Installing and testing CUDA in Ubuntu 14.04

Question

I am uncertain about how to install CUDA in my system. looking around there are many tutorials about cuda on 12.04 LTS and a few on 13.04 and 13.10, but they all talk about acquiring a deb package from the NVidia CUDA developer zone.

Well NVidia does not offer a Debian package for 14.04 as of yet.

However, there is a promising package in apt repository: nvidia-cuda-toolkit.

The problem is that I didn't find any example with it. At least not the examples that are referred to in cuda6 online documentation section 4.11.

I should mention that the toolkit installed is v5.5, not v6 but I haven't found documentation for cuda v5.5 on the NVidia website.

So I can verify that nvcc is there, but nothing further than that. How can I get some examples to run to verify the CUDA is installed properly?

Solution 1

I got Cuda6 working on Lubuntu 14.04. This already had build-essentials installed, so if you're using a fresh install, you should probably install it:

apt-get install build-essential

Download the cuda6 run package (6.0.37 at the current time of writing) to ~/Downloads:

Open up a terminal and extract the separate installers via:

mkdir ~/Downloads/nvidia_installers;
cd ~/Downloads
./cuda_6.0.37_linux_64.run -extract=~/Downloads/nvidia_installers;

(I tried running the .run file directly, but it kept screwing up my Xorg install and would never let X run. I believe it is a config issue between driver versions: those installed by apt-get nvidia-331-updates and the cuda*.run driver.)

Completely uninstall anything in the Ubuntu repositories with nvidia-*. I used synaptic and did a purge, AKA completely uninstall programs and configuration.

sudo apt-get --purge remove "nvidia-*"

Have these instructions handy as we need to kill X install the driver. Press CTL + ALT + F1 to drop to the physical terminal and log in.

cd ~/Downloads/nvidia_installers;
sudo service lightdm stop
sudo killall Xorg
sudo ./NVIDIA-Linux-x86_64-331.62.run 

Accept the EULA and install the driver. I would recommend letting it update Xorg config files.

After that installer finishes, turn on the nvidia module and install CUDA.

sudo modprobe nvidia
sudo ./cuda-linux64-rel-6.0.37-18176142.run
sudo ./cuda-samples-linux-6.0.37-18176142.run

test if the drivers are working by going to your sample directory

cd /usr/local/cuda/samples
sudo chown -R <username>:<usergroup> .
cd 1_Utilities/deviceQuery
make .
./deviceQuery    

Worked for me at this point. Now restart X

sudo service lightdm start

You should be able to do

lsmod | grep nv

and see a line with nvidia listed. Don't forget to log back out of your physical terminal if it all worked.

APPENDIX

In my case it was necessary to add the folder that contains the executable to your $PATH.

One way of doing it is to edit the ~/.bashrc file in your Home folder. Add a line to your .bashrc (modify the location if you changed the default CUDA installation folder)

export PATH=/usr/local/cuda-6.0/bin:$PATH

Save the file and then source your .bashrc by typing

source .bashrc

when in your home folder.

Solution 2

For CUDA-6.5 I followed this simple tutorial:

Download the .deb here then

sudo dpkg -i cuda-repo-ubuntu1404_6.5-14_amd64.deb
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install cuda
echo 'export PATH=/usr/local/cuda-6.5/bin:$PATH   #CUDA' >> ~/.bashrc

That's everything I needed to start coding on a fresh 14.04.1 install with my GTX 750ti. It installs the nvidia-340 driver. deviceQuery and all of the other samples ran properly after I compiled them.

Solution 3

I have installed the nvidia-cuda-toolkit package this morning on a fresh 14.04. I also installed the nvidia driver (version 331.38 marked as tested) from the additional driver interface.

sudo apt-get install nvidia-cuda-toolkit

Up to now everything seems to work well (nvcc is here, display is correct). You need to restart to use the new driver.

As you mentioned this is CUDA 5.5 but in my case it's not a problem.

Solution 4

Quick and easy solution that worked for me (cuda 5.5, Lubuntu 14.04 64-bit):

Make sure you're using nvidia's propietary driver (331.38 for me) from Start menu-> Preferences->Software & Updates.

