Proprietary NVIDIA drivers on Ubuntu 20.04 and 21.10 not working

I have a GeForce RTX 3060 Ti graphics card, and a clean install of Ubuntu 20.04 LTS. My motherboard is from MSI: PRO Z690-A DDR4(MS-7D25). I have installed the OS from a bootable USB drive, and selected the options Download updates while installing Ubuntu and Install third-party software for graphics and Wi-Fi hardware and additional media formats. After installing, I booted into the OS.

Now I still wanted NVIDIA drivers, so I followed this tutorial.

I have updated the software using the GUI software updater. I looked into the "Additional drivers" part of Software & Updates, and the Nouveau driver was selected. I clicked Using NVIDIA driver metapackage from nvidia-driver-470 (proprietary, tested)option, applied the changes and rebooted. Now my PC will not get past the MSI booting logo. I can get a tty with Ctrl+Alt+F3. From there I executed these commands:

$ ubuntu-drivers devices
== /sys/devices/pci0000:00/0000:00:01.0/0000:01:00.0 ==
modalias : pci:v000010DEd00002489sv000010DEsd0000153Cbc03sc00i00
vendor : NVIDIA Corporation
driver : nvidia-driver-470 - distro non-free recommended
driver : nvidia-driver-495 - distro non-free
driver : nvidia-driver-460-server - distro non-free
driver : nvidia-driver-460 - distro non-free
driver : nvidia-driver-470-server - distro non-free
driver : xserver-xorg-video-nouveau - distro free builtin

Note that I do not get a model field! I don't know why...

$ nvidia-settings -q all
Unable to init server: Could not connect: Connection refused
ERROR: The control display is undefined; please run `nvidia-settings --help` for usage information.

$ nvidia-smi
Wed Dec 22 11:47:05 2021
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| NVIDIA-SMI 470.86 Driver Version: 470.86 CUDA Version: 11.4 |
|-------------------------------+----------------------+----------------------+
| GPU Name Persistence-M| Bus-Id Disp.A | Volatile Uncorr. ECC |
| Fan Temp Perf Pwr:Usage/Cap| Memory-Usage | GPU-Util Compute M. |
| | | MIG M. |
|===============================+======================+======================|
| 0 NVIDIA GeForce ... Off | 00000000:01:00.0 Off | N/A |
| 0% 33C P8 6W / 200W | 14MiB / 7982MiB | 0% Default |
| | | N/A |
+-------------------------------+----------------------+----------------------+
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Processes: |
| GPU GI CI PID Type Process name GPU Memory |
| ID ID Usage |
|=============================================================================|
| 0 N/A N/A 1017 G /usr/lib/xorg/Xorg 8MiB |
| 0 N/A N/A 1310 G /usr/bin/gnome-shell 3MiB |
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+

$ nvidia-smi --query-gpu=name --format=csv,noheader
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Ti

$ sudo lshw -c video *-display description: VGA compatible controller product: GA104 [GeForce RTX 3060 Ti Lite Hash Rate] vendor: NVIDIA Corporation physical id: 0 bus info: pci@0000:01:00.0 version: a1 width: 64 bits clock: 33MHz capabilities: pm msi pciexpress vga_controller bus_master cap_list rom configuration: driver=nvidia latency=0 resources: irq:160 memory:42000000-42ffffff memory:60000000-6fffffff memory:70000000-71ffffff ioport:5000(size=128) memory:43000000-4307ffff *-display UNCLAIMED description: VGA compatible controller product: AlderLake-S GT1 vendor: Intel Corporation physical id: 2 bus info: pci@0000:00:02.0 version: 0c width: 64 bits clock: 33MHz capabilities: pciexpress msi pm vga_controller bus_master cap_list configuration: latency=0 resources: memory:41000000-41ffffff memory:50000000-5fffffff ioport:6000(size=64) memory:c0000-dffff memory:45000000-4bffffff

$ systemctl status gdm
● gdm.service - GNOME Display Manager Loaded: loaded (/lib/systemd/system/gdm.service; static; vendor preset: enabled) Active: active (running) since Wed 2021-12-22 11:17:05 CET; 31min ago Process: 892 ExecStartPre=/usr/share/gdm/generate-config (code=exited, status=0/SUCCESS) Process: 913 ExecStartPre=/usr/lib/gdm3/gdm-wait-for-drm (code=exited, status=0/SUCCESS) Main PID: 916 (gdm3) Tasks: 3 (limit: 76852) Memory: 5.6M CGroup: / └─916 /usr/sbin/gdm3
dec 22 11:17:05 spectroag systemd[1]: Starting GNOME Display Manager...
dec 22 11:17:05 spectroag systemd[1]: Started GNOME Display Manager.
dec 22 11:17:07 spectroag gdm-autologin][961]: gkr-pam: no password is available for user
dec 22 11:17:07 spectroag gdm-autologin][961]: pam_unix(gdm-autologin:session): session opened for user developer by (uid=0)
dec 22 11:17:07 spectroag gdm-autologin][961]: gkr-pam: gnome-keyring-daemon started properly

(I installed Ubuntu with auto login)

