnected
[    11.077] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): DFP-3: Internal TMDS
[    11.077] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): DFP-3: 165.0 MHz maximum pixel clock
[    11.077] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): 
[    11.109] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): LG Electronics LG Ultra HD (DFP-4): connected
[    11.109] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): LG Electronics LG Ultra HD (DFP-4): Internal TMDS
[    11.109] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): LG Electronics LG Ultra HD (DFP-4): 600.0 MHz maximum pixel clock
[    11.109] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): 
[    11.109] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): DFP-5: disconnected
[    11.109] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): DFP-5: Internal DisplayPort
[    11.109] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): DFP-5: 2660.0 MHz maximum pixel clock
[    11.109] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): 
[    11.110] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): DFP-6: disconnected
[    11.110] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): DFP-6: Internal TMDS
[    11.110] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0): DFP-6: 165.0 MHz maximum pixel clock
[    11.110] (--) NVIDIA(GPU-0):
dvilela
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  • You seem to concentrate on off-topic Elementary; which is neither Ubuntu nor official flavor of Ubuntu - https://askubuntu.com/help/on-topic (it gets listed multiple times with detail, 19.04/19.10 appear without detail, plus they hadn't been released at the time of your Feb/March discussion) – guiverc Nov 14 '19 at 12:58
  • Maybe you're right. I was trying to recall when he bought it, and it could perfectly be April, but that was just a guess. I remember trying with elementary first, and with 19.04 a few weeks after, when it was released. Since then I've been changing so it's not rare that I messed up my mind. Edited. Since the problem seems to be with all Ubuntu based I tried, this seems the best place to ask to me. – dvilela Nov 14 '19 at 13:14
  • Elementary is not Ubuntu, nor an official flavor of Ubuntu thus off-topic (https://askubuntu.com/help/on-topic) - Ask on https://elementaryos.stackexchange.com or https://unix.stackexchange.com/ (where Ubuntu and Elementary are both on-topic) – guiverc Nov 14 '19 at 13:27
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    Would you be more comfortable if I delete the elementary word? As i already stated, i’ve been trying with Ubuntu 19.04 and 19.10 (yesterday) and then i tried with something different to ensure it is base related. Fyi, I also asked first in the elementary subreddit, but obviously there is much more potential help here. If you prefer, I can reinstall Ubuntu and make the same question, because I’ll get again the same result as yesterday. – dvilela Nov 14 '19 at 13:41
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    @K7AAY Ok, I just installed 19.10. After the installation, black screen, but this time no ssh as the 435 driver is installed by default and I don’t even have the chance to login to install openssh. – dvilela Nov 14 '19 at 19:08
  • @K7AAY thanks, I tried those yesterday also with the same result. – dvilela Nov 14 '19 at 19:54
  • Have you checked for any BIOS/firmware updates from Gigabyte? Applying the latest might help. – ubfan1 Nov 14 '19 at 20:54
  • That was actually a good idea. I just applied a minimal bios update, but unfortunately it didnt solve the issue. Thanks! – dvilela Nov 14 '19 at 21:44

1 Answers1

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The issue is now solved: the problem was a long HDMI cable. It work with Windows but not with GNU/Linux.

dvilela
  • 139