nVidia problems with 2nd. monitor

[Teunis]

After I managed to get the proprietary nVidia drivers installed using Jockey I tried to set up my second monitor. when I hit Apply the screen became a mess and froze.

The card works OK (with a few minor plasma glitches) on the build in screen, when I switch to exclusively the external screen all locks up.
I've tried with two HP screens, my regular HP ZR24w and an older HP w20, both with the same problems.

This is a Toshiba Tecra S5 laptop with a Quadro NVS 130M video card, the driver reports it's version 290.10.
The card works fine in 10.10 with driver version 285.05.

So I wonder if there's a(n elegant) way to 'downgrade' to the previous driver?

[james147]

After I managed to get the proprietary nVidia drivers installed using Jockey I tried to set up my second monitor. when I hit Apply the screen became a mess and froze.

What are you using to set up the two screens? Best way is to use the nvidia-xsettings util and configure it to use twinview.

So I wonder if there's a(n elegant) way to 'downgrade' to the previous driver?

*ubuntu doesn't really support downgrading (it is a generally messy process at the best of times)so there isn't really an elegant way to do it... Only way I know of is to uninstall the new one are reinstall the old one. There might be a better way, but what ever method you choose make sure you backup first.

If you mean switching form the closed to the open driver, then thats much easier. Just open jockey and deactivate the nvidia driver (the open one should then be used again as it was never uninstalled)

[Teunis]

Yes I usually set such up through the nVidia settings and the 2nd. monitor as twin view.

The problem with installing an older version is that it doesn't show up in Jockey.

[james147]

The problem with installing an older version is that it doesn't show up in Jockey.

You could try

apt-get install pkg=version

but that will only work if the mirrors still have that version else you are going to have to find a deb online.

[blackpaw]

For older versions I usually find it easier to manually install nvidia using their tarballs. A must to install the repo version first though

[Teunis]

The problem switching on the second screen remains, every other time I do get the system up but it takes 90 seconds to become responsive again.
Starting up Firefox locks the system for 5-10 seconds.
Once up everything feels better/quicker than 11.10.

This is the kdm.log, without knowledge of the subject I could believe the line about a wrong ABI version is significant.

X.Org X Server 1.11.3
Release Date: 2011-12-16
X Protocol Version 11, Revision 0
Build Operating System: Linux 2.6.24-30-server x86_64 Ubuntu
Current Operating System: Linux Tecra-12-04 3.2.0-14-generic #23-Ubuntu SMP Fri Feb 3 23:17:59 UTC 2012 x86_64
Kernel command line: BOOT_IMAGE=/boot/vmlinuz-3.2.0-14-generic root=UUID=bf400327-ec18-4d70-a860-941f275200ff ro quiet splash vt.handoff=7
Build Date: 03 February 2012  05:44:31AM
xorg-server 2:1.11.3-0ubuntu10 (For technical support please see http://www.ubuntu.com/support) 
Current version of pixman: 0.24.2
    Before reporting problems, check http://wiki.x.org
    to make sure that you have the latest version.
Markers: (--) probed, (**) from config file, (==) default setting,
    (++) from command line, (!!) notice, (II) informational,
    (WW) warning, (EE) error, (NI) not implemented, (??) unknown.
(==) Log file: "/var/log/Xorg.0.log", Time: Wed Feb  8 14:26:25 2012
(==) Using config file: "/etc/X11/xorg.conf"
(==) Using system config directory "/usr/share/X11/xorg.conf.d"
(WW) NVIDIA: This server has an unsupported input driver ABI version (have 16.0, need < 14.0).  The driver will continue to load, but may behave strangely.
(EE) Failed to load module "nv" (module does not exist, 0)
klauncher(1535) kdemain: No DBUS session-bus found. Check if you have started the DBUS server. 
kdeinit4: Communication error with launcher. Exiting!
kdmgreet(1274)/kdecore (K*TimeZone*): KSystemTimeZones: ktimezoned initialize() D-Bus call failed:  "Not connected to D-Bus server"

[Teunis]