$ sudo lspci -vnn | grep -i VGA -A 25
00:02.0 VGA compatible controller [0300]: Intel Corporation Device [8086:4680] (rev 0c) (prog-if 00 [VGA controller]) DeviceName: Onboard - Video Subsystem: Micro-Star International Co., Ltd. [MSI] Device [1462:7d25] Flags: bus master, fast devsel, latency 0, IRQ 255 Memory at 41000000 (64-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=16M] Memory at 50000000 (64-bit, prefetchable) [size=256M] I/O ports at 6000 [size=64] Expansion ROM at 000c0000 [virtual] [disabled] [size=128K] Capabilities: [40] Vendor Specific Information: Len=0c <?> Capabilities: [70] Express Root Complex Integrated Endpoint, MSI 00 Capabilities: [ac] MSI: Enable- Count=1/1 Maskable+ 64bit- Capabilities: [d0] Power Management version 2 Capabilities: [100] Process Address Space ID (PASID) Capabilities: [200] Address Translation Service (ATS) Capabilities: [300] Page Request Interface (PRI) Capabilities: [320] Single Root I/O Virtualization (SR-IOV)
00:06.0 PCI bridge [0604]: Intel Corporation Device [8086:464d] (rev 02) (prog-if 00 [Normal decode]) Flags: bus master, fast devsel, latency 0, IRQ 123 Bus: primary=00, secondary=02, subordinate=02, sec-latency=0 I/O behind bridge: [disabled] Memory behind bridge: 44800000-448fffff [size=1M] Prefetchable memory behind bridge: [disabled] Capabilities: [40] Express Root Port (Slot+), MSI 00 Capabilities: [80] MSI: Enable+ Count=1/1 Maskable- 64bit- Capabilities: [90] Subsystem: Device [0000:0000]
--
01:00.0 VGA compatible controller [0300]: NVIDIA Corporation Device [10de:2489] (rev a1) (prog-if 00 [VGA controller]) Subsystem: NVIDIA Corporation Device [10de:153c] Flags: bus master, fast devsel, latency 0, IRQ 160 Memory at 42000000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=16M] Memory at 60000000 (64-bit, prefetchable) [size=256M] Memory at 70000000 (64-bit, prefetchable) [size=32M] I/O ports at 5000 [size=128] Expansion ROM at 43000000 [virtual] [disabled] [size=512K] Capabilities: [60] Power Management version 3 Capabilities: [68] MSI: Enable+ Count=1/1 Maskable- 64bit+ Capabilities: [78] Express Legacy Endpoint, MSI 00 Capabilities: [b4] Vendor Specific Information: Len=14 <?> Capabilities: [100] Virtual Channel Capabilities: [250] Latency Tolerance Reporting Capabilities: [258] L1 PM Substates Capabilities: [128] Power Budgeting <?> Capabilities: [420] Advanced Error Reporting Capabilities: [600] Vendor Specific Information: ID=0001 Rev=1 Len=024 <?> Capabilities: [900] Secondary PCI Express Capabilities: [bb0] Resizable BAR <?> Capabilities: [c1c] Physical Layer 16.0 GT/s <?> Capabilities: [d00] Lane Margining at the Receiver <?> Capabilities: [e00] Data Link Feature <?> Kernel driver in use: nvidia Kernel modules: nvidiafb, nouveau, nvidia_drm, nvidia

$ prime-select query
nvidia

$ ps aux | grep X
root 1017 0.0 0.0 25358216 56396 tty2 Sl+ 11:17 0:01 /usr/lib/xorg/Xorg vt2 -displayfd 3 -auth /run/user/1000/gdm/Xauthority -background none -noreset -keeptty -verbose 3
root 2905 0.0 0.0 25346156 51956 tty1 Sl+ 11:50 0:00 /usr/lib/xorg/Xorg vt1 -displayfd 3 -auth /run/user/125/gdm/Xauthority -background none -noreset -keeptty -verbose 3
develop+ 3488 0.0 0.0 17676 664 tty3 R+ 12:12 0:00 grep --color=auto X

(I'm in tty3 executing this)

$ cat /etc/default/grub | grep CMDLINE
GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="quiet splash"
GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX=""

Any idea what might be happening? It looks a lot like it should work, but I can't get any visuals.

In my BIOS I can see that Secure Boot is disabled, also I'm using UEFI if that matters.

Please let me know if I should provide more information!

EDIT: I got the screen to show a log during boot, so I can see what it's doing before being stuck. This is the last part of what's on the screen:

[ OK ] Started Session 1 of user developer. Starting RealtimeKit Scheduling Policy Service... Starting NVIDIA Persistence Daemon...
[ OK ] Started NVIDIA Persistence Daemon.
[ OK ] Started Snap Daemon. Starting Wait until snapd is fully seeded...
[ OK ] Finished Wait until snapd is fully seeded.
[ OK ] Started RealtimeKit Scheduling Policy Service. Starting Daemon for power management...
[ OK ] Started Daemon for power management.

Most processes I would expect are also there, but I cannot copy it all for you. It looks like it holds after finishing, and I have no idea why still...

UPDATE : I have installed Ubuntu 21.10, and downloaded the driver with sudo apt install nvidia-driver-470. When rebooting, I have the same situation as described in the post. This time, I also cannot go into the VT3 by pressing ctrl alt f3, since it keeps going back to what I think is VT1 (the login screen), showing a black screen with a cursor (again like in the post).

UPDATE : I have tried to update my BIOS version, but the v11 version bricked my whole system and I had to manually downgrade the BIOS back to v10. I have tried with the 495.44 driver, and also with the 470.94 driver that's not in the standard repos. I have tried with kernel 5.15. Nothing worked unfortunately. With kernel 5.15 and driver 495.44 the latest boot log is "Starting Show Plymouth Boot Screen..." and I don't have a log saying it finished.

UPDATE : Here is some more information: /var/log/boot.log, which looks quite normal to me. /var/lib/gdm3/.local/share/xorg/Xorg.0.log, which shows an interesting error. For both logs I am using kernel 5.13.0-22-generic and NVIDIA Driver 470.86 on a fresh install.

1 Answer

I got it to work! I am stupid for only doing this so late, but my monitor was connected to the HDMI port of the motherboard, and not of the GPU. Just moving the cable to the GPU port fixed it, because the drivers were working correctly... I hope no-one else has to go through this!