How to Overclock Nvidia Video Cards in Linux

Need to squeeze some extra juice out of your Nvidia video card? Want that extra FPS in your favourite shooter to secure your rank? The process is extremely simple and all you need to do is enable Coolbits which is popular in Windows. This tutorial can be done by any user who has some simple knowledge of the terminal and this should work with nearly any release of the nvidia’s unix drivers for the past year or so.

To start off be sure to have Nvidia’s drivers installed and working properly. Next go into terminal and make sure you are root (and for Ubuntu users simply follow the commands I do as I am using Ubuntu Gutsy). Open your favourite text editor, for me it is Nano due to its simplicity.

sudo nano /etc/X11/xorg.conf

Look for a section of code named “Device.” It should resemble something similar to this.

Section “Device”
Identifier “Videocard0″
Driver “nvidia”
VendorName “Videocard vendorname”
BoardName “nVidia Corporation Unknown device 0000″
EndSection

Now all you need to do is add this piece of code towards the end of the section.

Option “Coolbits” “1″

Now your xorg.conf should look like this.

Section “Device”
Identifier “Videocard0″
Driver “nvidia”
VendorName “Videocard vendorname”
BoardName “nVidia Corporation Unknown device 0000″
Option “Coolbits” “1″
EndSection

Save the file and exit out of terminal. Now you are all done, all you must do is restart X by restarting your machine or entering the following code in the terminal.

init 3 && init 5

Coolbits will now be located within the Nvidia Display Settings application. Good luck and if you have any questions or comments, please leave them below with your email address included (it will not be displayed, it is just for me to reply to your question).

*Disclaimer: This tutorial is only for demonstrational purposes only. This tutorial is distributed in the hope that it will useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. Use at your own risk.

Ultimate Stunts 0.7.4 Released

UltimateStunts will be a remake of the famous DOS-game “stunts”. This DOS-game, which was released in the early 1990’s, can be downloaded on several abandonware sites, e.g. the XTC site . It is a 3D racing game, with simple CGA/EGA/VGA graphics and no texture or smooth shading, but because of the spectacular stunts (loopings, bridges to jump over, etc.) it was really fun to play. One of the best aspects of this game is that it had a track editor. Because of the tile-based tracks, every gamer was able to make it’s own tracks. [Source]

Ultimate Stunts is an amazingly addictive game and can be enjoyed by people of any age.

Homepage | Downloads | Screenshots

Nvidia Linux Drivers Updated (169.09)

 

Recent fixes in the latest release of Nvidia Display Drivers Include:

• Fixed a bug that caused the X driver to crash if the X.Org GLX extension module was loaded instead of NVIDIAs
• Fixed a problem causing the fan on some GPUs to always run at full speed.
• Improved the X drivers awareness of the current notebook docking status.
• Fixed a bug in the Linux/i2c algorithm driver implementation that prevented core transfer types from succeeding.
• Fixed brightness control on HP Compaq notebooks.

You can find the drivers over at Nvidia’s Unix Drivers Portal Page.

Nimuh: Searching for the Andalusian Treasure Released

Nimuh is a project puzzle game destined to improve the knowledge of Andalusia. According to Wikipedia, Andalusia is an autonomous community of Spain. Andalusia is the most populous and the second largest, in terms of its land area, of the seventeen autonomous communities of the Kingdom of Spain.

“Nimuh” has been released under the Creative Commons license. It’s a puzzle type game and it’s based in the “Theseus and the Minotaur Mazes” game, but we decided to improve it by adding a 3D isometric view. You can go through 40 different Andalusian locations and play all the levels while you learn about the typical food, fiestas and history of every place.

(Image from Linux Game Tomb <happypenguin.org>)

Visit the official homepage. Visit the Linux Game Tomb page.

How to Install Emulators on Ubuntu (SNES Edition)

    Remember the good ol’ days when you would stay up all night trying to get to that next level.. when nothing else mattered but that extra life or one more point to beat that high score? Those were the days… but those days don’t have to leave you know. There is hope, and that hope is found in an SNES emulator by the name of ZSNES. If you do not have Ubuntu, you can still use ZSNES but you will have to build it from source which you should all know because it will come into play many times while using linux/unix.

The installation process of ZSNES is actually quite simple. Almost no work is required and it can all be done graphically through Synaptic if one wishes to do so but here we will simple use the terminal to save time. First off, let us update synaptic.

sudo apt-get update

Now it is time to install ZSNES which is found in the Ubuntu Repositories, if you do not have Ubuntu or would like to build from source, you can get the source code here.

sudo apt-get install zsnes

Now look in your menu and you should see under games, ZSNES. That is all there is to it! Now you have the emulator installed, it is basically just like the console. I have found that I have experienced some glitches with sound though and I would recommend going into ZSNES then Config >> Sound then setting the sampling rate to 8000HZ only if you experience sound lag. Also, you may have to install these files and I have read that you could try this command:

sudo aptitude install libsdl1.2debian-alsa

Do not forget to install your USB-based gamepad to get the most out of your gaming!

Now you can play all of your favorite games or public domain games. Keep in mind the legality of this varies from country to country and this tutorial is a demonstration and for educational use only. This program is distributed in the hope that it will useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License for more details. The ZSNES Team is not connected or affiliated with any mentioned company in any way. Companies and all products pertaining to that company are trademarks of that company. Please contact that company for trademark and copyright information. Along with that note, Linux Gaming Today is not connected or affiliated with any mentioned company in anyway and we hold no responsibility for any damage of any form and/or illegal activities conducted through use of this tutorial. This HOWTO comes with no explicit or implicit warranty whatsoever. Use at your own risk!