I have NVIDIA on Ubuntu and my standard practice is to use the proprietary driver. This means everytime a new kernel comes out I have to recompile the driver against the new kernel or the whole X11 system will not fire up. So, you have 3 choices, use the builtin Ubuntu way they have above, use the monitor plug in on the motherboard or: Blacklist the Ubuntu driver and do a highwire act in the grub boot sequence to use the NVIDIA binary. NVIDIA proprietary actually is screams 8x faster on my homebuild so definitely worth the hassle. Here's the deal.
Download the latest NVIDIA driver from the official website. Make note where you store the .run program, restart the computer. Immediatly after BIOS screen hit [ESC] to enter the boot selection menu. Select the latest kernel in [RECOVERY] mode, since the NVIDIA driver cannot be installed while X Server is running. Do the [hard drive test], you have to do that before mounting the filesystem. Log in to the [ROOT SHELL] and mount the hard-drive with
Now you're in business. Change to the Downloads directory <code>cd /home/username/Downloads</code> or wherever you put the file NVIDIA-XXX.XX.x86_64.run. Add an executable bit
Code:
chmod +x NVIDIA*.run
Now I recompile the binary against the new kernel.
Code:
./NVIDIA*.run --add-this-kernel
Recompiling creates a new executable called NVIDIA-XXX.XX.x86_64-custom.run. Run this custom binary without any arguments and say yes to everything.
Code:
./NVIDIA-*-custom.run
. Exit the shell and reboot.
If you go with this method you have to do this whole rigamarole Every time you want to upgrade your Linux kernel. But a high poly game I have went from 60fps to over 1200fps just from using the proprietary driver, and blacklisting the Ubuntu driver. I'm using the EVGA[/code] GTX 960.