Ubuntu 12.10: nVIDIA Oops!

I thought installing the nvidia drivers would be very easy.  Turns out, I was wrong.  I ran sudo apt-get install nvidia-current which failed because apparently, it didn't include the kernel headers.  I ended up with vesa and without the taskbar, rendering the desktop useless.

To fix this, I went to the commandline screen (ctrl+alt+f1) and logged in.  Then sudo apt-get install linux-headers-generic and then sudo apt-get remove nvidia-* to get rid of the currently installed nvidia drivers.  Lastly, I ran the nvidia driver install again: sudo apt-get install nvidia-current-updates nvidia-settings to recompile the drivers (and slipped in the config app).  After reboot, all's well!  Special thanks to this forum thread.

Pulse Audio still exhibits the same issues with HDMI where the audio being played misses a few seconds.  Typical of this POS audio layer.

Now it's about trying to get this Logitech Quickcam to work which used to work splendidly on 9.10.  Oh well, time to see what's going on.

Ubuntu 12.10 - Growing Pains

I guess no matter how good things get with Ubuntu, you still get the usual first boot scares.  In my case, it's the video display (surprise! surprise!).  I run a GeForce 9500 GT and it's an old card for sure.  When I got to finally boot, I got a purple screen and then no video signal issue.  Poking around I realized I had to set the kernel options on grub to nomodeset but it's been a while since I last mucked with grub.  So, I wanted to do a post here that summarizes everything I've learned.

If you don't get the grub menu on boot, just before grub loads, press SHIFT.  Since I had the network boot to start, I had to press CTRL+C to stop network boot and then wait for the routine to exit.  Before the text "grub loading" appears, I was jamming the SHIFT key like crazy.  From there, I edit the first option (ubuntu) and then add nomodeset to the linux/boot entry.

Many, many thanks to this Ubuntu forum thread for the info.  It's nice to see that there's so much self-help information available online to fix these things.

Now it's time to get a real nvidia driver up and running!

Making the Leap

Today has been a long time coming.  I have extended the lifespan of Ubuntu 9.10 well beyond Canonical's support and I feel that with the strides Ubuntu has made, it's worth the leap.  I designed my work desktop computer so that I could easily backup my stuff and upgrade without much woes, but because of laziness on my part, I've been putting off that for a while.  Before I knew it, 9.10 had reached its end in terms of Canonical support.  Just like my old trusty Gutsy 7.10 install on my laptop, I was falling into the same trap of staying on an old system.  This time, hopefully, I stay true to the design goal and keep Ubuntu updated.  With Ubuntu 13 aiming towards gaming (thanks to Valve), it should be an interesting ride for sure.

I had a few external hard disk scares last night as I was backing up my stuff.  I swear Seagate products have gotten lousy through the years.  Thankfully I have more than one drive to back my office stuff up.  Smooth start to the transition, right?  I thought so.

Next up was booting Ubuntu 12.10 and not detecting my network card.  Cool.  Thankfully, I saw a link on Ubuntu's forums about a glitch where you need to set the network boot as the first booting device from the bios.  The tip didn't work in the forum thread, but it sure damn worked for me.

Now, I've clicked install and the disc is taking a while to read.  I hope I manage to get the upgrade or all the work will be for naught.  I'll post again when something significant happens.

Tried some games on Wine

Hitman Sniper Challenge doesn't work on Wine.  Oil Rush on the other hand works splendidly although I initially had trouble getting it to run.  You have to switch it to use opengl instead of DirectX. To do that, go to /path/of/steam/steamapps/common/Oil Rush/data/launcher and edit interface.html.  From there, edit the video_app to opengl instead of auto.

This will also help those who want to use Steam's startup parameters from the property dialog box.  Open Steam Works Link on Oil Rush

Linux as a Gaming Platform?

I'd like to think more and more companies are looking into Linux as a viable platform.  Ubuntu is making a significant push for this and Valve is on their side as of the moment.  If Ubuntu is pushing for a Gaming Platform, I think it makes sense to make an edition that uses a rolling release system.  This ensures that there is only 1 configuration that publishers and developers aim for, and all the rest is just upgrading versions instead of major overhauls that has been happening with every major Linux distro release.  This also makes it easier for maintainers because all of this is just open source software, so they'll figure out just what a game needs to work for their system.  Lastly, this helps gamers who just want to bump up the packages they need to get something to work.  Doing the distribution upgrades takes a lot of time to do and is very risky as well.

If a manufacturer targets a single Linux platform, everyone in the open source community can pick up the slack and figure out how to make it work elsewhere.  This is the open source community at its best and brightest.  Adding a rolling release on top of it, in my opinion, just makes the entire process easier for everyone, gamers and developers alike.

Congrats Reversion on Suzanne Award for Best Designed Short

Congrats to the Reversion blokes for bagging a Suzanne Award.

Watch here!

O'Reilly vs Stewart 2012: Great and Disappointing

There's really not much to say about the debate between Bill O'Reilly and Jon Stewart but that it was funny, substantive and not surprising for those who have seen the two duke it out.  I had a great time watching this, but had a cruel sinking feeling as the credits began to roll.

After trading jabs, jokes and political points, nothing has changed.  Both sides agree to disagree on a myriad of issues and at the end of the bell head to their respective camps, with neither men convincing the other of anything that they don't already believe.