Now some hours later I get this in the kdm.log:

kdmgreet(1274)/kdecore (K*TimeZone*): No time zone information obtained from ktimezoned 
QInotifyFileSystemWatcherEngine::addPaths: inotify_add_watch failed: Bestand of map bestaat niet
QFileSystemWatcher: failed to add paths: /tmp/0405653624/.config/ibus/bus
(EE) NVIDIA(0): Error recovery failed.
(EE) NVIDIA(0):  *** Aborting ***
(EE) NVIDIA(0): Error recovery failed.
(EE) NVIDIA(0):  *** Aborting ***
(EE) NVIDIA(0): Error recovery failed.
(EE) NVIDIA(0):  *** Aborting ***
[mi] EQ overflowing.  Additional events will be discarded until existing events are processed.

Backtrace:
0: /usr/bin/X (xorg_backtrace+0x26) [0x7fcdbdcfdbf6]
1: /usr/bin/X (mieqEnqueue+0x263) [0x7fcdbdcde303]
2: /usr/bin/X (0x7fcdbdb76000+0x62084) [0x7fcdbdbd8084]
3: /usr/lib/xorg/modules/input/evdev_drv.so (0x7fcdb56a5000+0x5d48) [0x7fcdb56aad48]
4: /usr/bin/X (0x7fcdbdb76000+0x8a787) [0x7fcdbdc00787]
5: /usr/bin/X (0x7fcdbdb76000+0xb053e) [0x7fcdbdc2653e]
6: /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libpthread.so.0 (0x7fcdbce9e000+0xfc10) [0x7fcdbceadc10]
7: /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/xorg/extra-modules/nvidia_drv.so (0x7fcdb6bc1000+0xf1a0f) [0x7fcdb6cb2a0f]
8: /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libpixman-1.so.0 (0x7fcdbcc17000+0xe213) [0x7fcdbcc25213]
9: /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libpixman-1.so.0 (0x7fcdbcc17000+0x14726) [0x7fcdbcc2b726]
10: /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libpixman-1.so.0 (0x7fcdbcc17000+0x13986) [0x7fcdbcc2a986]
11: /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libpixman-1.so.0 (0x7fcdbcc17000+0x41373) [0x7fcdbcc58373]
12: /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libpixman-1.so.0 (pixman_image_composite32+0x498) [0x7fcdbcc20478]
13: /usr/lib/xorg/modules/libwfb.so (wfbComposite+0x1d8) [0x7fcdb5f3f228]
14: /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/xorg/extra-modules/nvidia_drv.so (0x7fcdb6bc1000+0x4c1632) [0x7fcdb7082632]
15: /usr/bin/X (0x7fcdbdb76000+0x115ab4) [0x7fcdbdc8bab4]
16: /usr/bin/X (0x7fcdbdb76000+0xd945d) [0x7fcdbdc4f45d]
17: /usr/bin/X (0x7fcdbdb76000+0xda375) [0x7fcdbdc50375]
18: /usr/bin/X (0x7fcdbdb76000+0xd8ba0) [0x7fcdbdc4eba0]
19: /usr/bin/X (0x7fcdbdb76000+0x76b7e) [0x7fcdbdbecb7e]
20: /usr/bin/X (MapWindow+0x179) [0x7fcdbdbef879]
21: /usr/bin/X (0x7fcdbdb76000+0x48d80) [0x7fcdbdbbed80]
22: /usr/bin/X (0x7fcdbdb76000+0x4e4a1) [0x7fcdbdbc44a1]
23: /usr/bin/X (0x7fcdbdb76000+0x3d3ca) [0x7fcdbdbb33ca]
24: /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libc.so.6 (__libc_start_main+0xed) [0x7fcdbbdc430d]
25: /usr/bin/X (0x7fcdbdb76000+0x3d6bd) [0x7fcdbdbb36bd]
[mi] These backtraces from mieqEnqueue may point to a culprit higher up the stack.
[mi] mieq is *NOT* the cause.  It is a victim.
[mi] Increasing EQ size to 512 to prevent dropped events.
[mi] EQ processing has resumed after 23 dropped events.
[mi] This may be caused my a misbehaving driver monopolizing the server's resources.

The system is still running fine.