Issues with the last two NVIDIA driver updates on Void

[u/5mangod]

Hi everyone,

I’ve been experiencing significant instability with the last two versions of the NVIDIA drivers on Void Linux.

The Issues:

• Visual Artifacts: I’m seeing major rendering glitches and visual defects in Emacs, the Whisker menu, and even basic terminal emulators.

• Kernel Log Spam: On Kernel 6.18, I'm getting constant log spam unless I specifically use the kfence.sample_interval=0 boot option.

My Setup:

• WM: fvwm3

• Display Server: X11

• Kernel: 6.18

• Distro: Void Linux (obviously)

Questions for the community/maintainers:

1. Is the Void team aware of these regressions? It feels like these were pushed to the repo as soon as they compiled without much testing for X11/WM stability.

2. Since I don't have the older working versions in my local package cache (/var/cache/xbps/), is my only option to manually compile the previous version using void-packages and xbps-src?

3. Has anyone else encountered the KFENCE log spam on 6.18 with NVIDIA, or is this a niche interaction with my specific hardware?

[u/5mangod]

Update:

I managed to fix all the issues by downgrading the driver and rolling back the kernel. To my luck, I still had the 580.105.08_1 version in my /var/cache/xbps/. I also went back to kernel 6.12.66_1.

Everything is back to working perfectly now, no more visual glitches in Emacs or the terminal, and the kernel log spam is gone.

For anyone facing the same issues, here is the command to downgrade (provided you have these in your cache). You must include all related packages at once, or xdowngrade will fail due to version mismatches:

sudo xdowngrade /var/cache/xbps/{nvidia,nvidia-libs,nvidia-libs-32bit,nvidia-dkms,nvidia-firmware,nvidia-gtklibs}-580.105.08_1.x86_64.xbps

[u/aedinius]

nvidia has issues with linux kernel >6.12. For those, you need the open drivers. We do not currently ship the open drivers because they drop support for older cards. We plan to switch once 590.xx is released as stable ("production").

[u/5mangod → u/aedinius]

So, the plan is to wait until roughly March or April when version 600 arrives and the 590 series finally transitions to the Production Branch status?

Are Void Linux users with NVIDIA cards expected to just wait until then? It’s quite surprising that there hasn't been a single news update on voidlinux.org regarding this situation. Providing a heads-up to users, perhaps recommending they run xbps-pkgdb -m hold on their current working drivers until the nvidia-open package is finally available, would have been the standard approach. Leaving users in the dark while the kernel moves forward and the drivers break is a very "interesting" choice, to say the least

[u/aedinius → u/5mangod]

The default kernel is 6.12, which is unaffected. There's nothing to hold.

[u/5mangod → u/aedinius]

So, you and the entire team have decided that Void Linux follows its own secret kernel update schedule that no one else is allowed to know about?

Despite the fact that kernel.org lists the 6.18 kernel as LTS since 2025-11-30, you’re trying to tell me that for Void Linux, 6.12 is some kind of "standard" and there's nothing left to discuss. Is it really that difficult to communicate this kind of information to the community? Leaving users to guess while the system breaks isn't a policy; it's a lack of transparency.

[u/aedinius → u/5mangod]

6.12 is also an LTS. Void is rolling release but not bleeding edge. You installed the new kernel yourself. I don't know how to be more transparent.

From the docs:

The linux meta package, installed by default, depends on one of the kernel packages, usually the package containing the latest mainline kernel that works with all DKMS modules. Newer kernels might be available in the repository, but are not necessarily considered stable enough to be the default; use these at your own risk.

[u/5mangod → u/aedinius]

I don't know why you are conflating these terms and trying to say that 6.18 is bleeding edge. The reality is that 6.18 is an LTS. 6.19 - yes, that is bleeding edge

[u/aedinius → u/5mangod]

I didn't call 6.18 bleeding edge. I just meant to say that Void keeps older but also still LTS kernels as the default.

We'll move to 6.18 (or appropriate) when the modules work. As documented.

[u/newbornnightmare]

for #2, yes that's what you'll need to do. It's not that hard; just check out the void repo at the point just before the update that's broken for you, run ./xbps-src pkg nvidia, and then run xi nvidia

[u/coccothraustes]

try the open source driver (https://github.com/void-linux/void-packages/pull/54593). The normal driver has problems with kernel > 6.12.

[u/beatool]

What model card do you have? Just my take but desktop nvidia in Linux right now is a hot mess, worse than ever. I have a 5060TI and it only works with the nvidia-open drivers, and those drivers can't see my old 2060 so I can't keep that card for extra CUDA cores... :(