fc16 xserver won't start after upgrading to kernel 3.1.6

[jsp]

I have an nvidia quadro, and I have the rpm fusion X11 nouveau driver installed.

My understanding was that the nouveau driver obviates the need to install a new nvidia driver whenever the kernel gets updated. However, when I boot kernel 3.1.6 i get an error trying to start the X server. When I boot 3.1.5, the X server starts fine.

---------- Post added at 04:33 PM ---------- Previous post was at 04:14 PM ----------

The specific X server error is: module nvidia not found.

If I look in /lib/modules, I see that there is indeed a kernel module for 3.1.5, but not for 3.1.6. Should I install the kmod 3.1.6 kernel module, and in doing so will this replace the nouveau driver?

so you have the kmod-nvidia driver installed for 3.1.5 i take it. i would remove the kmod-nvidia and install the akmod-nvidia instead

[jsp]

no, i don't think i have the kmod 3.1.5 kernel driver installed.

[jsp@psy86 ~] 1003:$ rpm -qa | grep -i nvidia
[jsp@psy86 ~] 1004:$ rpm -qa | grep -i nouveau
xorg-x11-drv-nouveau-0.0.16-27.20110720gitb806e3f.fc16.x86_64
[jsp@psy86 ~] 1005:$

i thought that I had installed the proprietary drivers from NVIDIA, but my rpm output leads me to believe that the proprietary driver is not installed and that nouveau is taking the place of kmod/akmod/proprietary driver

[PabloTwo]

I have an nvidia quadro, and I have the rpm fusion X11 nouveau driver installed.

No, you don't. The nouveau video driver is part of the standard Fedora install. It does not come from the RPMFusion repos.

My understanding was that the nouveau driver obviates the need to install a new nvidia driver whenever the kernel gets updated. However, when I boot kernel 3.1.6 i get an error trying to start the X server. When I boot 3.1.5, the X server starts fine.

Wrong again. When you install the kmod-nivida or akmod-nvidia video driver from the RPMFusion repo, the nouveau driver kernel module has to be prevented from loading at bootup. Doing the corrrect kmod-nvidia/akmod-nvidia install method insures that the nouveau.ko does not load, and interfere, with the nvidia.ko kernel module. When you use the "nvidia" driver, you do not use "nouveau" for anything.

If you have kmod-nvidia installed and working for kernel-3.1.5, then when you upgrade to kernel-3.1.6, you must also upgrade the kmod-nvidia package that matches that kernel. If you don't, then there is no "nvidia.ko" to be found for the new kernel and you don't get an Xserver (graphical mode). Sometimes the kmod-nvidia package for a new kernel is a day or two late to arrive when a new kernel is released. In those cases, you either need to not upgrade to the new kernel until you see that there is a matching kmod-nviida package from rpmfusion to go along with it, or, install the akmod-nviida package.

What the akmod-nvidia package does is compile a new kmod-nvidia and kernel module on-the-fly at boot up time so you're not stuck without a nvidia kernel module for the new kernel.

To check which is your current video driver, do:

lsmod | egrep "nouveau|nvidia|vesa"

Is the picture a little clearer now?

[jsp]

yes. that's much clearer. i will try installing akmod. thanks!

[jsp@psy86 ~] 1021:$ lsmod | egrep "nouveau|nvidia|vesa"
nvidia 12122373 24
nouveau 754554 0
ttm 61533 1 nouveau
drm_kms_helper 30277 1 nouveau
drm 213647 3 nouveau,ttm,drm_kms_helper
i2c_algo_bit 5572 1 nouveau
i2c_core 28203 7 videodev,nvidia,i2c_i801,nouveau,drm_kms_helper,dr m,i2c_algo_bit
mxm_wmi 1743 1 nouveau
video 12388 1 nouveau

[PabloTwo]

Well, you have both the "nvidia" and "nouveau" kernel modules loaded. Not good. It's got to be either one or the other, not both. They are mutually exclusive. I don't know what method you used, or what guide you may have followed to install the nvidia driver, but I suggest you look in the Guides and How-to forum section and follow Leigh's nvidia driver guide.

[jsp]

I couldn't get twinview to work, so I downloaded nVidia's driver from their website and installed it using their install script. That also installed nVidia's X configuration utility, and allowed me to get twinview running correctly.

I'll check the guide. Thanks!