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I'm reinstalling Ubuntu 14.04 for the fifth time today, I already tried several solutions on a completely fresh installation (my default keyboard/mouse don't work during installation, have to use a spare keyboard every time which works, but this is not really a problem).

I managed to get everything running on my old laptop for testing purposes, but now I need the computing power of my desktop machine.

I'm using an nVidia GTX 970 with three screens plugged in: one on HDMI, two on DVI ports with VGA to DVI adapters, one of the VGA to DVI screens is the one that works and it's (conveniently) the oldest/smallest one.

Things I could observe consistently after every single installation:

  • TTY console does not work at all, every single one is just black with no reaction on input but I can still swap back to desktop
  • Only one screen is working (I usually have three in use, but a second would be godsend already) and the others aren't detected in system settings -> displays.
  • Resolution is fine

Some of the things I tried:

sudo apt-get install nvidia-current
sudo nvidia-xconfig

Observed result: UI took longer to initially load and completely froze after I logged in. But it fixed the TTY console issue.

  • Booting directly into text mode to install the driver I downloaded from nvidia website. This are the instructions I used.

Observed result: Boot never finished in text mode (rebooted multiple times) and it somehow crashed, but I couldn't figure out why (I think I can reproduce it if you want me to). This was fixable by booting into recovery mode and reversing the changes to the grub config file.

  • Booting into recovery mode and installing Nvidia drivers from there.

Observed result: Exactly the same as first one.

What do I actually want to accomplish now?

  1. Get my other screens to work so I can work comfortably again.
  2. Get the CUDA Toolkit to work since I want to use it with Torch.ch (can't link it here, only 2 links possible) which is the reason why I gave Ubuntu another try in the first place.

If you need any other information or want me to try something even if you aren't sure about it, please tell me, I already spent hours on it with zero progress, maybe you can do something.

Edit:

Output of nvidia-settings --version as requested:

nvidia-settings:  version 331.20  (buildd@roseapple)  Mon Feb  3 15:07:22 UTC 2014      The NVIDIA X Server Settings tool.    
  This program is used to configure the NVIDIA Linux graphics driver.      For more detail, please see the nvidia-settings (1) man page.    
  Copyright (C) 2004 - 2010 NVIDIA Corporation.

And what happens after doing

 sudo apt-get install nvidia-current

Resolution is much lower after reboot, looks like 800x600 to me.Then the UI crashes (mouse cursor disappears and I sit in front of an empty ubuntu wallpaper) as soon as I enter my user credentials, but the TTY console is working now. So I tried doing

sudo service lightdm restart

which results in 4 times

systemd-udevd[4114]: Failed to apply ACL on /dev/dri/card0: No such file or directory

and taking me back to the same low-res login screen that just crashes on login.

Fabby
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Dominik Beppler
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2 Answers2

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Honestly, I would stick with single monitor for Linux. I tried multi-monitor setup, but it screwed up my screens and I had to reinstall/format/do the whole damn installation again.\

Depending on your graphics card, I would get the drivers from the site, if there are any. I know that some AMD/ATI cards work like plug-and-play.

bobonano
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Don't use converters and if you really must: use externally powered ones that contain a DSP and can do the up/downscaling for you. It's not the modules (a.k.a. "drivers") that's the problem: it's the converters!

The older one is working because it's probably a standard VESA resolution (like 800x600 or 1024x768) and the other one isn't because it doesn't have enough power, or the resolution doesn't work out, or the sync or the ...

If your machine's output is to DVI, use DVI cables connected to DVI-capable monitors. (if you have other ports like HDMI, buy cables for those)

Sorry to be the harbinger of bad news!

Fabby
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  • As you're a reputation 1 user: If this answer helped you, don't forget to click the grey ☑ at the left of this text, which means Yes, this answer is valid! ;-) – Fabby Jul 16 '15 at 17:56
  • Shouldn't the HDMI to HDMI Monitor be working then? Since it's connected without any adapters directly to the graphics card – Dominik Beppler Jul 16 '15 at 23:57
  • Yes! :-) If you're willing to pursue a direct-connect solution, edit your question and provide the output to nvidia-settings --version and post the contents of your monitors.xml to http://paste.ubuntu.com and provide the link back here! Then we'll be able to make it work! ;-) – Fabby Jul 17 '15 at 08:32
  • Had to install nvidia-settings first, not sure if this was what you intended me to do. And I can't find a monitor.xml, where should I look for it? Also added what happens when I try to install nvidia-current – Dominik Beppler Jul 17 '15 at 10:34
  • Forget about CUDA for the moment. Uninstall if present and then, make a system back-up then install the latest version of the nvidia as explained here, reboot and copy-paste into a terminal locate monitors.xml and report back. (you're missing an s.) – Fabby Jul 17 '15 at 17:08