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Linux is a family of open source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991 by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged in a Linux distribution (or distro for short).

Distributions include the Linux kernel and supporting system software and libraries, many of which are provided by the GNU Project. Many Linux distributions use the word "Linux" in their name, but the Free Software Foundation uses the name GNU/Linux to emphasize the importance of GNU software, causing some controversy.

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What problems can I expect using Linux (Fedora) with an NVIDIA GPU? (lemmy.blahaj.zone)

submitted 21 hours ago* (last edited 16 hours ago) by Interstellar_1@lemmy.blahaj.zone to c/linux@lemmy.ml

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I'm planning on getting a laptop within the next month which will be my daily driver for university, and it has a RTX 5060. I know people have lots of issues with NVIDIA on Linux, but I don't know of any specific issues. What issues can I expect running Fedora 42 (KDE) on this device?

I am not responding to most comments here, but I am silently taking them into account.

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[–] balsoft@lemmy.ml 2 points 14 hours ago* (last edited 14 hours ago) (2 children)

It should work. The only practical issues are:

Usually, you will have to manually install the proprietary drivers (I think Fedora makes this relatively easy)
Wayland (the protocol most desktop environmentss use nowadays) support may be hit-and-miss at times (it will mostly work but it's not as polished as with Intel/AMD), and Proton (the thing that lets you play Windows games) may not play well either.

The ideological issue (which you probably don't care about) is that it pretty much requires proprietary (non-FOSS) drivers which run in kernel space and so in theory have complete access to all data on your computer (but then so does Intel ME). This is the main reason I personally will never use NVidia cards.

[–] IrritableOcelot@beehaw.org 3 points 7 hours ago

Yes, on fedora you just click the check box for the Nvidia driver repo in KDE Discover or Gnome Software, and you're good.

[–] CCRhode@lemmy.ml 2 points 7 hours ago (1 children)

The ideological issue (which you probably don’t care about) is that it pretty much requires proprietary (non-FOSS) drivers which run in kernel space and so in theory have complete access to all data on your computer (but then so does Intel ME). This is the main reason I personally will never use NVidia cards.

The only meltdown I've had with Linux occurred on a minor rev-level update to Debian that plugged some hole in the kernel the NVidia proprietary driver was crawling through. I had used Debian and an NVidia proprietary driver for years on an ancient motherboard. Then suddenly that "solution" disappeared. I had to replace the whole machine. Yeah, it was time. No, I wasn't ready. I don't know whether I should have been more pissed at Debian or NVidia, but I'm still on Debian. After the kernel update, X11 reverted to a default driver, and no install, uninstall, reinstall combination of the proprietary drivers seemed efficacious. I'm sorry I don't remember the exact software rev-levels and drivers involved. All notes I took at the time, if any, were lost in the subsequent crash and recovery from incompetently trying to roll back the kernel update.

[–] Flatfire@lemmy.ca 2 points 7 hours ago

That one sounds squarely on Nvidia. Any driver that uses undocumented workarounds to gain kernel level access or utilizes an access loophool for system hooks is a bad driver. I'd assume Debian, or likely more accurately the Linux kernel itself was updated following some matter of CVE that Nvidia was quietly abusing.

Frustrating, but a good example of why those kinds of proprietary drivers are such a nightmare. You really just don't know what techniques they're using.