System do not boot after install < MSI GS60 + Nvidia GTX 970m

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Hi I seem to be having a similar issue. like here: https://forum.antergos.com/topic/6917/system-won-t-boot-after-install

I have an MSI GS60 with an nVidia GTX 970m. I have installed the LTS kernel and that kernel does boot, however it does not appear to actually be using the nVidia drivers. Does anyone know how I would check that? Or what I would need to do to get them working?

@PoLoMoTo check:

lspci -k | grep -A 2 -E "(VGA|3D)"

but open new treat for this is the better way you can link to similar…

Thanks, that did show my 970m but it said the kernel module was “nouveau” I assume thats where I should see the nVidia driver listed?

I just ran ‘nvidia-xconfig’ as I saw in another thread and now it will not boot at all. None of the kernels I have seem to boot, including LTS. They all go to a black with either either a blinking cursor in the top left or a solid cursor.

@PoLoMoTo said in System do not boot after install < MSI GS60 + Nvidia GTX 970m:

nvidia-xconfig

This is not a good one for Arch Systems anymore…

also there is no need for xorg.conf file anymore… we have the nvidia-installer

sudo pacman -S nvidia-installer
nvidia-installer -t

if no error is shown up:

sudo nvidia-installer 

Antergos Nvidia Installer v1.12

optional arguments:
  -h, --help       show this help message and exit
  -b, --bumblebee  For Nvidia Optimus cards (Bumblebee + proprietary Nvidia
                   drivers)
  -f, --force      Force driver installation even if a nvidia card is not
                   detected
  -t, --test       Test mode. Nothing in your system will be modified
  -q, --quiet      Supress log messages
  -n, --nouveau    Restores nouveau (open) nvidia driver

@joekamprad I did that because when I installed nvidia-settings to see if that detected my graphics card it said to, I’ll just reinstall Antergos entirely and try nvidia-installer instead I guess.

When I reinstall should I select the option in the installer to use proprietary graphics drivers or should I just install them manually afterwards?

i would do it manuall after installing, but if your system do not start with nouveau, you are stick to do it in non graphic mode.

@joekamprad The system does boot with the open-source drivers so I’ll do that and then try to install the nVidia drivers

Ok so I think it’s working now, using nvidia-installer after installing Antergos without the propretary drivers seems to do the trick. The thing for me is that my graphics card is setup with nVidia Optimus which allows it to switch between the Intel graphics and the 970m on the fly to save battery. The Antergos installer did not seem to recognize this and just installed the nVidia drivers. When I used the nvidia-installer I had to use the ‘-b’ flag to specify an Optimus setup and now it all seems to be working just fine. Without that flag I was able to reproduce the black screen with cursor that I got from the Antergos installer.

So the TLDR; if you have an nVidia Optimus laptop, don’t install the nVidia drivers with the Antergos installer. After you have Antergos installed install ‘nvidia-installer’ with pacman and run ‘sudo nvidia-installer -b’ then reboot.

i like it to push users in the right direction to find a solution on their own! ;)