How To Install nouveau-firmware on Ubuntu 20.04

In this tutorial we learn how to install nouveau-firmware on Ubuntu 20.04. nouveau-firmware is Firmware for nVidia graphics cards

Introduction

In this tutorial we learn how to install nouveau-firmware on Ubuntu 20.04.

What is nouveau-firmware

nouveau-firmware is:

Contains the firmware-like context programs for the open-source nouveau nVidia drivers. These are required for acceleration (both 2D and 3D) on nVidia cards of the nv40 generation and above (GeForce6 and above).

Although the nouveau drivers are now able to generate this firmware for nv40 generation cards this package still contains the nvidia context programs for debugging purposes.

This package is temporary; the nouveau drivers will soon be able to generate this data on the fly.

There are three methods to install nouveau-firmware 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 nouveau-firmware Using apt-get

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

sudo apt-get update

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

sudo apt-get -y install nouveau-firmware

Install nouveau-firmware Using apt

Update apt database with apt using the following command.

sudo apt update

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

sudo apt -y install nouveau-firmware

Install nouveau-firmware 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 nouveau-firmware using aptitude by running the following command:

sudo aptitude -y install nouveau-firmware

How To Uninstall nouveau-firmware on Ubuntu 20.04

To uninstall only the nouveau-firmware package we can use the following command:

sudo apt-get remove nouveau-firmware

Uninstall nouveau-firmware And Its Dependencies

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

sudo apt-get -y autoremove nouveau-firmware

Remove nouveau-firmware Configurations and Data

To remove nouveau-firmware configuration and data from Ubuntu 20.04 we can use the following command:

sudo apt-get -y purge nouveau-firmware

Remove nouveau-firmware configuration, data, and all of its dependencies

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

sudo apt-get -y autoremove --purge nouveau-firmware

References

Summary

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