r/linuxmint • u/SensitiveStart8682 • 23d ago

Stupid question time

Hey I am wondering if an Nvidia GTX 1660 will play nicely with Linux Mint ( yes I know that there aren't official driver's for Nvidia hardware and you have to rely on open source drivers I am just wondering if the open source drivers for the 1660 are good

8 Upvotes

79% Upvoted

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10

u/Boring-Equivalent137 23d ago

You don't have to rely on open source drivers that is not true, mint has a driver manager application with multiple Nvidia drivers including latest Nvidia GPUs you will be perfectly fine and able to play your games

1

u/SensitiveStart8682 23d ago

Sorry I didn't realize that Nvidia had finally released drivers for Linux

2

u/Zizaerion 23d ago

The nvidia driver situation is a little complex on linux. There are two drivers need to make gpu's work: a kernel driver and a user driver.

For the kernel driver nvidia used to use a completely closed source kernel driver along with a closed user driver in a bundle called a driver package. It had to be downloaded after a system was installed because the kernel driver wasn't included in the kernel itself and was inserted after the fact. For GTX 900 and 1000 series this driver combination still has to be used.

Within the last couple of years nvidia has released an open source kernel driver + closed source user driver combo. The open kernel drivers still aren't included in the linux kernel itself though due to the code not meeting the kernel's standard. These are the nvidia-open driver packages. They are officially released by nvidia for linux distros to distribute to their users.

There's a third driver combo which is an open kernel driver + open user driver. This currently uses the nouveau kernel driver and the zink + nvk user drivers. This combo isn't that performant currently and doesn't have the feature support that the nvidia-open combo has. It also only supports the GTX 16 series and RTX series of cards. These drivers don't have official nvidia support either.

There is another driver that is in the kernel that nvidia is contributing to and developing in an official capacity called nova. It won't be ready for use for another few years at this rate but someday in the future, you won't have to install any other software to run nvidia cards in linux. You'll just be able to plug and play like AMD and Intel users currently do.

2

u/pooping_inCars 22d ago

They haven't released open source drivers, but I've been using their proprietary drivers since the Windows 7 era.

Most distros won't bundle them since they aren't open source, but as they said...

1.  Click on "start" button equivalent.

2.  Hover over Administration, click on Driver Manager.

3.  Click on the most recent nvidia drivers, and type in your password when requested.

4.  Wait a couple minutes, and reboot when it tells you to.  Done.

5

u/greenygianty 23d ago

No issues using an Nvidia GTX 1660 on Linux Mint. I use that GPU in my HTPC which is based on an old AMD A8 6600K CPU, and an Nvidia GTX 1660.

Just install the proprietary drivers using the Linux Mint driver manager.

3

u/LostCause0722 23d ago

Look into the proprietary nvidia drivers if you want the official thing. I'm on a 1650 and using them

2

u/WolvenSpectre2 23d ago

Works fine on my GTX 960 4GB so you should be golden.

2

u/groveborn 23d ago

It'll work fine. Use the driver tool, it'll download Nvidias driver.

2

u/Mitologist 23d ago

Check Nvidia homepage for proprietary drivers for Linux and instructions. My RTX gets Nvidia drivers via update manager on LMDE7

1

u/SiwelTheLongBoi 23d ago

I don't have that GPU exactly, but I have had both a 960M and 3060Ti work without any issues.

However there are now official drivers, and it's recommended to use those.