
Installing proprietary graphics drivers on Linux has always been a bit of a pain, and not something to inflict on nervous newcomers. Still, it's the only way to get the very best out of your graphics hardware, and both
NVida and
ATI have active Linux driver support programmes.
Simplifying what till now has been a command-line driven process is what lies behind
Envy, a series of Python scripts specifically designed to automate graphics driver installations for
Ubuntu and
Debian users. Its simple GUI says it all...
Choose your task, click
Apply, and it's away.
Behind the scenes it identifies your hardware, downloads the appropriate driver, sorts out dependencies, sets up xorg.conf (the Xserver's configuration file), and optionally reboots your system or restarts the graphics server, depending on whether you start it in GUI or command-line mode.
I've used Envy on more than a dozen installations now -- involving both NVidia and ATI graphics cards -- and it's always performed faultlessly. It's one of my installation essentials.
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