I’m returning to Linux after a long time, i decided to finally try an Arch-based distro and i must admit this one caught my eye.
I’ll go straight to the point: my laptop has a NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1050 (not the most recent one, i know) and i can’t seem to be able to make it work.
I installed and used nvidia-instbut, if i try and use nvidia-smi this is what i get:
nvidia-smi
Sat Dec 6 23:20:33 2025
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| NVIDIA-SMI 580.105.08 Driver Version: 580.105.08 CUDA Version: 13.0 |
+-----------------------------------------+------------------------+----------------------+
| GPU Name Persistence-M | Bus-Id Disp.A | Volatile Uncorr. ECC |
| Fan Temp Perf Pwr:Usage/Cap | Memory-Usage | GPU-Util Compute M. |
| | | MIG M. |
|=========================================+========================+======================|
| 0 NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1050 Off | 00000000:01:00.0 Off | N/A |
| N/A 29C P8 N/A / 5001W | 5MiB / 4096MiB | 0% Default |
| | | N/A |
+-----------------------------------------+------------------------+----------------------+
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Processes: |
| GPU GI CI PID Type Process name GPU Memory |
| ID ID Usage |
|=========================================================================================|
| 0 N/A N/A 614 G /usr/lib/Xorg 4MiB |
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
So basically i thought it would be a good idea to sign up to this forum and asking for help, after trying (and failing) to find a similar issue on this forum. Of course, if there’s something and i wasn’t able to find it, feel free to just link the answer and i’ll try, and if there’s some information you might need, just ask!
Second, your system info would be helpful. For your specific Hardware information run inxi -Fxxc0z | eos-sendlog in terminal and post back the supplied link.
Third, run pacman -Q | grep -i nvidia and post the output here in preformatted text (Ctrl E).
The more info, the better chance someone will be able to help you.
When i say that it does not work, i mean that if you look at the output of nvidia-smiit looks like it isn’t being used, it says that “Pwr:Usage/Cap” is “N/A / 5001W”. Maybe i’m reading this wrong and itìs used…?
Edit: You’ll have to check your UEFI Bios settings for the Gpu to see if it has settings for this purpose that set Hybrid or Dedicated or Integrated. Otherwise you’ll have to use something like Envy control or Optimus manager.
where it says (Device-2 section) status: current. That should mean that the graphics card is currently working, but feel free to correct me if i’m wrong.
That being said, nvidia-smi is showing me the same result as before:
nvidia-smi
Sun Dec 7 19:21:05 2025
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| NVIDIA-SMI 580.105.08 Driver Version: 580.105.08 CUDA Version: 13.0 |
+-----------------------------------------+------------------------+----------------------+
| GPU Name Persistence-M | Bus-Id Disp.A | Volatile Uncorr. ECC |
| Fan Temp Perf Pwr:Usage/Cap | Memory-Usage | GPU-Util Compute M. |
| | | MIG M. |
|=========================================+========================+======================|
| 0 NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1050 On | 00000000:01:00.0 Off | N/A |
| N/A 28C P8 N/A / 5001W | 27MiB / 4096MiB | 0% Default |
| | | N/A |
+-----------------------------------------+------------------------+----------------------+
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Processes: |
| GPU GI CI PID Type Process name GPU Memory |
| ID ID Usage |
|=========================================================================================|
| 0 N/A N/A 619 G /usr/lib/Xorg 25MiB |
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
I tried testing the card by playing something on yt at 2k resolution, and the only thing that’s changing in nvidia-smiis the temperature of the gpu. I believe that should prove that it’s working and now it’s just a problem of this utility…?
I’ve never used nvidia-smi and it really doesn’t tell you much. If you look at some of the info on it, it is referring to xorg. Looks like you are using Wayland. I’m pretty sure mine wouldn’t show anything different. I look at other outputs to show whether its’ working.
You are using KDE right? It uses Wayland which is a newer more modern protocol than xorg server. They are both display servers. You can use either if you have the proper packages installed. Wayland is currently being used and that is what you log into the desktop under. Wayland most likely is going to replace xorg being that it is more advanced and being developed more. There are other reasons as well such as security and such.
Edit: There are also display mangers (DM) Kde uses SDDM and that is the grapgical login screen. This is different than display servers.There are different DM for different desktops. I know it’s confusing but just a little bit of info.
Did you switch it back to integrated? Or do you have it set to Hybrid? Using the Nvidia gpu when unnecessary will use more battery life. But if you do switch to Nvidia then the output here will show it rendering on the Nvidia Gpu. You can see that if you run inxi -Ga
Other than that there may be a newer UEFI Bios update for this laptop. Current version and date is listed below.
in particular in Device-2 when it says status:current meant the system was rendering on that one. I still see
envycontrol -q
nvidia
And, it this is working properly, which i really hope it does, it should mean just that. Ngl, i don’t really care about life battery, this laptop’s battery is basically dead, i have to keep it always plugged in, so i wouldn’t worry about that. Do you agree with me? Am i missing something?
That being said, i tried a game on steam that used to run pretty bad with the Intel GPU and i found it running pretty smoothly, almost as smooth as it was when i used to play it on windows, so my guess would be that all is in order.
So my question is on envy control did you set it to Nvidia? Then it should be working. The drivers are installed for nvidia and it is showing that. If you post inxi -Ga what does it show?
