Re: udev vs nvidia

[Daniel Drake <dan@reactivated.net>]

If anyone is interested, I have solved the below issue. It turns out that you 
are supposed to load the module before starting X (even nvidia say so), and 
devfs did this automatically on bootup. So, the nvidia module should be added 
to an autoload list, and this issue is not a fault of udev/hotplug.

Daniel

Daniel Drake wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> Since switching to udev, I have had problems when starting X relating to 
> nvidia drivers. I know this is a tricky situation, with the nvidia 
> drivers being closed-source, nobody really knows how they work. If it 
> seems likely that this problem is not udev-related, then please tell me, 
> and I will go to nvidia instead.
> 
> I'm not sure if this is even anything to do with udev. The only reason I 
> suspect udev might be involved, is because of the existance of /dev 
> nodes seems to play a part.
> 
> 
> I am running nvidia drivers version 5336 with Martin Schlemmer's patch 
> applied to make them export info into sysfs.
> If I manually "modprobe nvidia", then I can see that the /dev/nvidia0 
> and /dev/nvidiactl nodes are created. So at this stage it seems to be 
> loaded.
> 
> 
> Ignoring the above situation, on a normal bootup, the nvidia module is 
> not loaded at the point where I "startx":
> 
> # ls /dev/nvidia*
> no such file or directory
> 
> # startx
> XFree86 Version 4.3.0
> Release Date: 27 February 2003
> [snip]
> (=) Using config file: "/etc/X11/XF86Config"
> Using vt 7
> (EE) NVIDIA(0): Failed to initialize the NVIDIA kernel module!
> (EE) NVIDIA(0):  *** Aborting ***
> (EE) Screen(s) found, but none have a usable configuration.
> 
> Fatal server error:
> no screens found
> 
> If I mknod the /dev/nvidia* nodes first, then X is able to start as 
> normal. Also, strangely, if I "modprobe nvidia", and then "startx" then 
> X starts as normal.
> 
> I believe that this problem comes around because the /dev nodes are not 
> created quickly enough.
> 
> # modprobe nvidia && ls -l /dev/nv*
> ls: /dev/nv*: No such file or directory
> 
> # rmmod nvidia
> 
> # modprobe nvidia && sleep 2 && ls -l /dev/nv*
> crw-rw-rw-    1 root     video    195,   0 Feb 16 19:47 /dev/nvidia0
> crw-rw-rw-    1 root     video    195, 255 Feb 16 19:47 /dev/nvidiactl
> 
> 
> My theory is that X loads the "nvidia" module, and then immediately 
> tries to initialize the display and whatever else. But as the nvidia* 
> nodes arent in place, it dies.


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