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 * Debian [[HowToPackageForDebian|Packaging How-To]]  * Debian [[HowToPackageForDebian|Packaging How-To]], Debian Wiki page on [[Packaging]]

Erik Auerswald

Email: <auerswal AT SPAMFREE unix-ag DOT uni-kl DOT de>

Skolelinux.de Wiki: http://wiki.skolelinux.de/ErikAuerswald

Ubuntu Launchpad: https://launchpad.net/~auerswal

My homepage at the Unix-AG Kaiserslautern: http://www.unix-ag.uni-kl.de/~auerswal/

Sourceforge: http://sourceforge.net/users/auerswald

Alioth: http://alioth.debian.org/users/auerswald-guest

Ohloh: https://www.ohloh.net/accounts/auerswald

NVIDIA Graphics Card

Back when I bought my current PC, one intended use was playing Doom 3. At that time, an NVIDIA graphics card was the only sensible choice for gaming under GNU/Linux, and I bought a GeForce 6600 GT. The proprietary driver was the only choice with Open GL support. I used to install it manually from the NVIDIA installer to use the latest version.

Later on I did not play that often and changed from using Fedora to Debian/Sid. The non-free NVIDIA driver quite often broke with the many kernel and X updates, so I changed to the free nv driver, which worked fine for 2D graphics. Later the nouveau project appeared, I am currently (October 2012) using this driver. It provides basic Open GL support, but is still not usable for gaming.

With the upcoming Steam for Linux I'll try the proprietary NVIDIA drivers again. Hopefully, DKMS will take care of recompiling the kernel module automatically. Let's see how well NVIDIA keeps up with X server development nowadays...

Anyway, my next PC will have Intel graphics, because Intel provides free drivers with good quality, performance, and features. IMHO, the AMD GPU driver's quality is not up to par (neither free nor non-free) and NVIDIA does not provide free drivers or even documentation.

Installed the current proprietary drivers today (2012-10-26): 

sudo aptitude install linux-headers-686-pae

sudo aptitude install nvidia-kernel-dkms
  • Reboot after installation is suggested to remove nouveau module from kernel. This works, but don't reboot yet.
  • A message is displayed that nvidia driver needs to be enabled manually in xorg.conf. 

cat > xorg.conf <<EOF
Section "Module"
    Load        "glx"
EndSection

Section "Device"
    Identifier  "Video Card"
    Driver      "nvidia"
    Option      "UseEDIDDPI" "false"
    Option      "DPI" "96 x 96"
EndSection
EOF
sudo mv -i xorg.conf /etc/X11/
  • The two options regarding DPI are necessary for me because the monitor seems to return (very) wrong DPI info. I don't remember this problem from before switching from nvidia to nv (and then nouveau), though.

Rebooting now changes from nouveau to nvidia X driver.

The non-free NVIDIA driver still works and provides better performance than the free driver. It is more work to use the non-free driver than just keeping nouveau. The nice framebuffer console provided by nouveau is gone. :\

Steam

With the open Steam beta under way, I wanted to try it out on my Debian/Unstable box. The Steam .deb package for Ubuntu 12.04 does not install cleanly on Debian/Sid, but solutions can be found:

I looked at the three scripts from the first link, decided to manually implement the steps from debian_install.sh and roll my own version of debian_steam.sh to start Steam.

  1. Decide to install special dependencies and startscript in ${HOME}/games/Steam and ${HOME}/games/Steam/lib, respectively

  2. Install libc6 version Steam depends on from Ubuntu repository 

    mkdir -p "${HOME}/games/Steam/lib"
cd /tmp
wget http://security.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/pool/main/e/eglibc/libc6_2.15-0ubuntu10.2_i386.deb
dpkg -x libc6_2.15-0ubuntu10.2_i386.deb /tmp/libc/
mv /tmp/libc/lib/i386-linux-gnu/* "${HOME}/games/Steam/lib"
rm -rf /tmp/libc6_2.15-0ubuntu10.2_i386.deb /tmp/libc

  3. Install jockey-common and python-xkit from Ubuntu repository 

    wget http://mirror.ovh.net/ubuntu/pool/main/j/jockey/jockey-common_0.9.7-0ubuntu7_all.deb http://mirror.ovh.net/ubuntu/pool/main/x/x-kit/python-xkit_0.4.2.3build1_all.deb
sudo dpkg -i jockey-common_0.9.7-0ubuntu7_all.deb python-xkit_0.4.2.3build1_all.deb
rm jockey-common_0.9.7-0ubuntu7_all.deb python-xkit_0.4.2.3build1_all.deb

  4. Install steam_latest.deb 

    wget http://repo.steampowered.com/steam/archive/precise/steam_latest.deb
sudo dpkg -i --force-depends steam_latest.deb
rm steam_latest.deb
  5. Create start script for Steam 
    cat > "${HOME}/games/Steam/steam.sh" <<EOF
#! /usr/bin/env sh

export LD_LIBRARY_PATH="/home/auerswald/games/Steam/lib:$LD_LIBRARY_PATH"
export LC_ALL=C
exec /usr/bin/steam "$@"
EOF
chmod +x "${HOME}/games/Steam/steam.sh"

  6. If needed, install dependencies asked for during installation of steam_latest.deb. Everything needed was already installed on my box, except libjpeg-turbo, which is not strictly necessary.

  7. Run the start script :-) 

    ~/games/Steam/steam.sh

CategoryHomepage

My User Pages: Alioth Debian Launchpad Skolelinux.de Sourceforge Unix-AG