Greetings lovely community,
For all of you Nvidia users here I’ve got some (hopefully!) good news again! Nvidia drivers are going from 510.68.02-1 → 515.43.04-1 and the update is now live. Normally for minor version bumps it’s not worth mentioning about the update, but since this is a major new version, this is just a brief reminder to please make sure you save all your work and make your backups/snapshots beforehand. I just updated the drivers myself, I’ll need to reboot and see if the linux/lts/zen kernels boot up fine, so I’ll edit the post afterwards if successful or if I encounter any issues.
Edit1: Nvidia has released a changelog for these drivers which can be viewed here:
IMPORTANT: According to the changelog and announcement, this is a BETA driver; it is a bit unusual, but it is not unheard of for Arch to sometimes push out drivers like this. If your hesitant for any reason(s), feel free to hold off on this update. I can’t speculate why this Beta driver is being used, if anyone has any insights please feel free to share.
Their Nvidia forum announcement for 515.43.04 [beta] version is here:
And here’s some of the specific packages that will be updated:
22 core/linux 5.17.6.arch1-1 -> 5.17.7.arch1-1
21 core/linux-headers 5.17.6.arch1-1 -> 5.17.7.arch1-1
20 core/linux-lts 5.15.38-1 -> 5.15.39-1
19 core/linux-lts-headers 5.15.38-1 -> 5.15.39-1
18 extra/gtk-update-icon-cache 1:4.6.3-1 -> 1:4.6.4-1
17 extra/gtk3 1:3.24.33-3 -> 1:3.24.33+r28+g01edbfb976-1
16 extra/gtk4 1:4.6.3-1 -> 1:4.6.4-1
15 extra/libxnvctrl 510.68.02-1 -> 515.43.04-1
14 extra/linux-zen 5.17.6.zen1-1 -> 5.17.7.zen1-1
13 extra/linux-zen-headers 5.17.6.zen1-1 -> 5.17.7.zen1-1
12 extra/nvidia-dkms 510.68.02-1 -> 515.43.04-1
11 extra/nvidia-settings 510.68.02-1 -> 515.43.04-1
10 extra/nvidia-utils 510.68.02-1 -> 515.43.04-1
9 extra/python-setuptools 1:60.0.3-1 -> 1:60.0.4-1
Note: This is for the nvidia-dkms package, but the regular nvidia package was updated to v515 recently as well; the dkms package usually is behind just a little bit. Just something else to note, this is NOT the new Nvidia R515 driver update that was recently made available by Nvidia to open source it’s modules, that is part of a separate package called nvidia-open in the Extra repos, which anyone is more than free to test, but just know it will be a multi-year process before it becomes in feature parity with Nvidia proprietary drivers.
Feel free to help test the nvidia-open drivers:
https://www.reddit.com/r/archlinux/comments/unpt7t/help_test_nvidiaopen/
To the Mods: I just put this under General, in case any users experience any issues this could be a thread for it, otherwise feel free to move this topic to a more appropriate category if need be, thank you.
The last time there was an major Nvidia driver update, a hotfix deployed shortly after, but I’m always willing to test at my own expense of course. If you’re curious you may re-read about the last Nvidia driver discussion here:
Edit2: Tested on linux/lts/zen kernels, no issues to report. Update looks to be successful.
Edit3: One of the Arch devs responded on the reasoning for releasing the Nvidia 515 Beta drivers:
The reason is because we’ve been testing it for some time with the help of our users and it seemed stable. Additionally, the new open source kernel modules don’t work without the beta user land utils and neither does new cuda.
So while you’re correct in saying that we generally shouldn’t (and in fact don’t) publish software that is officially not declared stable, sometimes we do to ensure a smoother experience for everybody. Source Link Here
