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I've recently started programming in university and for an OS they gave us Ubuntu 12.10 to code in. Now I have quite an old laptop but still reliable, Intel Dual Core, 4GB DDR2, Nvidia 6500GT (I think need to check again). So one day when I boot Ubuntu is shows me this window "system is running in low graphics mode", I research it and apparently it's because of an outdated graphics card driver. So I look and it tells me to use:

Sudo apt-get install nvidia-current

So it installed and I thought it would be fine, this is where it all went to hell. The next time I booted, the launcher didn't start, the toolbar on the top wasn't showing. Only the desktop and my few work folders remained on the screen, there's and only an error showed the first time "compiz has failed to launch" or something, I click launch again but it doesn't do anything. I even tried uninstalling the drivers and installing one according to the os type (got the idea from an answer here) but it didn't change anything.

I'm desperately looking for a solution because there's more assignments on the way and I need my laptop to work properly. I've really enjoyed ubuntu thus far but this is scaring me from using it in the future, thanks in advance for the help :)

UPDATE: Okay so I uninstalled the driver and its back to normal now, yay :D now there's just the "system running in low graphics mode", anyway to get rid of that? I have to restart my laptop 2 - 5 times for it to boot up without that message, I'm sure there's a more elegant solution? By the way thank you so much for the help :)

Shockwave
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  • I think you should read this: http://askubuntu.com/a/206289/169736 if that don't work, please add /var/log/Xorg.0.log and ~/.xsession-errors. – Braiam Aug 13 '13 at 12:19

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Whist I do not have an Nvidia card to test on, can point you to this link. My take on this is that the correct driver for your card, a GEForce 6 series card, is the nvidia-304 series driver, which should be the correct driver to work with your card. If you can try the command:

sudo apt-get install nvidia-304

you might be able to quickly recover from the issue you are presently experiencing on another laptop.

UPDATE: Apparently as commented below, that package is not available in 12.10.

If you have a way to tell which package is the same as the Nvidia 304 driver, that is the one you want.

If expediency matters more, you could install the official release from here by following the instructions here.

UPDATE 2: Have you tried booting into recovery mode and determining if that will work?

Also, could you add the Xorg.0.log or the errors from same to the issue? That might prove useful as well.

freecode
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  • There is no nvidia-304 package in Ubuntu 12.10. This is an nvidia-304 package in Ubuntu 13.04, however Shockwave is using Ubuntu 12.10. – karel Aug 13 '13 at 12:26
  • Anyone still running 12.10 know which packages in 12.10 support the Nvidia 304 driver? No longer running 12.10 here. – freecode Aug 13 '13 at 12:28
  • The nvidia-current package in Ubuntu 12.10 is the Nvidia 304.88 driver. Shockwave already installed the nvidia-current package. – karel Aug 13 '13 at 12:31
  • Yeah I've tried recovery mode but it tells me that there are no errors for some reason, I'm considering just changing the OS to 13.04 if it will save me the trouble – Shockwave Aug 13 '13 at 17:23
  • Maybe, the open source Nouveau drivers work pretty well in 13.04 for me, and actually prefer them to the proprietary drivers for my ATI card. ATI has not kept up so much. Nvidia is usually well supported, but if the card itself is bad, that's a problem as well. – freecode Aug 13 '13 at 17:35