Hi Rocky
Your reply rather surprised me. I have not yet made any further changes today, as i wish to take stock of the journey to this point, what it means, & what's the next logical steps.
I am still struggling to understand your rationale in reversing your until-recent advocacy for me changing from the Nvidia gpu driver to the Nouveau driver. Based on the research i did per my earlier post in this thread https://forums.mauilinux.org/showthread....6#pid41756, there was not a consistent view "out there" one way or the other on Nvidia or Nouveau. Admittedly in the link we both posted, https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+sourc...ug/1530405, there was a little more support expressed for Nvidia in lieu of Nouveau.
However, look at my own documented freeze history in this thread; the failures have been split virtually 1/2 & 1/2... which is why in an earlier post i mentioned to you:
The question of Nvidia vs Nouveau has come up previously in other Maui threads [with posters speaking favourably of Nouveau], but just to limit myself to the current thread:
A distinct operational benefit i have experienced since i changed to the Nouveau driver from Nvidia driver, per my post https://forums.mauilinux.org/showthread....5#pid41375, is that:
...so on balance, & contrary to my earlier stubbornness of prior months, my preference at the moment is probably to retain Nouveau driver, not return to Nvidia driver (IF Nouveau is technically compatible with using the Intel gpu].
Please Rocky, i hope my taking these reflections does not seem like i am ungratefully biting the hand that has been generously feeding me. It's just that to this point [even though i now readily acknowledge it is NOT the fault of Maui per se, but rather maybe what lies below Maui [ie, 16.04], i have endured a great amount of stress & hassle with all the freezes [& occasional Tower unavailability whilst pursuing remedies], so i don't wish to take actions lightly now.
To the question of whether or not the current, active, GPU is now Nvidia or Intel, this latest pic would seem to indicate Intel (i know that when Nvidia is activated, in contrast the LHS column has very many more entries. In previous years, on my Lappy [reminder, this thread is for Tower not Lappy] when it still ran Mint 17.x KDE4, it suffered continual bad graphics failures at Resume from Suspend, which i eventually cured by using nvidia-prime to change to the Intel gpu... & as best i recall now, it then looked pretty similar to this latest appearance of the applet in Tower]:
So, if Tower is now using Intel gpu, do i still have a choice of Nvidia or Nouveau driver, or must it be only Nvidia, or must it be only Nouveau? My confusion on this point is another reason, additional to the historical reasons listed above, for my decision not to make further major changes today til i understand.
Finally, even though you see i am still weighing up the gpu driver i wish to use, is it safe for me to proceed now with your other recommendation of running the 16.04.2 HWE package & installing the 4.8 kernel... or is it safer not to, til the current statuses of active gpu, & driver, are resolved?
Thank you.
Your reply rather surprised me. I have not yet made any further changes today, as i wish to take stock of the journey to this point, what it means, & what's the next logical steps.
I am still struggling to understand your rationale in reversing your until-recent advocacy for me changing from the Nvidia gpu driver to the Nouveau driver. Based on the research i did per my earlier post in this thread https://forums.mauilinux.org/showthread....6#pid41756, there was not a consistent view "out there" one way or the other on Nvidia or Nouveau. Admittedly in the link we both posted, https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+sourc...ug/1530405, there was a little more support expressed for Nvidia in lieu of Nouveau.
However, look at my own documented freeze history in this thread; the failures have been split virtually 1/2 & 1/2... which is why in an earlier post i mentioned to you:
Quote:I do note your suggestion to try my Nvidia driver again [which i assume you are only making specifically in awareness of my kernel upgrade to 4.9.9, otherwise i cannot see the point, given that the explicit reason i previously switched from Nvidia to Nouveau [per advice from leszek, Pliny & you, if i recall] with the various older kernels was the plethora of freezes]. However, given today's new change already made [the intel-microcode installation, as above], i shall hold off on the GPU driver switch-back until/unless there's another freeze [ie, so i can properly judge the effectiveness or not of intel-microcode].
The question of Nvidia vs Nouveau has come up previously in other Maui threads [with posters speaking favourably of Nouveau], but just to limit myself to the current thread:
Quote:https://forums.mauilinux.org/showthread....7#pid41397
leszek
Nouveau drivers are well capable of running 3D games aswell. You don't need proprietary drivers for this.
All in all I think the unexpected behavior shows the flaws of that proprietary driver.
Quote:https://forums.mauilinux.org/showthread....3#pid41553
rocky7x
Hi kdemeoz,
Nouveau has gone a loooong way since Mint 17 & KDE4 days. For an old card like you have, I would maybe even go so far and say it's a better solution than the proprietary driver (maybe not for gaming, but for desktop definitely). My friend has an even older Nvidia card (but not so old that it would fall into legacy driver support) and Maui doesn't even come up with proprietary driver - it says that no OpenGL 2.1 support was found. But with Nouveau ALL works correctly. So I have only good experience with Nouveau. Of course, you cannot try it with the newest Nvidia cards, but with Kepler and older ones I would say that the experience is very good (especially if gaming is not required).
A distinct operational benefit i have experienced since i changed to the Nouveau driver from Nvidia driver, per my post https://forums.mauilinux.org/showthread....5#pid41375, is that:
Quote:now, after each Suspend - Resume, no longer are Cairo-Dock & my desktop icons garbled; they stay good.
...so on balance, & contrary to my earlier stubbornness of prior months, my preference at the moment is probably to retain Nouveau driver, not return to Nvidia driver (IF Nouveau is technically compatible with using the Intel gpu].
Please Rocky, i hope my taking these reflections does not seem like i am ungratefully biting the hand that has been generously feeding me. It's just that to this point [even though i now readily acknowledge it is NOT the fault of Maui per se, but rather maybe what lies below Maui [ie, 16.04], i have endured a great amount of stress & hassle with all the freezes [& occasional Tower unavailability whilst pursuing remedies], so i don't wish to take actions lightly now.
To the question of whether or not the current, active, GPU is now Nvidia or Intel, this latest pic would seem to indicate Intel (i know that when Nvidia is activated, in contrast the LHS column has very many more entries. In previous years, on my Lappy [reminder, this thread is for Tower not Lappy] when it still ran Mint 17.x KDE4, it suffered continual bad graphics failures at Resume from Suspend, which i eventually cured by using nvidia-prime to change to the Intel gpu... & as best i recall now, it then looked pretty similar to this latest appearance of the applet in Tower]:
So, if Tower is now using Intel gpu, do i still have a choice of Nvidia or Nouveau driver, or must it be only Nvidia, or must it be only Nouveau? My confusion on this point is another reason, additional to the historical reasons listed above, for my decision not to make further major changes today til i understand.
Finally, even though you see i am still weighing up the gpu driver i wish to use, is it safe for me to proceed now with your other recommendation of running the 16.04.2 HWE package & installing the 4.8 kernel... or is it safer not to, til the current statuses of active gpu, & driver, are resolved?
Thank you.