How To Install bumblebee on Ubuntu 20.04

In this tutorial we learn how to install bumblebee on Ubuntu 20.04. bumblebee is NVIDIA Optimus support for Linux

Introduction

In this tutorial we learn how to install bumblebee on Ubuntu 20.04.

What is bumblebee

bumblebee is:

Bumblebee is an effort to make NVIDIA Optimus enabled laptops work in GNU/Linux systems. These laptops are built in such a way that the NVIDIA graphics card can be used on demand so that battery life is improved and temperature is kept low.

It disables the discrete graphics card if no client is detected, and starts an X server making use of NVIDIA card if requested then let software GL implementations (such as VirtualGL) copy frames to the visible display that runs on the integrated graphics. The ability to use discrete graphics depends on the driver: open source nouveau and proprietary nvidia.

There are three methods to install bumblebee on Ubuntu 20.04. We can use apt-get, apt and aptitude. In the following sections we will describe each method. You can choose one of them.

Install bumblebee Using apt-get

Update apt database with apt-get using the following command.

sudo apt-get update

After updating apt database, We can install bumblebee using apt-get by running the following command:

sudo apt-get -y install bumblebee

Install bumblebee Using apt

Update apt database with apt using the following command.

sudo apt update

After updating apt database, We can install bumblebee using apt by running the following command:

sudo apt -y install bumblebee

Install bumblebee Using aptitude

If you want to follow this method, you might need to install aptitude first since aptitude is usually not installed by default on Ubuntu. Update apt database with aptitude using the following command.

sudo aptitude update

After updating apt database, We can install bumblebee using aptitude by running the following command:

sudo aptitude -y install bumblebee

How To Uninstall bumblebee on Ubuntu 20.04

To uninstall only the bumblebee package we can use the following command:

sudo apt-get remove bumblebee

Uninstall bumblebee And Its Dependencies

To uninstall bumblebee and its dependencies that are no longer needed by Ubuntu 20.04, we can use the command below:

sudo apt-get -y autoremove bumblebee

Remove bumblebee Configurations and Data

To remove bumblebee configuration and data from Ubuntu 20.04 we can use the following command:

sudo apt-get -y purge bumblebee

Remove bumblebee configuration, data, and all of its dependencies

We can use the following command to remove bumblebee configurations, data and all of its dependencies, we can use the following command:

sudo apt-get -y autoremove --purge bumblebee

References

Summary

In this tutorial we learn how to install bumblebee package on Ubuntu 20.04 using different package management tools: apt, apt-get and aptitude.