Download the .deb package for your Ubuntu release from Nvidia's site.

Add repo:

sudo dpkg -i cuda-repo-ubuntu1304_6.0-37_amd64.deb
sudo apt-get update

Get dependencies:

sudo apt-get install freeglut3-dev build-essential libx11-dev libxmu-dev libxi-dev libgl1-mesa-glx libglu1-mesa libglu1-mesa-dev

Get the toolkit:

sudo apt-get install nvidia-cuda-toolkit

(Optional) Get nsight IDE:

sudo apt-get install nvidia-nsight

And you're ready to go!

Solution 5

I got CUDA 6.0 up and working on 14.04 using the following steps.

Install the nvidia-331, nvidia-331-dev and nvidia-331-uvm packages from xorg-edgers using instructions for adding the ppa from here.

Install CUDA 6.0 using the "-extract" method above, except ignore the steps for installing the driver and instead rely on the packages. Only install the compiler and samples.

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Comments

[TinyEpic]

@Chris.Wilson I was following your instruction and everything was fine; but at the ./deviceQuery stage my machine said no CUDA-capable device is detected. My machine has Nvidia GTX780. Do you have any idea about this problem?

[Nickolai Leschov]

My Ubuntu 14.04 complains: "E: Unable to locate package nvidia-cuda-toolkit". Maybe because I have a 64-bit server distribution? Do you know how I can install CUDA on Ubuntu 14.04 64-bit server?

[stealthcopter]

Probably need to add the nvidia repo to your sources

[200_success]

@NickolaiLeschov nvidia-cuda-toolkit is part of multiverse, which you may need to enable.

[nass]

cuda-5.5 samples are in /usr/share/doc/?

[Coiby]

It depends. Please check /usr/local/cuda/samples/. It it doesn't exist, you can download .run from developer.nvidia.com/cuda-downloads and only install samples. It'll be installed to ~/NVIDIA_CUDA-5.5_Samples/ by default.

[Chris.Wilson]

@tohnperfect: you might need to modprobe nvidia after the driver install so that the ./deviceQuery actually hits the nvidia driver. Did it happen to work after a reboot? If so, the nvidia driver probably wasn't actually loaded.

[Nickolai Leschov]

Notes: 1) On my system the package is called build-essential, not build-essentials 2) I don't have X to stop, as I run a server variant without X 3) sudo modprobe nvidia goes FATAL at this point, looks like the driver wasn't installed? My version of the recipe is here, but it doesn't work.

[Nickolai Leschov]

When I install driver with sudo ./NVIDIA-Linux-x86_64-331.62.run, I get an this error. In /var/log/nvidia-installer.log I see the following lines. When I try make oldconfig && make prepare I get this. At this point I gave up.

[hookenz]

The correct build essential package name is "build-essential" (no s).

[Bart]

It is not necessary to extract the .run file. Instead, just supply the appropriate command line options. E.g., sudo ./cuda_6.0.37_linux_64.run -driver -silent to install the driver, sudo ./cuda_6.0.37_linux_64.run -toolkit -samples -silent -override to install the toolkit and samples (use -help for more options). Also, better not chmod the samples directly: the toolkit contains a script cuda-install-samples-6.0.sh in its bin directory to copy them to a local location.

[Arjun]

I'm getting a Fatal error: can't create deviceQuery.o: Permission Denied . What am I to do? Sorry I'm new to linux. I did chmod -R root * before. @Chris.Wilson Besides, I do not know if it is due to the driver, but I can log in but nothing happens after that. The screen remains frozen.

[Steven C. Howell]

This worked well for me (got CUDA 7.0). It took a long time to download the files (during the apt-get install) but it now works.

[user1282043]

Does this still work if I want to install CUDA purely for parallel processing purposes, and I don't want my graphics card to be used for rendering?

[mkuse]

I get a pre-install script error and finally it fails to install.

[Scott Stensland]

CUDA 7.5 is at r-tutor.com/gpu-computing/cuda-installation/cuda7.5-ubuntu