Installing CUDA purges previous NVIDIA driver installation

Question

I just finished installing CUDA on my system following these instructions and found out that the installation changed the NVIDIA driver being used on my machine from version 352.55 to version 352.39, as you can see below:

I probably wouldn't have even noticed it if I hadn't installed the driver version 352.55 to avoid the following two errors:

ACPI PCC Probe Failed
[snd_hda_intel 0000:00:03.0: failed to add i915 component master (-19)]

that pop-up on any other driver I installed.

I have 2 questions:

During CUDA installation, is there a way to specify NOT to change the currently installed NVIDIA drivers?
If I purge driver 352.39 and reinstall 352.55 is this going to mess up my system / CUDA installation?

My system: Linux vega 3.19.0-25-generic #26~14.04.1-Ubuntu SMP Fri Jul 24 21:16:20 UTC 2015 x86_64 x86_64 x86_64 GNU/Linux

After you install driver, make sure to install nvidia-modprobe and then install CUDA via deb file from Nvidia for latest one. During install deselect installation of driver. — Arup Roy Chowdhury, Nov 21 '15 at 14:38
@ArupRoyChowdhury - Could you please write your comment in form of an answer? It'd be very useful! Thanks a lot — Matteo, Nov 22 '15 at 17:59

Arup Roy Chowdhury · Answer 1 · 2015-11-23T01:54:26.033

1

This is for standalone desktop with nvidia graphics. If you wish to retain your existing driver, download the 7.5 CUDA deb from nvidia, during install, deselect driver option otherwise your existing driver would get over written. Make sure to do the bash entries as described in the nvidia manual. if you have the driver installed, make sure to install nvidia-modprobe and reboot or else CUDA will not see your driver install.

edited Nov 23 '15 at 01:54

answered Nov 23 '15 at 00:32

Arup Roy Chowdhury

1,580

Thanks for your answer! A last doubt, how do you deselect driver option? – Matteo Nov 23 '15 at 18:09
During install it will offer to install driver, select N. – Arup Roy Chowdhury Nov 24 '15 at 11:20

score 0 · Answer 2 · answered Nov 21 '15 at 14:26

It's clear in the instructions that you linked to that in order for CUDA to work there are tight restrictions on supported environments (see table 1 Native Linux Distribution Support in CUDA 6.5 on page 2). Your kernel version is 3.19.0-25-generic while the requirements listed indicate 3.13 on Ubuntu 14.04.

I can only suggest that perhaps if you follow the strict requirements exactly you might get the results you desire. I cannot guarantee this however. If you find another solution please post your answer here so that others with the same problem can learn from your experience.

Installing CUDA purges previous NVIDIA driver installation

2 Answers2